Ease of Use: So easy
Content: Alright – I thought the grammar explanations are lacking sometimes (as many people pointed out). However, I like that the book provides a simpler way of saying the grammar point using previously learned grammar.
I know some people prefer longer explanations, but the lack of words on the page actually felt better for me usually. It felt cleaner and less cluttered. On its own, it would be hard to study purely from this textbook. But with other resources like internet, YouTube, and blogs, it was fine for me.
I never think you should only use one resource to study from anyways.
Structure: Well-structured and easy to break down into smaller learning chunks.
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Interactive: It provided a few practice problems at the end of each lesson and a chapter test. There are 6 chapters. I liked the practice problems as review, but since I haven’t taken the JLPT I don’t know how similar they are to the real thing.
Overall: I think overall it provides a great simplified intro to most of the grammar points. It’s not super in-depth, but for a basic overview, it’s good.
If you want an all-in-one, this is probably NOT the book for you. I think depending on your learning style it may work for you or not.
I think the highlight is how easy it is to use for self-study, even if you aren’t good at it. It has well-structured short lessons and short chapters, so it is easy to plan out a weekly study schedule. More importantly, the short chapters kept me motivated to study everyday.
Compared to Tobira’s structure, I think it’s a lot more simplistic as it removed all the group exercises. Tobira lumps like 16 grammar points at the end of each chapter with 3+ ways to say each, so it’s easy to get overwhelmed. But, if you like knowing all the ways to use a grammar point, Tobira is great and will tell you the difference between similar grammar points.
Personally I just want focus on learning the general way use, and then go back and learn the other ways.
Compared to Genki 2’s structure, I loved Genki, but it does use a lot of English in their explanations, so it gets cluttered and you rely on English to learn rather than try to figure out the meaning in Sou-matome.
Background: I studied Japanese from zero in college using Genki 1 and 2, Marugoto, and Tobira.
framed in beige 