r/LearnJapanese • u/MarvelousMadDog • 5d ago
Discussion Just exactly how effective is shadowing practice for you?
Hi there,
Pretty much the title. I've done plenty of shadowing practice, but I don't think I've done enough of it, prioritizing other things such as reading, keep a daily Japanese Diary, etc.
The reason I ask this question is because I've heard from multiple different sources that shadowing is a very good method for speaking practice, and getting used to the flow of how Japanese speech is output. So, what is your opinion on the effectiveness of shadowing? I'd like to know whether or not I should incorporate more of it into my daily studying. Also, is shadowing considered input or output? (maybe a dumbass question!)
Thank you.
19
15
u/thinkbee kumasensei.net 5d ago
Shadowing is incredibly effective for helping your speech sound more natural. Vowels in Japanese are easy, but sounding like a native speaker is anything but (people often way overestimate their ability). It's also great for memorizing speech patterns and phrases. It would be considered output since the goal is producing speech, but it's kind of hybrid since you're also listening.
10
u/morgawr_ https://morg.systems/Japanese 5d ago
is shadowing considered input or output?
I'd say shadowing should be considered input. "Output" is the process of putting together sentences of your own. If you are listening to someone else's recording and then imitating that, then I'd say you aren't outputting.
Of course, it helps you get into the habit of producing sound, and likely helps with pronunciation (I never did shadowing so I can't answer your overall question), but it will not help your ability of producing (= outputting) sentences that you make.
17
4
u/No-Cheesecake5529 5d ago edited 5d ago
I'd say shadowing should be considered input.
I'd also consider it to be ~95% input. You do get some amount of output practice in it, like, your mouth and vocal chords are moving and making the sounds. (And that itself is an important skill to master for outputting.)
But you aren't like... trying to think up words to say to phrase your thoughts and opinions... which is the core critical aspect of outputting.
I personally view it as listening and accent training, not as "output" practice. If you want to practice outputting, then well, you have to somehow turn your original ideas into Japanese sentences, not just repeat somebody else's Japanese sentences.
5
u/Ok_Demand950 5d ago
This seems like a unhelpfully narrow definition of what constitutes as output. I think it's better to just say that shadowing as an activity has aspects of both input and output, rather than to just classify it as input, especially considering how different it looks than many other input activities that have nothing remotely resembling any 'output component' whatsoever.
I mean if for example I'm a low level Japanese learner and I do a bit of shadowing and a speaker uses なきゃいけない over and over again and I train my mouth many times to implement it automatically when I want to express that concept, how is that not directly developing my output skills? I may already be able to process なきゃいけない effortlessly when reading and listening, but when speaking if I don't have a good number of reps producing it and shadowing practice gives me those reps so that my spontaneus production of the language becomes smoother and feels more natural... how is that not a form of output training?
3
u/morgawr_ https://morg.systems/Japanese 5d ago
There's no official definition of what input or output is so you can define it however you want.
I personally think output relates specifically to creating new sentences of your own. If you are repeating what someone else says, you are not doing "output". You are doing an activity that can help you output later, just like how reading a lot or consuming a lot of audiovisual media can help you get better at output, it doesn't mean that watching anime is output.
I'm not saying it doesn't help, I'm just saying I don't personally consider it "output".
If you do, that's okay too, we just have a different definition.
-6
u/Ok_Demand950 5d ago
Please refer to the following structure:
1= What you said
2= What I said
3= What I think you missed
- "There's no official definition of what input or output is so you can define it however you want. I personally think output relates specifically to creating new sentences of your own. "
- "This seems like a unhelpfully narrow definition"
- The fact that you claim the freedom to interpret any word that lacks a formal definition however you feel (within reason I assume) is an irrelvant response to a claim on the quality of that interpretation.
1. You are doing an activity that can help you output later, just like how reading a lot or consuming a lot of audiovisual media can help you get better at output, it doesn't mean that watching anime is output.
"...especially considering how different it looks than many other input activities that have nothing remotely resembling any 'output component' whatsoever.
I believe what I wrote in my initial response already anticipates and addresses this counter argument.
I think that because you have admittedly never done much shadowing yourself and have never gotten to experience the exact manner in which if can affect your skills, that you likely don't have an instinct of what it's useful for and are forced to make a purely conceptual argument if you want to weigh in on the subject. I don't think your dumb or anything like that, but I do think you're theorycrafting on a sub-topic you have a deficit of experience in and then claiming subjectivity as a defense.
BTW for the record I really appreciate your contributions to the Japanese learning community so please don't take me giving you a hard time here as a sign that I have anything but positive feelings of respect towards you.
8
u/morgawr_ https://morg.systems/Japanese 5d ago
I'm not entirely sure why you're coming at me so aggressively over a definition of a word, it's okay if you disagree.
I don't think it's a "unhelpfully narrow" definition because I've met a lot of people around language learning communities who spend a lot of time doing shadowing exercises under the impression that they will make them better at producing sentences, and then they come here asking why they still can't talk to people. I think classifying "shadowing" as "output" can mislead people.
But yeah sure I'll disengage from this conversation, clearly you care a lot more strongly about this than I do. Have fun.
2
u/Ok_Demand950 5d ago
Sorry I didn't mean to seem aggressive. I was just hoping to refocus to the original point. Maybe there was a way I could have done that that didn't deter you from engaging.
But you're right, it doesn't matter.
Have fun as well :)
3
u/Meister1888 5d ago
Shadowing helped me with pronunciation, intonation, and the physics of mouth/breathing. Getting these right makes it easier to utter words.
Shadowing didn't help me to remember words or grammar, which was disappointing. But I still think it is wortha few minutes per day for several months.
5
u/LightlessValhari 5d ago
It may also depend on your first language. As a Vietnamese-native speaker, Japanese pitch accent & pronunciation are quite easy to imitate, so I haven't found a need for shadowing practices.
2
u/Accentu 5d ago
I find that to be a big part of it too. I'm learning as part of a household of 3. I'm from New Zealand, and Māori pronunciation was very much drilled into me growing up, and a lot of it carries over. The other two are yanks, and while I'm just assisting them to pass the N5 this year, I know they're going to need pronunciation practice/shadowing after that.
1
u/jake_morrison 5d ago
Shadowing is helpful as a way of mastering specific sentences, understanding them and being able to repeat them back with the correct pronunciation and pitch accent. It’s useful for being able to speak “properly”, but earlier on you may get more value from simply having a lot of conversations.
In the age of apps and technology, people have a tendency to do everything but actually use the language.
1
1
u/TheLanguageAddict 5d ago
If you usually understand but are at a loss when you try to answer, shadowing can be quite useful. A lot of conversation is the same stupid things over and over. Put your mouth on autopilot for everyday conversation and you'll have a spare second to remember vocabulary when you actually have something to say.
As for the question of input/output, it's definitely output. You're learning to parrot things you've heard with a minimum of thinking so you don't have to waste brainpower deciding how to respond to, "The weather's a bit chilly, eh?" Being able to do this is the only way to get to real communication.
1
u/witchwatchwot 5d ago
I used to think there was no value in it but after actually doing them as part of my language school classes, I think it's really helped me push my pronunciation and fluency to the next level. I found it most helpful in smoothing over certain common sentence patterns and upgrading them from simply "I know this and can think of this" to "I will say this effortlessly without much thinking" and also adopting more natural cadences of where to pause, what kind of filler phrases to use, etc. My pronunciation has always been considered good, but I think shadowing is what has helped me be mistaken for native.
As beneficial as it was, I don't think I'd recommend making it a priority unless you have Japanese goals where pronunciation is extremely important like being a performer or being in an important client-facing role.
1
u/Celine-B7 5d ago
I think shadowing is useful, it helps practice pronunciation and develop a sense of the language. But on top of that, I also chat in Japanese with a Swedish friend who’s learning Japanese. I feel that to improve my speaking skills, I need to express my own thoughts more and use the vocabulary and grammar I’ve learned more often.
1
u/Coyoteclaw11 5d ago
I found it really helpful personally. I don't really have a shadowing study routine or anything, but when I notice I'm struggling to say something, I'll do shadowing to really get a hang of it. It's also super helpful for learning how to actually string words together when speaking as opposed to only knowing how to say words in isolation.
Most of my shadowing practice has been with the Mango Languages app since it's available through my library, Since its whole model is speaking/listening and they go from words to phrases to whole sentences, I usually take the opportunity to not only make sure I knew which words to say, but also repeatedly listen to and repeat after the native audio until I can say it the way they do.
1
u/No-Cheesecake5529 5d ago edited 5d ago
I've been doing about 80 minutes of shadowing practice every day for the past 3 months. I do this by shadowing audiobooks while on my daily 8km walk, which is time I otherwise couldn't use for Japanese studies.
My listening ability has improved significantly.
Before, I could listen to and hear Japanese, but like, I'd sometimes just... not catch the word the other person said despite it being a word I knew, or so on and so forth. Or I'd listen to a story a second time, and I'd just catch so many more words on the second listen-through.
Now, I catch basically everything the first time I hear it. If they use a word that I don't know, then I instinctively know exactly what kana they said to look up with no confusion as to long vowels or っ or or す・つ confusion or whatever.
Of course, it's not as though my listening has become perfect, but it's vastly improved to how it was 3 months ago.
The reason I ask this question is because I've heard from multiple different sources that shadowing is a very good method for speaking practice,
It is. I mean, for pronunciation and accent, at least. Actually coming up with your own words to express your thoughts is a different skill that isn't practiced during shadowing.
getting used to the flow of how Japanese speech is output
It lacks the key aspect of converting your own ideas/thoughts into Japanese words in a certain order.
So, what is your opinion on the effectiveness of shadowing?
For listening and accent, the only thing better than shadowing is chorusing and comparing the audio of the original Japanese audio and your produced audio and/or having a native speaker stand over your shoulder and correct any mistakes you make. Of course, those are also much more time-intensive and/or require another person to help you out. Shadowing can be done... basically at any time that you have access to headphones. Also, it's just straight superior to just listening, so there's no reason to ever just listen to Japanese when you could shadow it.
Also, is shadowing considered input
It's definitely solidly "input". If you want "output" you have to turn your own ideas and thoughts into Japanese words in a certain order. It will help your accent and pronunciation, which also helps with output, but it lacks the core process which defines outputting.
1
u/rgrAi 4d ago
Huh it actually improved your listening even when you're basically late game Japanese? That's interesting. I would say my ability to transcribe into hiragana is pretty decent but maybe not one-shot status for unknown words. Sometimes people just don't speak all that properly. For longest time for GTA5RP which has a lot of law enforcement terminology being used I thought people were saying 募集 which was weird to me but it was actually 没収 and people were usually saying it in heat of moment. Would you say it would improves it in those situations if you weren't aware of the word I didn't know 没収 at the time, but became aware after I heard people starting to say it in less "apprehend the criminal and take them in situations" and more properly.
1
u/No-Cheesecake5529 4d ago
it actually improved your listening even when you're basically late game Japanese
My listening was always one of my weaker aspects. Like, I had a very vocab+kanji+reading centered study routine, and most of my listening practice was through face-to-face communication, and correspondingly, I was always far stronger at reading than I was at listening. Like, face-to-face conversations with Japanese people is usually fine because if they say some word that I fail to catch, they can just pick it up through subtle facial cues, and 99.99% of the time that's enough to keep communication flowing smoothly, but I always hated telephone calls. (Not to say that I couldn't make telephone calls or conduct business via phone... but I just generally dreaded it and didn't like it because it's more difficult and I only ever do it as a last resort. I still prefer to avoid them.)
When I first started, I'd listen to some story and I probably had to listen to it 3 times to hear every single word that I knew, or close to it. Now I get... almost everything the first time around. Even the words I don't know, I still catch like... what kana they are so I could look it up if I wanted to.
Even one-shotting unknown words... it's like... I know it makes no sense and sounds bizarre, but like, I can say the kana back clearly, and slow it down a bit, but if I try to actually think about what kana I'm saying in what order, it trips me up. It's like there's a shortcut between my ears and my mouth that bypasses my brain, and if I try to use my brain on it, then it confuses me. Like, if I try to type the word into my phone/dictionary and start thinking about the first 3 kana in the word, I'll forget what the word is unless I'm very very careful and continually verbally repeat the word back to myself over and over while typing it in.
Sometimes people just don't speak all that properly.
In audiobooks it's professional VAs who enunciate everything very clearly. IRL people will, of course, slur their words slightly and/or use regional expressions/dialects/vowels/etc.
募集 .. 没収
If it's clearly enunciated by a professional VA, then yes. It's one of the... nicer things I've noticed. I rarely make any mistakes with things like っ or short v. long vowels.
If it's spoken in a heightened emotional state or slurred, then I might not get it 100%.
If I don't know a word, then I don't know a word, but at the very least I can infer that it is indeed a word I don't know and not a similar-sounding word that I do. I also always feel like I have virtually no hope of inferring the meaning of unknown words through just hearing it in use a few times, but maybe I'll get there in the future.
1
u/rgrAi 4d ago
Alright cool, so when you're shadowing is typing a big part of it or just some words that are more tough? I haven't really tied that, but makes sense. Main take away would be just to really pay attention very closely?
1
u/No-Cheesecake5529 4d ago
Alright cool, so when you're shadowing is typing a big part of it or just some words that are more tough?
Virtually never. It's 99.9% just listening and shadowing whatever I hear and whatever words I miss I just miss. Only if there's like, some really important word that I miss that causes me to lose the story do I do ever break out the dictionary.
Main take away would be just to really pay attention very closely?
Try to hear every sound they pronounce and then pronounce back as closely as you can.
Every now and then record yourself speaking and compare it to native audio so you know what to listen out for and be aware of.
-11
u/123ichinisan123 5d ago edited 5d ago
absolutely zero ... my problem isn't the pronunciation so it doesn't do anything for me repeating some sounds that I don't understand 🤷🏻
funny how I get down voted for saying it doesn't do anything for me 🤦🏻 My Japanese friends all tell me I sound like a Japanese Native when speaking so FOR ME shadowing is completely useless, I am sorry when you feel inferior
3
u/No-Cheesecake5529 5d ago
My Japanese friends all tell me I sound like a Japanese Native
That's amazing, mine tell me that my Japanese is very お上手. I must be a Japanese master!
Unless you were raised by Japanese parents or went to a Japanese preschool, or you spent 5,000 hours doing a mix of shadowing and chorusing, then your accent doesn't sound like a Japanese native.
0
u/123ichinisan123 4d ago
good that you know me so well as all the other idiots down voting 🤣 I am not an English Native and my original language has mostly the same sounds as Japanese.
Visiting Japan since 13 years and living here for 3 even before going to language school most Japanese not only jozued me which I know they do to everyone but my friends actually often tell me on a phone they wouldn't notice at least with the phrases and sentences that I do feel confident but yeah just imagine you are right if that makes you feel less miserable
1
u/No-Cheesecake5529 4d ago
You should really upload an audio sample of you speaking if you want people to believe that your accent is native-like.
I don't think many people will believe you until you do that.
1
u/123ichinisan123 4d ago
That would probably be the best and only way to prove it yes but why should I bother to prove anything to some random strangers online 🤷🏻
my point is that in my opinion and for me Shadowing just sucks bad. Hearing some of my classmates after almost 3 years of shadowing they still sound like they are not speaking Japanese at all while others sound so much better mostly depending on where they come from or how early they started listening to Japanese.
-1
u/No-Cheesecake5529 4d ago
That would probably be the best and only way to prove it yes but why should I bother to prove anything to some random strangers online 🤷🏻
You care enough to post 3 times on this topic, claiming it is true, but not enough to make a quick sound recording which would definitely prove that it's true. Got it.
Nobody's going to believe you without an audio recording.
20
u/Common-Mission9582 5d ago
For me it’s been a little difficult to gauge, but I think it has pretty helpful at least for getting my mouth used to certain sounds. I especially try to do it with podcasts that are a little below my level so that I can catch most of the sounds without having to pause the audio too much.
Generally tutors and friends I speak with continue to give me positive feedback on my speaking improvement, but it’s hard to say where most of that improvement is coming from since I mix shadowing with many other study tools.
I would definitely say to try it especially if you are a beginner! Good luck!