Grammar Book

Hello, First I would like to say that I love Rocket Japanese, it's fits perfectly on what I was looking for learn Japanese, demo I feel a little lost about grammar and it's being really hard to me to construct my own phrases. Specially with the verbs forms and connectors like ga and wa. So I was thinking in use some complementary grammar book (for beginners) to help me with this. I was wondering if someone could recommend me one. I need it with romanji though, I'm trying to avoid the katana/hiragana/kanji :P Arigato gozaimasu.

Sorry, I can't help with grammar books, but I have a few comments on what you said. First of all, I advise that you should not avoid the Japanese characters, especially the kana. These play a huge role in helping you learn the language, as you advance with learning, romaji will only make it more confusing... Secondly, Rocket Japanese has quite good grammar lessons, however these become useful only later on, as you advance through the course. As far as I adapted to this learning technique, I can say that it is easier at first to learn expressions and phrases just as Kenny gives them to you. Only after you get used to them, should you try understanding them and the way the sentences are structured. I'm saying this because when starting to study the structure of the Japanese language, you need to have somewhat a larger vocabulary, otherwise it would be very difficult. Hope these hints will hell you with your learning, as it really depends on the individual how effective this learning style is :)

Thanks for the reply ^^ I'm really not interested in learn how to read or write in Japanese. I'm fine being an illiterate in that language :P I'm dyslexic and learn new characters requires way more time from my part that I'm willing to spend, but I'm really interested in learn the language because it has concepts that nor English or Spanish has. Having said that, could you please elaborate a bit more about the importance of the kana in the learning of the language? because I don't really see it, since I don't care about reading and writing, but if it's really important I should reconsider how I spend my time learning Japanese. Regards.

Well, considering your case then, it won't be that useful to learn the charaters. However, without them it is really difficult to learn the language. Kana is the first step twards kanji. Because Japanese is a phonetic type of language, to understand the majority of words, you need to know the compound kanji from which they are made. This is because there are lots of kanji that share the same on-readings, making the language a bit hard to learn at a higher level without learning some of the basic functions of kanji along with the vocab. From my personal experience, once I started learning kanji, as I enlarged my kanji knowledge, learning new vocab and sentence structures became easier too.

Konnichiwa Rodrigo! I would have to agree with Coddo, Learning Kana is a very important part of learning Japanese (even if you learn only Hiragana and Katakana) because it can certainly help you see how and why certain words are pronounced the way they are. Also, as far as constructing your own sentences, there is just one simple pattern you have to remember and you will never go wrong. Here's the abbreviation: TTPOV Here's what it means: Topic Time Place Object Verb When constructing your own sentences, you simply have to insert vocabulary into the slots (although you don't have to fill in all the slots as long as they are in order), and place the correct particles between words, and you will never go wrong. Also, here is a quick summary of commonly used particles and how you would use them: Wa: usually, wa is used after your topic, or when explaining likes and dislikes (suki) Ga: Used after your topic for emphasis (Ex: I, of all people, am happy) or can be used to point out the object of the sentence Ni: Used to indicate going to a place De: used to indicate going to a place BY something (Ex: going to a place BY train) He: Less used version of Ni, when in doubt, use ni ...and that's all I can think of at the moment. Hope that helped!

I have two small things to add to what スゴイマンゴさん said :). 1.) Ni is used both for time and locations, while He (read as simple "e") is used exclusively for locations (dynamically, when it's about a movement action as in "let's go there" -> "soko e ikou"). 2.) TTPOV structure applies for everyday casual conversation. On informal situation, things may vary a bit :D. But these things will come naturally after you have spent a little more on learning the language.

Oh yes, I forgot about the time one. Thank you コッドさん!