Nakama 1A (World Languages)

For two semesters I've been using this textbook and student Workbook along with the CD's that you buy separately for both. They are overpriced and poorly designed. Despite having a native speaking instructor I found the activities and homework clumsy and often hard to follow. They were usually out of sequence meaning you often did activity B on page 35 before activity A on page 34 the following week. It was common for words and phrases that were not covered to come up at critical points which made it unnecessarily confusing. I have friends who are native speakers who found the instructions harder to follow than the language itself.The lesson device used is primarily talking about school: the level, major, name, country of origin etc. Unfortunately the phrase for college student or graduate student is almost ten syllables long. In other words, it's a mouthful. It's also boring especially if you're not in school. I know these are phrases I will never need to use. By comparison I need to know how to get somewhere, order food and even communicate basic likes and dislikes. This kind of basic communication might be buried in there somewhere but not organized and hard to find.I'm actually changing schools to get away from these awful textbooks. The only good thing about the textbook is the mnemonic devices for memorizing Hiragana and Katakana. However there are other books on just "kana" that use similar devices and cost a fraction of these textbooks. There is also an app for iPhone and iPad called "Kana" by Jan Bogner that help you write it accurately. When it comes to the "kanas" it's route memorization that just requires a lot of written repetition and taking them "five" at a time (a, i, u, e,o; ka, ki, ku, ke, ko etc.). You really don't even need these books for learning them. Now I know the "kanas" but have no idea what anything means. Really kind of frustrating. Pass on these textbooks I don't know anyone who could learn Japanese using them - even a language savante would be discouraged.

This book is beginner friendly to learning Japanese if you are taking a Japanese Class. The tips given about memorizing hiragana and katakana has helped me tremendously. Along with the practice problems it helped solidify the knowledge I had known about hiragana and katakana. Not only that it also taught me the culture and manners of Japan. With that I believe this is a good book to have but is flawed when learning to pronounce words or letters.

I currently attend Harold Washington College and am taking Japanese 101. This text was required for the course and I DIDN'T feel like paying for the book AND the cd (Screw You Becks!!!!!!), so Amazon was the way to go. Upon receiving this book, I found it to be in mint condition with no damages whatsoever. I recommend this book for anyone who wants a fresh start learning the Japanese language. Just be sure to discipline yourself to not only recognize the characters but also be able to write/produce them, and you'll have nothing but success.

The book is not bad. However, it jumps right into Hirigana off the top. Which it is a little frustrating,trying read questions in characters, that i felt I was not ready for. Then once you start to sound out the Hirigana (not totally reading Hirigana), the book sneaks in kanji with no explanation. All of this happened in the first 2 chapters. It is a bit difficult. I find myself a bit frustrated with this book but is was a requirement for school.

I used this book for my Japanese language course I took over the summer. They wean you off of romanji pretty quickly which forces you to learn the hiragana and katakana quickly. I believe 25 or 26 kanji is introduced in this book. It's organized well, it has vocabulary for each chapter and then exercises that are centered around the theme. It makes Japanese fun and less intimidating. Definitely get it for your studies. Great for beginners. いいですよ！

I use this book in my Japanese 1 class in college. It's a really great book to learn many things with the Japanese language and culture. I'm not sure if this book would be so great without being in a class, but I doubt this book was created for self study. There are better self study books out there. Anyway, if this book is required for your class, I think you'll learn a lot. Study! Take advantage of the book!

The condition of the pages are great, the cover was a bit tattered but overall it was a great buy. There was no writing on the pages when I received it. A great buy.

Thankss man, it's so pricey at school, this was the cheapest i can get c: It came very used, but i dont care as long as all the pages are in. I'll be writing in it either way