日本語の はんせい 三

The end of first semester is finally here, and with it the end of the third goal cycle.  I believe that I made a good amount of progress this goal cycle, and throughout the semester, toward improving my pitch patterns and speaking speed, as well as my general comprehension.  I really enjoyed the Japanese language table, which was always a lot of fun and a good way to practice Japanese in an informal setting, and am sad that there is no table during reading period or finals.  Going to office hours was an excellent way to work on my pronunciation, as I had the opportunity to repeat certain phrases many times until my pitch pattern was correct, especially for the particles that come after common nouns.  This was also a great setting in which to work on improving the speed of my speech, as I often tried to carry on a natural conversation for an extended period of time.  While I only did a few formal shadowing exercises this goal cycle, I feel that they were quite challenging and really pushed me to work on correct pronunciation even when speaking quickly.  In addition, while working on the listening exercises out of the textbook and listening to the プリラジ, I improved my ability to work around words that I don't know and extract meaning from the dialogue anyway.  Finally, the プリテレ project was actually a lot of fun, and practicing my part (for the broadcast later today) helped me to improve the speed and pronunciation of my speech, and also taught me some cool new vocabulary.  I can't wait for next semester and to continue learning such a cool language!