GENKI I: An Integrated Course in Elementary Japanese (English and Japanese Edition) Paperback – February 10, 2011

Great approach to learning Japanese for mature students. I used this one in school and purchased it for review and refreshing what I learned. Highly recomend

I decided to use genki to learn Japanese by myself, since this series is well known, and the class pace is too slow (only 2 hrs a week, far from enough to consolidate your skills in my opinion.) Here's how I used Genki I and II for self-study:1. Go over all the vocabs and grammars, review them on time ( by reading the 読み書き, and doing the work book exercise.)2. For each lesson, when you are familiar with 75% of the vocabs and grammars. Do dictation of the dialogue.3. Do extensive reading. ( I highly recommend Japanese Grader Reader set: Japanese Graded Readers: Level 0 Vol 2 (Japanese Graded Readers))Here's the pros and cons:Pros:1. Comprehensive skill developments (listening, reading, writing, speaking). It's not that nerdy style where it digs into the very details of the grammars at the beginning.2. Shadowing. For the dialogues and the exercise, it would stop for a while for you to repeat or make sentences.3. The later lessons would repeat what you have learned in the previous lessons as to help you review, so you don't need to go over the previous too frequently as you move on. For this reason, I suggest the users not stick to one page if confused, just move on.Cons:1. Some English translations are not very accurate, though it won't affect too much of understanding.2. Isolates the new words and grammars in different lessons. Since many Japanese words have the same origin, or have similar meaning, it should have shown more connections among the words. (e.g.1. umi means the sea, mizu means water, and mizuumi means lake, which is literally sea + water, but it doesn't mention that; 2. Grammar like なければいけません, which means "you have to do", appearing in lesson 12, is actually using grammars in the genki II book, so it should be put in genki II)3. (Not a big deal at all) I think "メアリーさんは日本語を勉強します" shows up too frequently in the book :)4. There's NO high/low pitch on the words, so I have to listen to the MP3 to know the pitch. Pitch is important because pitch can determine the meaning. (切る/着る、橋/箸 for example.)After finishing the first Genki, you are in N5, after the second one, N4 shouldn't be a problem.

I like the Genki books. I grew up speaking Japanese and have gone to Japanese school and taken college level Japanese courses. I would have to say that this book compared to another one I have used is more user friendly. I liked the way that it is organized. To me, it is a pretty good introductory Japanese textbook. If you are an independent learner, it may not be the best textbook to learn from. There are a lot of group activities to do in the book. It would be great if you have someone to do it with. Also, I think it needs more examples or more exercises to practice the grammar/vocabulary introduced. A supplement might be good, not the workbook. The workbook have examples, but I can't figure out if I am right or wrong. It did not come with an answer sheet. I usually ask someone I know. There are other supplemental sources.I just want to say something about textbooks in general. Not all of them will suit a person's learning style. They are all different and they all suit each person differently. I just happened to like this one way more than Yookoso. As for the romaji issue, I personally did not care for it. If you are serious about learning Japanese, then learn Hiragana and Katakana ASAP. That is what will help you in advancing in your Japanese language learning. It opens up more doors in learning the language. Also, the textbooks are teaching basic grammar. Yes, there are several ways to say one thing, even in English. It really is up to the person to practice and eventually a particular style or way of saying things will be more familiar. I have spoken to Japanese people. I would say it one way and the other person would correct me by telling me a different way of saying it. Both ways were correct. One way was more mature. It has to do with style and familiarity and maturity level. It all comes down to continually learning the language.

Amazing book it's very modern and has a fashionable cover. The content in this book is very understandable and friendly. If your thinking of buying this get the workbook... It's a great conjunction to the textbook especially to practice what you've learned in the textbook ! I didn't buy the answer key because I don't have anyone here that knows Japanese that could check my work but I use an app called HiNative (both on iOS and android) where I can asked questions about the language I want to learn. I have gotten to ask whether my answers where correct in the work book and it's worked out just fine! Also I have Tae Kim's grammar guide (blue book is available on Amazon) (also an app and and online site where you can access his guide absolutely FREE) I was using as my main text book but I couldn't really practice what I'd learned and I wasn't understanding some grammar points being covered. But since getting this textbook and using it as my main textbook I've been able to understand and practice what I've learned as well... I will use Genki as my main text book. As well as Tae Kim as my cliff notes and the a dictionary of basic Japanese grammar as kind of like a teacher if I don't understand a grammar point in either books I do plan to buy the second edition of Genki after I finish the first one ! At first I was using Tae Kim's guide to learn vocabulary and a book called Common Japanese Collocations (this book is very good too and available on Amazon) but I've switched to iknow.jp where you can learn the core 6,000 commonly used Japanese words. I recommend all of the products I've mentioned they are all amazing and very benefiting if your thinking of or already learning Japanese. I'm a self learner so I hope I've been able to help other self learners or students in a class and I am still using the Genki 1 second edition so I'm no where near done in just giving my opinion on the product! 👍🏽👍🏽👍🏽🤓🤓😄