Buuki and the Pinging Monster: A kickstarter for Japanese Learners
Channel: MonnieBiloney
Date: 01/03/2022

One of the hardest things about learning a new language is diving into native material. There have been many different attempts by different authors and publishers over the years to help kick us into the language battlefield. However, quite a few of those sources were either mind-bogglingly boring or a little too simplistic for my preferences. 

Not only that, but some of them would claim that they were amazing for learning just because they would have Japanese on one side, and English on the other! For that to be anywhere near effective, you would have to have 2 English translations, one to convey the more ‘literal’ meaning of the sentence, and one for the contextual meaning. 

For example, むかしむかし、あるところに contextually has the meaning of “Once upon a time” but literally it means something closer to “long long ago, in a certain place.”

This story will not contain an English translation alongside the Japanese text. Now, you might wonder how this would be any different than just grabbing a random Japanese picture book and reading that--and I’m getting there

What makes this book different from other Japanese children's books is that it will have 3 versions, which you can choose from depending on your learning style. The text of the story will be identical between these 3 editions

One version is a book that looks like a normal children's book, but it has grammar explanations in English at the back. Each story page will have symbols on it, referencing which pages contain the grammar explanations that were used on that specific page.

Another version will be an activity book. The book will contain activities you’d normally find in an activity book, but also contains the narrative of the story.  These activities would contain, but not be limited to, word searches, mazes, dot to dot, splot the difference, etc. The explanations of these activities would be in English.

The last one will be a simple coloring book, for those who enjoy coloring pages more than getting into the nitty-gritty of grammar. The grammar pages would also be included for those who enjoy both of course.
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