Adventurasia Community

The Kumon program offers two forms of instruction — class method and correspondence. For now, I’m going with the class method as it will help to keep me on schedule. There are various classes/centres throughout Japan (probably hundreds), and I will probably be going to one of the main centres located in Ichigaya as it’s convenient from both work and home. This particular centre is opened from 14:00 - 20:00 Tuesdays/Fridays. You can choose to go to the centre once or twice a week, and at any time during its hours of operation. During the trial I will attend twice a week, but may switch to once a week later on. This flexible time arrangement works well for me as the available ‘visiting window’ is quite wide — case in point, this Friday evening we have a company social, and if I had to attend class at a fixed time such as 18:00-20:00, then I’d have to either miss the class or miss the event. But in this case, I can juggle my schedule a bit, and attend both :-).

At the centre, you submit your worksheets for marking. At the same time, you will be asked to read aloud the material in the worksheet — the instructor will check for pronunciation/fluency/accuracy. The marked sheets are returned and you need to correct any mistakes and get them approved by the instructor. While the sheets are being marked, the instructor will hand you the next set of worksheets for the day. You would then borrow one of their CD Players, go through the exercises, then hand it in for marking, followed by reading aloud. Once this is done, you then let the instructor know when you plan to visit the centre next, and he/she will provide you with enough worksheets to ‘tide you over’ until the next time you visit. eg. On Tuesday, I completed one set of worksheets (20 pages) in class, then before leaving, got 2 sets of worksheets (40 pages total) which are good until my Friday class.

At the start of the program, you take a diagnostic test. I did okay in some of the more advanced reading passages, but did horrible on katakana and writing kanji. With the kumon method, they won’t let you advance unless you have mastered the materials at a lower level. So I’m starting at a level that begins with writing katakana. There are two main japanese programs: japanese language program for non-native speakers; and the kokugo program designed for native speakers. The non-native speaker program consists of 15 levels (katakana begins at level 4) while the kokugo program consists of 25 levels. Each level of the non-native speaker program consists of 10~20 sets of worksheets for a total of (100~200 pages). To go to the next level, you need to pass an ‘achievement test’ with at least 80% score.

I like how the course seems to be structured in a way that the learning is progressive — each set of worksheet builds on the previous set; mastery of a set of worksheets is required before moving to the next set. My problem is that I’m stronger in certain grammatical structures, yet do not have the basics down pat — this is as a result of taking courses from various schools at different levels, and non-structured self study. The Kumon curriculum takes you from zero ability all the way up to about a grade 9 equivalent at a Japanese school. (Beyond level 2 of the Japanese proficiency exam)

Of course, since this course is based on individual learning, there is little or no opportunity for roleplaying, and/or interaction with a diverse group of people. I’d say enrolling in a course that focuses on conversation would be a perfect complement to the Kumon course. Many foreigners will argue that ability to converse in Japanese is more important than reading/writing — but I think this depends on the type of work you do. At the moment, I’ve been doing a fair bit of work setting up computers / internal network, and I sure wish I could read the dialogue boxes without having to ask a non-techncial Japanese staff member to try to read and explain it to me.

Finally, because the way the course is structured, the costs are very reasonable. Either correspondence or class course costs less than 10,000 Yen per month. The only other item that needs to be purchased is an audio CD+transcript for 1000 Yen per level.