Complete Japanese: The Basics (Book) (LL(R) Complete Basic Courses)

I started this course book and cd collection and I really like it. Unlike most tutorials it starts off with the basics of grammer: understanding vowel and consonant pronounciation. Starts off with everyday words for each, very short lesson to show you how to pronounce all the vowels and consonants and then you listen to the CD after every lesson to hear exactly what you are reading. Just like learning our own native language it teaches everyday words first, just like we learned apple, Monday, dollar etc first and then sentences. It also explains syllabary. I've picked up many tutorials trying to learn Japanese and so far this has been the easiest to understand and relate to. It's not repition from a tape/CD it's actual learning how to understand and speak it. THEN you can go on to learning kana, kanji,writing etc. Some complaints I read is that it doesn't use the Japanese characters or real-world sentences and situations. Well this is like learning in elementary school. You learn letters, then the words, then the sentences and essays and so on. You don't just jump into writing long words and sentences when you don't even know how to read yet. My only complaint is that with this and all the tutorials is that it's difficult for me to hear some of the words so I have to keep playing back the entire lesson just to replay one word that I have trouble with (on a CD).

I am in the process of studying Japanese to prepare for living in Tokyo next year. Learning Japanese through the Living Language series is helpful but also has some drawbacks. The biggest drawback is that the writers fail to include pronunciation helps in the text itself, however they do indeed provide native Japanese speakers to help in the accompanying three CDs. Also, they spend the first four or five lessons on various grammatical topics, which can actually be a little confusing when trying to learn a new language. Other language series jump into learning words and phrases by repetition, citing the fact that to really learn any new language you must practice repeating it over and over out loud and not worry at first about grammar and syntax. That being said, I will seek to finish the 40 lesson in this course and hope it better prepare me for my year that will be spend in Japan.