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Japanese Textbook Review: Genki I

Thu, Feb 28, 2008

Language, Textbook Reviews

genki textbookOver the next month, I will be reviewing some of the mainstream Japanese text books that are currently being used by Japanese language learners; from there I will move on to reviewing programs that use technology to teach Japanese (such as Japanesepod and Rosetta). Why am I doing this, you ask? Well, it’s pretty big chunk of my senior thesis (which is on Japanese pedagogy). I’ll fill you in on the details later, but for now, let’s get started with this review.

I spent a couple of hours going through Genki I. I would summarize the book for you, but I think they do a much better job: “Aim and Purpose: Genki, An Integrated Course in Elementary Japanese is a textbook for beginners in the study of the Japanese language. Students can complete the elementary-level study of Japanese in the 23 lessons of this text, which is divided into two volumes. The book is designed maily for use in university and college courses, but it is also effective for high school students and adults who are beginning to learn Japanese either at school or on their own.”

Overall, I was very impressed with this textbook. I don’t remember what text I used when I first started learning Japanese, but it certainly wasn’t as swanky as this one (swanky is a good thing). I can see why so many Japanese classrooms use this as their only textbook. It has good flow, it does well building lessons on top of each other, and it always gives you just enough information to get you thinking a little bit (good for weeding out the people who only think they want to learn Japanese, but are actually just lazy).

Still, there were a few pitfalls. To find out what they are, and to find out if this Japanese textbook is right for you, click on, my friend, click on.

Good “Building up” Process:

Genki 1 does a great job taking you through things at a reasonable pace. It starts you out with really simple concepts / words and builds you up to the more complicated ones. As long as you go through the textbook correctly, I don’t see anyone having any problem with the more difficult things that come later in the book. One thing that is kind of irking is the lack of “review sections,” though there is nothing stopping you from going back and reviewing sections on your own. Still, since chapters usually build on each other, you’ll find stuff from previous chapters as you progress forward. Going back to make sure you remember everything is still highly recommended.

Vocabulary Lists:

At the ends of chapters, there are “vocabulary lists” that list off all the new words you’ve “learned” throughout the chapter. This is useful to have and study. It certainly would have saved me a lot of time, since I’m the type of person who likes listing things out and covering one side and reciting the other to help me memorize everything.

Genki Workbook / CDs:

If you are clever enough to come up with your own exercises and drills, I don’t think the workbook is really necessary. All it does is give you more stuff to practice, which anyone can do on their own. The CDs, however, are a must (I think). One of the most important things when learning Japanese is your pronunciation, and if you don’t have someone talking to you and correcting you, you have to find something else. The Genki audio CDs are the answer. Although the version of the book that comes with the CDs costs a little bit more, I definitely think they are the answer to a lot of problems I see with traditional self-teachers.

The Self Teacher / Self Learner:

Although Genki claims that this book was made for both self teachers and classroom learners, I think it’s pretty apparent that their primary concern was the latter of the two. I’m not saying that this is a bad book for self learners, though. I’m just saying that a classroom user will get a much richer experience out of this book if used with a teacher. That is true with all text books, I think, so I wouldn’t worry about it too much. If you get this book and you are a self-teacher, I would suggest you do a few extra things:

Rushing through the book without a teacher will only be a waste of time. Definitely make sure you understand everything in a chapter before moving on. I know it’s easy to become impatient with this kind of thing, but you have to go through it slowly in order to give yourself a good foundation.

The Content:

I would say that the content of the book itself is fairly boring, but what text book isn’t (That Dirty Japanese language book doesn’t count). You will be barraged with questions like “what time is it?” or “what is your phone number.” Unfortunately this isn’t something you can really escape in any beginning text book. I don’t know why, but these are all things you have to learn before getting to the fun stuff. You’ll just have to be patient and march through it all.

One more strange thing about the content that interested me was their love of putting you in “host family” situations. A lot of the example situations take place between you and your host family. Granted, a lot of people are working towards this, but this isn’t quite as useful for someone learning Japanese for business (not to say that the grammar and vocabulary might not be useful; it’s just that it will feel less applicable). Still, business or not, I think this is a good book for anyone, as it does a good job giving people a good Japanese language foundation.

Conclusion: Should I buy it?

The short answer is “yes,” and the long answer is “no.” If you are going to buy this book, you should be sure that you’ll continue with your Japanese. It’s not super cheap (though it is better than most text books), and it’s not super engaging, so patience is really key. If you are a self-teacher and you are motivated, then this book will probably be great for you. If you are in a classroom, then you probably don’t get to choose your book anyways (though this might be a good book for supplemental materials). If I had to start all over, then I think this would be my book of choice.

Overall Score: 9/10*

*This score was revised from a 10/10 down to what it is now. My previous rating was based on a curve (since I’ve looked at a lot of other texts) and that made things confusing. Here is the new rating, as well as why I rated it this way:

Although Genki isn’t perfect, it is almost there. Compared to other text books, Genki is phenomenal. If you have a good teacher, Genki goes even farther up and beyond the call of duty. It can be good even if you are self teaching yourself, too, but you have to be a motivated person. What it is missing, in my mind, is entertainment value. “Ha!” you say. “My text books don’t have to be entertaining for me to learn from them!” I totally agree with you, but think of how much easier it would be if the text actually was enjoyable to read. What if there were little stories strewn about the book that made you laugh and want to continue on? That, I think, would be the perfect text book. Unfortunately, a book that is entertaining AND educational doesn’t exist at the moment, so Genki will be your best bet.
Want to Buy Genki? You can find it on Amazon.

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This post was written by:

koichi - who has written 82 posts on Tofugu.com.

Koichi is a cool frood that knows where his towel's at. He created Tofugu, and is currently working on a few other projects as well: Koichiben & BoxedTofu.

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