Customer Reviews

Learn in Your Car Japanese Complete: The Complete Language Course 2nd Edition [With Guidebook] (Japanese Edition)

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I used this course, Pimsleur, Japanese for Busy People, and Remembering the Kanji as the foundation of my Japanese studies. While the other products I mentioned are more useful for the initial learning stage, particularly Pimsleur and Japanese for Busy People, this product is a terrific way to review material and is very cost effective.

The method is simple and logical. It starts with simple words and builds up to complicated sentences. An English speaker says the English word and a Japanese speaker says the Japanese word twice, with a pause before each repetition. In addition to being organized in building blocks, it is organized thematically, such as transportation phrases, hotel phrases, etc.

Overall, highly recommended and you cannot beat the price for the amount of vocabulary and sentence patterns covered.

I have been studying Japanese for sevral years now, and currently live in Japan. Over time I have realised that the most important 'secret' to learning another language is more about frequency of study rather than materials. In other words, you have to study a lot!

If all you do is go to a lesson once or twice a week, then you won't progress much. This course gives you the chance to study every day, and that makes the difference. I am learning a lot from this package and will continue to use it for many years.

Buyer beware! The very last lesson of this set (Lesson 78, I think. level 3, disk 3) is riddled with errors. There is confusion with 'sore' (that) and 'sora' (sky). It means the difference between 'The sky is gray.'(English) and 'That is gray.'(Japanese). Also there is confusion of the meaning of 'ani' (older brother), the text says this means 'younger brother'. It's a short lesson, and the 'sore'-'sora' error comes up twice. There are other minor mistakes hroughout the text, but the final lesson of level 3 really stands out. Be careful. Otherwise the lessons are great.

Learn Japanese In Your Car is the best compared to all the other language methods that I own. Vocabulary and grammar are slowly, clearly, and logically introduced via an audio format that you can use anywhere. I uploaded the lessons into my iPod, and have transformed hours spent driving, exercising, and doing any daily chores into my language learning time.

This series has the best pacing, sound quality, production value and super clear pronunciation...far better than Drive Time Japanese, or Barron's Now You're Talking In No Time (Barron's is also worthwhile, see comments in the next paragraph). Learn In Your Car moves from single words pronounced slowly and clearly, to a few words put together as a phrase...the same way we all learned to speak when we were babies. Unlike Drive Time Japanese, which has some frustrating and annoying elements, Learn in Your Car is relatively easy and pleasant to follow while driving or doing household chores. It's a great value: Nine CDs, plus a really nice travelogue DVD, a bonus CD of computer and internet phrases, and a handy carrying case to toss in your car.

I recommend starting with Learn in Your Car because of its excellent pacing for beginners. It really helps build up a comfortable base of vocabulary, grammar, listening comprehension and pronunciation. Then pick up Barron's Now You're Talking Japanese In No Time: Book and Audio CD Package (Now You're Talking Series) before your trip to Japan. Now You're Talking is faster paced, more compact (2 CDs), still affordable, and has a 200+ page full-color phrase book that is perfect for tourists, plus a mini-book that fits in your pocket or purse and is great for quick language reference.

Those who are serious about fluency will need to get additional practice with Japanese reading and writing (I bought Let's Learn Hiragana: First Book of Basic Japanese Writing (Kodansha's Children's Classics), Let's Learn Katakana: Second Book of Basic Japanese Writing and Lets Learn Kanji: An Introduction to Radicals, Components and 250 Very Basic Kanji (Kodansha's Children's Classics)) since writing is obviously beyond the scope of any audio course.

I have found this "listen and repeat" audio course very useful in my studies. It's not all-encompassing, but for the price it is a good value. Don't be turned off by the first few tracks, which are for travelers going to Japan. After track six it goes into vocab and sentences that you would learn from a basic textbook. I've been able to turn lots of wasted time driving, doing chores, and exercising into something more productive. By breaking each track into smaller ones using iTunes (~1 min in length), this course became even better for me.

Learn in Your Car (LIYC) is great for building up vocabulary and essential sentence patterns quickly in Japanese. If you are looking for an audio course that explains grammar, try Michel Thomas. LIYCJ may be a bit too fast-paced for complete beginners, but if you are even semi-familiar with some of the basics (kana sounds, basic grammar: the "o," "wa," "ga," "ni," and "no" particles, the concept of counters for counting objects, etc.), you'll be fine. I think LIYCJ is best suited for supplementing material you are learning currently, or to brush up on Japanese you've forgotten. However, beginners, even complete beginners, can still learn a lot from doing this course if they don't mind looking up grammar online for more details. If you have the money and you don't have much experience with Japanese, I highly suggest using Michel Thomas' course(s) first, then LIYCJ. Both combined are still much cheaper than Pimsleur.

While I think the popular audio courses are very different from each other, and it's a bit unfair to directly compare them, comparisons are still useful, especially since you probably can't afford all three for lack of time/money. With that said, here's a comparison of some of them:

Comparison to Other Audio Programs (from what I've read and learned from listening to samples, I only own LIYCJ and Michel Thomas):

-Michel Thomas: Slower-paced. Lesson/classroom format with two other students that explains grammar. Small amount of vocab (~500), but you'll know it well. Has you build your own sentences with lots of practice. Lesson overview booklet included. Good value for the price. 8 hours of audio for beginner course, 4 hours for advanced course. Tracks are roughly 5-6 min in length, so easy to skip back and forth. Would pair nicely with LIYC Japanese (I suggest using it before LIYCJ). The "slow" student in the lessons may get on your nerves after a while. I've found it very engaging and fun so far! Best audio course for complete beginners.

-Learn in Your Car: Faster-paced. Listen and repeat (no lessons that explain grammar). Transcripts (with brief grammar notes) included. Focuses on building vocabulary and learning basic sentence patterns. Incorporates previously learned vocab in new sentences to reinforce. Good value for price. 9 hours of audio. Tracks are short, easy to skip around. Better for semi-beginners than complete beginners.

-Pimsleur: Very slow pace. Listen and repeat. Better than other courses for pronunciation, since it says each sentence at varying speeds and even backwards. No transcripts. Has Graduated Interval Recall method which asks you to repeat phrases you learned before at consistent intervals. Small amount of vocab (~500), but you'll know it well . Focuses on memorizing dialogue. Lessons are generally 30 min long, so it's harder to skip around to repeat something specific. Good, but seems overpriced for for the material you learn. ~45 hours of audio for all 3 levels of comprehensive package, but most of that is repetition. OK for complete beginners, but MT is better.

-Japanesepod101: Podcasts plus other materials for beginner to advanced learners. Each podcast normally has a fun dialogue, slower version of the dialogue, then they explain the vocab and grammar. The newer podcasts (Newbie series and later seasons of beginner, intermediate, and advanced) seem more structured and efficient than the earlier ones. You can get a free 7 day trial to see if you like it. A basic subscription is $8/month (can download all podcasts and transcripts), but you can often get it for $4/month. Or you could pay for a few months and download everything you want and then quit. The latest podcasts are free on iTunes. Unfortunately, their website is a bit confusing and extremely commercialized (feels like an infomercial!), but the podcasts are actually quite good.

-Drive Time Japanese (Living Language): Some people seem to really like this series. It sounds extremely similar to LIYC, mostly listen and repeat. Reinforces/repeats previously learned words in new sentences. Comes with a booklet with transcripts. Relatively inexpensive.

-Behind the Wheel: At this time I haven't been able to find much reliable information about this course, so I'm hesitant to recommend it. From reviews it sounds like it helps you build up your own sentences, and is similar to this course in that it has a lot of "listen and repeat" material. One reviewer mentioned that it does not have the most logical grouping of words. (Note that some of the reviews for it are fishy...they are written by reviewers who recommend Behind The Wheel in every single one of their reviews, and the only reviews they've written are for similar language courses. There aren't very many "real" reviews left after you discard those, so beware.)
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Learn in Your Car Japanese:

Pros:
-Learn ~2000 words/short sentences
-Covers quite a bit of material in terms of sentence patterns and verb tenses (see detail below). While I wouldn't say you'd be an upper-beginner after finishing this course (especially since you aren't writing anything), it's certainly an excellent foundation and you'd be able to blaze through parts of your textbook since you already know some of the vocabulary and grammar. You'll have many "Aha!" moments when you connect the grammar explanation from the textbook with the sentences you learned on the CDs.
-Comes with booklets that contain transcripts. They have the pronunciation in romaji and kana (Pimsleur does not have transcripts). They also have brief grammar notes.
-Most words are spoken clearly. There were a couple of words/phrases per track that I couldn't understand well, but I just looked them up when I got home. The "g" is a bit soft and sometimes sounds like an "m." Sometimes I can't differentiate between the "wa" and "o" particles if the speaker says things too quickly.
-Progressively builds on previous knowledge so sentences get longer/more complex over time (though they are still pretty short when compared to a fluent speaker, I think sentences from Michel Thomas are longer)
-Vocabulary is repeated throughout to reinforce memory
-For the most part, words/sentences are grouped logically together
-Each word/phrase is repeated once in English, then twice in Japanese. There is normally enough time in between to say it out loud (assuming you know the answer and are relatively quick about it)
-Good for beginners who want to learn some basic Japanese words/phrases without worrying about grammar (assuming they don't mind blindly memorizing).
-Can be used as a supplement to a textbook if you are currently studying Japanese (correct pronunciation is important, plus it reinforces vocab and grammar)
-Also good for reviewing Japanese you have learned in the past
-Easy to listen to while you drive, exercise, do chores, etc.
-Tracks vary from a couple minutes to ten minutes in length, so it's easy to skip ahead or go back.

Cons:
-Just like Pimsleur, you aren't going to be "taught" anything in this course. It's purely listen and repeat. The transcripts do have brief grammar notes, so I suggest reading them before getting in your car or exercising, etc. Unfortunately, they hardly explain anything about counters. It's a relatively easy concept to grasp but you'll be confused as to why the phrase "one person" ("hitori") is its own word that does not include the words "one" or "person" ("ichi" and "nin").
-Does not cover the kana sounds in the audio. There is a brief description in the booklet about basic Japanese sounds.
-Don't expect to understand all of the grammar that you hear. This course is designed for you to memorize the pattern first, and then learn the grammar behind it from a textbook. You can either just copy the speaker and blindly memorize, or you can look up more information online.
-Covers mainly polite Japanese only
-Doesn't cover much adjective conjugation (i.e. negative adjectives
-I wish the tracks had been broken into 1 to 2 minute segments. They vary from 1 to 10 minutes in length. Over 2 minutes is too many words at once! I had to keep rewinding or fast forward to the part I wanted to learn. I solved this by importing the songs into iTunes, right-clicking on the track to get the info, changing the stop/start time of the track, and then creating an AAC file copy. This makes it easier to digest the material in small chunks! I can just repeat 1-2 minute sections and then move onto the next one when I'm ready.
-There are no dialogues, just words and short sentences. You won't practice your listening comprehension very much (for that I've heard Living Japanese: Diversity in Language and Lifestyles (Conversations with Native Speakers) is good)
-The pacing and lesson order makes sense for the most part, but I'm not sure why basic things like colors, clothes, and days of the week are on the last CD (the vocab is put into more complex sentences though, so it's not just a list of words)
-You aren't encouraged to make your own sentences, which Michel Thomas (and supposedly Behind the Wheel) does.

Overview of Lessons (I did not list all tracks because some are continuations (e.g. "More numbers")):

LEVEL 1
Basics (I, you, he, she...)
Basic Phrases
Transportation Nouns
Transportation Phrases
Money
Hotel
Directions (right, left, corner, street...)
Numbers
At the Restaurant (no food names though)
Shopping
Time, General
Time of Day
Questions
Shops
Nouns
Adjectives and Adverbs
Verbs
Prepositional Phrases
Prepositional Pronouns
Possessive Adjectives
Conjunctions and Similar Words
Wanting to Do Something
Forming Questions
Having to Do Something

LEVEL 2
Sentences with Negative Adjectives
Getting Around
The Verb Desu - To Be
The Verbs Imasu and Arimas (to be or exist, present tense)
To have or to own something
Present tense practice
Future Tense
Past Tense
The Telephone
Iru and Aru in negative sentences
Desu with Adjectival nouns
Desu with verbal adjectives
Negative past tense

LEVEL 3
To be able to do something
Present progressive tense (I am eating)
Using direct object pronouns in sentences
Using indirect object pronouns in sentences
Pronouns in negative sentences
The Car
Needing to Do Something
Someone should do something
Someone might do something
Days of the Week
Months of the Year
At the doctor's office
At the dinner table
Reflexive and Reciprocal constructions (the man washes himself)
Clothes (vocab is placed in full sentences here)
Colors (vocab is placed in full sentences here)

Compared to Pimsleur, I think LIYC is a much better value. It's not as dialogue-focused, and it doesn't have the "Graduated Interval Recall" method (which basically just asks you to remember sentences you learned before), but it goes through much more vocabulary and at least the same amount of grammar. I really like the LIYCJ transcripts in case you don't catch what the speaker said. Michel Thomas is also good if you want more of a classroom/lesson format. In fact, you should try doing Michel Thomas first to understand the grammar, and then use LIYCJ to build your vocabulary and practice the grammar. Every language course has its pros and cons, so I recommend seeing if your library has these courses to figure out which is best for your learning style.

A little about my Japanese studies: I'm using Japanese for Everyone: A Functional Approach to Daily Communication as my main textbook. For Kanji I use Remembering the Kanji, Vol. 1: A Complete Course on How Not to Forget the Meaning and Writing of Japanese Characters. To review vocab/grammar/kanji I use Anki, a free flashcard software with spaced-repetition.

If you want some more ideas for well-reviewed resources, I've made a Listmania List called The "Best" Books/Resources for Learning Japanese: Beginner to Advanced. I'll post the link in the comments in case you are interested.

I hope you have fun Learning Japanese!

The product is acceptable for people with a background in spoken Japanese. The audio is clear, even in the tone in the Japanese speaker's voice was mechanical and dull.
I lived in Japan for a total of four years and the notion that someone who hasn't heard Japanese or is unaware of Japanese orthography and phonology could "learn Japanese" anywhere, using these discs inspires hilarity. This sterile, rote auditory and spoken practice is useful only for a person who wants to keep or extend their foundation in spoken Japanese.

One thing that makes this a great supplement to the excellent all-audio Pimsleur is that the Learn in Your Car series comes with a booklet that has sentences written out in the latin alphabet and hiragana. It's wonderful to practice reading hiragana with this set when the brute memorization efforts seem intimitating at the beginning.

I looked at reviews for this product, and a bunch of people said that they used it to help them practice Japanese that they have already learned, so I bought it. Let me tell you, it does just that! As a Japanese major, this has been a very helpful product in stimulating the Japanese side of my brain as I prepare to study abroad. It's easy to use and very comprehensive. I don't know if I would recommend this to people who have never taken Japanese before, but for those who have, this is a very useful tool to complement your studies.

I agree with the other poster who said this is not for a complete beginner, but an excellent way to reinforce and make active things you've learned already. I won't repeat any more positive comments - it's a very good program.

Here is why I didn't give it 5 stars. Every "g" was pronounced soft. Although Japanese will often say that the soft g is better than the hard g, I hear hard g's more often. So a mixture would be better IMO. Also, having more than one speaker would be better. Unnatural overuse of personal pronouns exists, as it does in most Japanese learning material. Finally, there are some irregular pauses in the middle of sentences. But over all, very good.

This cd set is great value for money. It comes with excellent quality extras and is easy to follow.

The video Japan guide and the cd case is graet value.
The course, is many words, phrases and sentences to repeat.
Well, a good pasttime, provided you learn Japanese from other sources, or you are an actor and want to impress someone ( an hotel concierge) with two words in Japanese.
Intonation isn't all that good, and the tone is always the same.
Anyway, it costs not so much, so isn't a bad deal.
( I am afraid that the edition of saa-review was defective. I have a correct phrasebook, ad a video guide ).