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Long-term Japanese Road Map with Matt from MattvsJapan! (Patreon)

Published:
2020-06-18 04:18:40
Imported:
2026-06
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Content

Japanese Phonetics Index Page

Good afternoon Patrons! The newest episode of Japanese phonetics is live! In this lesson, which be listed near the top of the above index page, I talk with Matt from Refold and discuss the most effective long-term study plan for Japanese learners aiming for a very high level of Japanese fluency. Note that this video is rather long (close to two hours!), so if you would like a brief breakdown of the roadmap, please skip to the one hour and twenty-one minute, zero second, mark. The separate Q&A video should be up in approximately one week. Please check all the following for links to Matt's great content!

Matt's YouTube Channel
Matt's Patreon
Matt's Refold website

As always, if you have any questions or concerns with regards to this lesson, please don't hesitate to leave a comment below. Thank you very much for your continued support, and good luck with your Japanese studies!

Best from Beppu,

Dōgen

Files

Previews only

Long-term Japanese Study Plan with Matt from MattvsJapan!

Talking with Matt from MattvsJapan about the best way to study Japanese for people who are interested in reaching a high level of fluency. Matt's YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/mattvsjapan Matt's Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/massimmersionapproach Index 00:00 Intro 02:40 When to start thinking about studying phonetics (Dogen) 04:24 Three times to focus on phonetics (Matt) 06:38 Thoughts on studying phonetics (Dogen) 09:13 Put off speaking first and why (Matt) 17:38 The role of phonetics in studying Japanese (Matt) 20:06 Knowing the rules of phonetics (Dogen / Matt) 25:37 Thoughts on studying phonetics (Matt / Dogen) 32:18 Thoughts on studying Japanese (Matt / Dogen) 46:17 The Mass Immersion approach (Matt) 51:27 Discussion on learning kanji (Matt / Dogen) 1:07:45 Back to The Mass Immersion approach (Matt) 1:13:17 Domains within the language (Matt) 1:16:21 Thoughts and feedback (Dogen) 1:21:00 The Long-term Study Plan (Matt) 1:21:45 Year One 1:25:01 Year Two 1:26:06 Year Three 1:28:00 Year Four, Five, and beyond 1:34:05 Wrap up (Dogen / Matt)

Comments

Phen-the Moogle

咎めるｗｗ　sounds like a manga or video game word, feel like I've seen it in some proverb or something. かっこいい響きがするけど日常会話では使われてないかもね、残念やけど☆

Phen-the Moogle

This video is always something any learner can go back to if they get lost , it's really really really well made! Thanks so much :)

Phen-the Moogle

I have a question about 12人の優しい日本人, where can I find Japanese subtitles for this? I have trouble hearing Japanese from old movies, or the sound quality is harder for me to hear, compared to modern anime and even some older anime. I can read more fluently so Japanese subs would be the easiest way for me to check my listening.

Phen-the Moogle

Sorry for a lot of comments and questions. This is my last one on this particular thread. It's really important to me. How do you do sentence mining at a more advanced level. I'm fluent or at the level of doing it monolingually now, but this is what my card might look like: front: たんか切って飛び出してきたはいいが、まったく見当すらつかないぜ back: 啖呵（たんか）喧嘩・口論の時、大きな口を叩いて強がること 大口（おおぐち）をたたく でかい口をたたくのはやめろ おおぼらを吹く 自慢する 大言壮語　たいげんそうご＋する 私はそんな大言壮語には惑わされない ---- I have たんか　underlined in anki. I have some synonyms and other words or sentences that come to mind. I also try to explain it simply or use the easiest definition. Am I supposed to stick to only one Japanese synonym that comes to mind? Also I found this new word 大言壮語 , do I need to make a brand new card for it? I just found it as a reference to the word たんか. I want to do sentence mining more efficiently for my level because it can get chaotic when you know a lot of words.

Dogen
>>103558703

Hi, Phen! JP here, Dōgen's business partner. I'm helping manage the messages here on Patreon. Since it's an older movie, 12人の優しい日本人 can be a bit hard to find. There are some places like Amazon Japan or other shops that have it for sale on DVD or Blu-ray, but after some searching online with Dōgen, we can't tell if these include Japanese subtitles or not. I hope this helps! — JP

Dogen
>>103566649

Hi, Phen. Unfortunately, I’ve only ever used premade Anki decks in the past due to my primary interest being in phonetics and creative writing in Japanese, rather than vocabulary. Thus, I’m unable to answer this type of question in a qualified manner; I would encourage you to ask Matt about this directly, as he’s much more of an expert in this field. Apologies for not being able to help more! Dōgen

Zachary Vaughan

マッタさんとドウゲンさんありがとうございます！

Brandon Newton

Not really sure why this video is listed in the course at all...

Daichi

It's not the end of the world, but there is a bit of a background hum on this video. :/

Dogen
>>38844652

My apologies for that—it's currently very hot here in Japan so it's necessary for me to use my air conditioner while recording (opening the window only makes things louder as I live right next to a road). Thank you for the understanding!

Jenpai

I appreciate the input you lads did for this video. Recently joined the Patreon and am finding helpful information and a new viewpoint on my Japanese studies.

Dogen
>>39204438

Very glad to hear that Jenpai! The Q&A video should be coming up soon!

Nikolai

Lots of great value in this video man. Been studying Japanese since 2012 (inconsistently) and have gotten serious the last few years (and also graduated in linguistics!). I appreciate the long-term study plan and strategies mentioned, even as a dead intermediate learner. Love the work you do man!

Dogen
>>39316255

Thanks so much Nikolai! I'm sure if you apply some of the techniques we talk about in the video you'll notice yourself making progress in little to no time. Cheers!

Tyler Davis

I thought the bit at 1:24:40 where Matt was talking about the goal of making new Anki cards in year 1 was to be able to understand more Japanese versus producing Japanese was really good for me to hear. As someone who is definitely still at the beginner level I have sometimes found it disheartening to not be able to produce some of the vocabulary I'm learning, but I guess that's trying to run before I can walk in those instances. The roadmap at the end is the only part I've checked out thus far, but it was really good and I'm excited to come back to the rest of this video when I have more time.

Dogen
>>40194955

Hi Tyler! Glad to hear that you got so much out of just a small part of the video; I'm sure you will learn a lot from the other bits as well—Matt is a very intelligent guy!

Luke Hoffman

This may be a question better suited for Matt, but can the MIA approach still be effective when combined with a traditional classroom setting? I'm about to start taking the 3rd level Japanese class at my university, and after watching this video I'm debating whether or not I should continue with that sort of learning environment. So do you think that combining the 2 methods would still be as effective?

Dogen
>>42102636

Hi Luke. I do think this would be a question better suited for Matt, but in my opinion it would be best to continue taking the courses, provided most if not all of them are taught by native teachers, and to also heavily supplement these courses with native input. Cheers!

Gregorio Bonini

Hi Dogen, is it a problem if I started right away with the pitch accent stuff (of course after learning Hiragana/Katakana) whithout having 4/6 months of study under my belt and I'm doing quite intensive pitch accent studies? Also, what exactly do you mean by that? Are 6/7 hours a day of listening/general training enough? Apologies if I missed that. thank you!!

Dogen
>>44106286

Hi Gregorio. I would not studying pitch accent immediately after learning hiragana / katakana. Yes, I recommend that most learners first get 4-6 months of study under their belt. 6/7 hours a day of listening is good, and I would recommend that you supplement this using the kind of practice by trying to learn a fair amount of elementary and intermediate grammar using a grammar dictionary, as well as ANKI to study new words. For more details I would encourage you to check out Matt's website, www.massimmersionapproach.com, as he does a better job than me at breaking down your first year. Cheers

Jennifer

I could never get into Anki. So clunky to use. FlashQuiz (Microsoft machines, for offline) or Memrise are more user-friendly. It's also a lot easier to add audio and images on those platforms. I tried doing that with Anki and it took for-freaking-ever. I'm a little over two years in. I got a pen pal at the beginning of year two (and went to Japan, too--managed to navigate just fine). So at least I'm not behind on my speaking, though my main focus has been reading throughout this process. 話すのが下手ですから、よろしくお願いいたします。

Dogen
>>46641707

Hi Jennifer. Yes, Anki does seem to be hit-or-miss for the most part; many people swear by it, while other people say they never use it. I do think it’s a good option when trying to mass memorize new words or grammar points. こちらこそ、よろしくお願いします！

Lioba Roggendorf

You are so incredibly helpful, this video alone was worth joining your Patreon. Thanks a lot!

Dan C

This is really good for general calibration; everyone's circumstances are different and you both did a great job of taking that into account when making recommendations. Thanks heaps!

Jacob Sandlund

Hello, I really found this video helpful, so thank you! I am trying to look into the mass immersion approach further and it looks like Matt's Mass Immersion Approach website isn't working or doesn't exist anymore (https://massimmersionapproach.com/).

paul walther

In my experience, contrary to what Matt says, Japanese people will NOT understand you if you are translating in your head or maybe trying to use some words you looked up in an English/Japanese dictionary. Of course, you can get lucky sometimes. And sometimes it can't be helped. What else are you going to do if you haven't heard a Japanese person say it or can't remember it because your memory stinks.

paul walther

After roughly 10 years of studying Japanese I'm at the equivalent of someone who's just finished year 3 of MIA. Nice 😂.

Alex OK

No matter how many times I hear Matt talking about his interpretation of the language acquisition theory, it still bugles me and I subconsciously resist to believe in it, but on the other hand I've experienced exactly the same things on my language learning journey! Going off topic, I enjoy comparing J-pop covers and anime openings by non-native singers and then going back to the originals, and I think that there's a big difference when singing with pitch accent or not. When that thought came to me, I was shocked. The contrast was so stark! I'm just wondering whether someone here has experienced something similar or I'm completely nuts and there's nothing to it? I've also noticed that when I'm comparing the lyrics to the actual singing, I recognize a lot of words on paper but not in the singing itself because the singer changes the stress but the pitch remains the same and that's how the listener is supposed to decipher the aural content. Is that so or am I completely off the track? Thank you, Dogen and Matt, for the great value you provide us all. Good luck with your endeavors and stay safe!

Lennart van der Velden

Hi Dogen, loving the course so far! I have a question about aspiration: is extra aspiration sometimes used to sound more 'international' or more 'English-like'? I've been listening to Japanese rap to expose myself a bit more to the language, and I noticed that sometimes rappers seem (to my novice ears) to aspirate more than average (just to give an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GyvnLHCfFI ). Is it actually exaggerated, and if so, why?

Dogen
>>66878235

Hi, Lennart. I'm glad you're enjoying the course! On a quick listen to part of that track it does sound like some bits have more aspiration than normal, but I don't want to get into this too much more. When it comes to music and singing, a lot of what I cover in the course does not apply. Singing, not just in Japanese but in other languages as well, involves a lot of sound, speed, and other changes that you wouldn't use in normal speech, so in many ways you can't really use it as a study tool for regular pronunciation. I hope this helps!

Stephen Leung

So I do have a question about starting output ... Matt mentioned that if you really like speaking you can start earlier than year3 ... my question is if I am quite introverted and don't really like speaking with people, can I put it off even later ... or even just kind of not do much output but still get to "pretty fluent"? Even in my native language, I just don't like talking to people I don't know well, let alone creating new friends in a foreign language I haven't mastered ... is just a practical impossibility for me. (Even though I do actually live in Japan) Any recommendations? Could I just keep sticking with massive input, and still reach a decent (even if not high) fluency? Or for example I can just do a bunch of 独り言 and still be fine? Thanks!

Dogen
>>76142058

When and how to output can vary for each person and can really depend on what your goal is for the language. It's probably good to take some time and think about what you want to achieve, what fluency means to you, and structure your studies accordingly. If fluency means reading or understanding movies and shows, you might not need to output that much. If your goal is to be able to deal with other people you'll need to speak eventually, even if it is only with a language partner or someone else who can help you with your studies. I hope this helps. Good luck with your studies!

Todd Sarner

I wanted to watch "The Gentle 12" after hearing about it here....does anyone know how to stream it in the US? Can't find it anywhere.

malt beverage
>>86184445

Same here. Based in the UK but not sure where I can stream it. Great & v inspiring video!