Podcasts by Robot Challenge Screen
The Ultimate Study Guide to Passing the JLPT in Less Time and With Less Pain.
Further podcasts by Clayton MacKnight
Podcast on the topic Sprachen lernen
All episodes
JLPT BC 167 | Learning to take Breaks from 2015-09-16T12:40:33
This last month has been pretty rough on me to be honest. There was a lot of last minute planning for my vacation. And of course, right when you want to go on vacation, everything seems to need ext...
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JLPT BC 166 | What a Rat Experiment might Tell us about Japan’s Population Problem from 2015-09-02T14:38:52
When I first moved to Japan loved the city. It was nice and compact and everything is in one place. As long as you are a decent walk away from a train station you can get anywhere pretty easily wit...
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JLPT BC 165 | Speaking Practice with FluentU from 2015-07-29T00:41:39
I’ve always found summer to be a more active time. Despite the oppressive heat and humidity we have here in Japan, I still think the increased sunlight and ability to walk around the house in a lot...
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JLPT BC 164 | You’ll always be an Outsider in Japan from 2015-07-15T12:52:49
I grew up in white bread America where the corn grows high and hills don’t. I spent most of my time in a city of a mere 10,000 where everybody knew each other (and who was doing what to who). It wa...
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JLPT BC 163 | Chatting it Up from 2015-06-24T12:42:41
It’s a story you’ve heard several times – we don’t talk to each other like we used to. Because ya know, back in the good ole days we used to chat it up with our neighbors and everybody knew everybo...
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JLPT BC 162 | 5 Things to Know to Become an Ukiyo-e master from 2015-06-10T15:31:15
Ukiyo-e, if you are not familiar, is a Japanese art form that was popular from 17th century to 19th century Japan. It basically consists of woodblocks used for mass production of pictures. Ukiy...
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JLPT BC 161 | Doing it the Hard Way from 2015-05-27T11:15:48
In school, I always had a hard time paying attention in class. The teacher would lecture away and we were suppose to be taking notes, but to be honest I could never proper filter out what was impo...
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JLPT BC 160 | BSing in Japan, Honne vs. Tatemae from 2015-05-13T02:31:17
A few years back, I was working at a school and we were trying to arrange a farewell party for one of our fellow teachers. One teacher found a great Indian restaurant that wasn’t too far away from...
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JLPT BC 159 | Analog vs. Digital from 2015-04-29T12:52:31
I’ve been taking it pretty easy with my studies recently due to some re-prioritizing of my time. I’m chugging away on Hirugao and Harry Potter but I’m giving myself a little more time to digest thi...
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JLPT BC 158 | Divorce in Japan from 2015-04-15T12:47:14
I should start off by saying that I’m not getting divorced. I’m still happily married and probably will be for the foreseeable future. Some of my fellow expatriates and Japanese friends haven’t b...
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JLPT BC 157 | Back to jDramas from 2015-04-01T12:28:47
I’ve been spending (or wasting depending on how you look at) with keeping my streaks up on Memrise. I think it is great to have that daily goal, but I have busy days and not so busy days and it can...
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JLPT BC 156 | The Realities of Living in a Foreign Country from 2015-03-18T12:41:39
There seems to be a small subsection of the expat population in Japan, that likes to shower the world with negativity and tell you about how horrible it is to live in Japan. Some of them came over...
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JLPT BC 155 | Intensive Reading and Memrise Update from 2015-03-04T12:26:47
I’ve been trying to keep my studying pretty steady over the last couple of months and not really piling on and changing anything. This has a lot to do with me just having way too much going on for ...
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JLPT BC 154 | Big Hero 6 vs. Baymax from 2015-02-18T15:06:53
A couple of weeks back I had some free time to take my family to Baymax (US title: Big Hero 6). It is a cute little movie about a boy, named Hiro, who befriends his brother’s robot and ultimately ...
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JLPT BC 153 | The Inevitable Catch Up Phase from 2015-02-04T12:51:18
December in Japan is always unbelievably busy. There is the Christmas/Bonenkai party season. Then, you have New Year’s cards to design and write. And finally, the big cleaning where you throw out a...
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JLPT BC 152 | 5 More Things I Wish Japan Had from 2015-01-14T14:44:20
Last month, I ranted on about 5 things that I think Japan could import from other countries. One thing that I missed on that list, and this list as well, is a work-life balance. Japan definitely do...
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JLPT BC 151 | Vocab Bulking through Reading from 2014-12-30T12:27
I celebrated Christmas a little early again this year. The 23rd is a holiday here in Japan. (It’s the Emperor’s Birthday). It is the one day that we officially have off and get paid for it, so it t...
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JLPT BC 150 | 10 Things I really Wish Japan Had from 2014-12-17T02:30:15
Japan has a lot of great things to love about it. There are convenient train systems, relatively low crime, and 24 hour vending machines. These all make life extremely nice for us all, but if I may...
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JLPT BC 149 | The Harry Potter Method from 2014-11-26T02:15
It has been an incredibly busy couple of weeks. I was incredibly busy with Halloween and the little one. We were actually able to go trick or treating twice. Trick or treating is not yet a standa...
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JLPT BC 148 | Living in Groups in Japan from 2014-11-12T02:28:26
At one time, I used to teach an English class to some public servants. And it being a government sanctioned event, everything had to start incredibly early, 8am to be exact. This was not a normal t...
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JLPT BC 147 | How to Learn Japanese Particles from 2014-10-30T12:52:53
It has been an incredibly tough month for me. I had some more medical issues I had to deal with. Nothing serious or life-threatening just incredibly time consuming. We are also running into some fa...
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JLPT BC 146 | Travel to Matsuyama with Me from 2014-10-16T01:31:36
Phew, that was a bit of a long train ride. It seems like Matsuyama is such a long way from most of the major cities in Japan. And it really feels like it too. I heard there are around 500,000 peopl...
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JLPT BC 145 | The Only Constant is Change from 2014-09-24T14:19:05
I used to be a huge Garfield fan growing up. I read all his comics and thought that they were the best. For my 8th birthday, my parents even made me a Garfield shaped cake and decorated it perfectl...
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JLPT BC 144 | The Top 5 People that Stay in Japan from 2014-09-10T14:16:08
For a lot of people, living abroad is a temporary thing. Most come for a year or two to work, or to go to school. Then, they hightail it back to their home countries to start their ‘real’ lives. ...
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JLPT BC 143 | More Fun More Reading from 2014-08-20T16:34:12
I’ve recently been really mixing up my studying to try to do some more things. I can never seem to keep my motivation up for passing the test between these lulls in action of between taking the tes...
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JLPT BC 142 | Convenience in Japan from 2014-08-06T14:58:46
My wife and I had just arrived in Paris for our honeymoon. Due to our flight being delayed, we were about 2 hours later than we originally planned. We were both fairly hungry, but it being a strang...
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JLPT BC 141 | Post Test Slump from 2014-07-23T15:03:51
About a week ago, I went up to Kyoto University to take the test again at their somewhat poorly cooled facility. I covered my first impressions before earlier, but in general I felt more confident ...
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JLPT BC 140 | Top 10 things to do in Japan from 2014-07-02T14:57:13
This post is a continuation of last month’s top 10. #80991982 / gettyimages.com 5. Purikura This is one of those things that most people probably don’t know about outside of Japan, but can be the s...
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JLPT BC 139 | Getting Closer to the July Test from 2014-06-18T14:35:34
With the July test just around the corner, I’ve switched off all of my ‘fun’ studying which is a bit depressing. I’ll basically be reviewing and really perfecting everything before the big day. It’...
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JLPT BC 138 | Top Ten Things to Do in Japan from 2014-06-04T02:26:41
10. Karaoke Box or Clubs Karaoke boxes or clubs as they are sometimes called are practically everywhere in Japan. If you are downtown, all you need to do is walk a few blocks at night and you will...
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JLPT BC 137 | Bulking Up on Vocabulary from 2014-05-21T15:14:50
We are now moving into the final stretch before the July test. I’ve switched a lot of fun studying into more aggressive drilling and practicing vocabulary and grammar. I think it is important to ...
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JLPT BC 136 | My Greatest Adventure from 2014-05-07T14:27:05
Living and working in Japan for a few years, you get to have a lot of adventures. Living abroad in general just encourages you to go out and experience life. For example, I never used to travel alo...
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JLPT BC 135 | Adding Grammar and Vocabulary Back In from 2014-04-24T15:17:28
I’ve got a good start on the first book of Game of Thrones (氷と炎の歌１). It has been a lot of fun because I really like that particular story. I think there are a lot of people that will probably find ...
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JLPT BC 134 | How to Marry a Japanese Woman from 2014-04-09T15:01:43
I’ve been married now for 5 years. This is after dating my wife for about 3 years before we got married, so we have been together for a grand total of about 8 years. It has been a sometimes interes...
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JLPT BC 133 | Beware of the Yellow Sand from 2014-03-26T14:02:27
You were probably advised when you were very young to not eat the yellow snow. What about yellow sand? It’s that season again in Japan, and we are again being blessed with the wonderful dirty, grit...
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JLPT BC 132 | Making Good Progress from 2014-03-12T14:02:48
I have finally finished off the two elementary school level books that I had lying around the house. They were novelizations of “Toy Story” and “Surf’s Up” that I had picked up awhile ago. These no...
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JLPT BC 131 | The Smell of Coffee in Japan from 2014-02-26T14:43:14
When I first came to Japan, I was, like so many others, fascinated by the vending machines. I mean there are vending machines absolutely everywhere in Japan. And they will vend absolutely everythin...
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JLPT BC 130 | Adding in a Little Fun from 2014-02-12T14:12:04
Okay so I officially failed the exam again. I had a bit of a hunch that I wouldn’t pass but it is good to get the official results, so I can start planning out how to study this year. I want to mak...
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JLPT BC 129 | The Evolution of Japanese Housing from 2014-01-22T15:35:39
When you visit a foreign country, the first thing on your list to check out is usually not the houses. After all, they aren’t quite as glamorous as 400 year old temples and shrines. But, they can t...
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JLPT BC 128 | Getting Ready for Winter Break from 2013-12-18T14:14:22
So the test is finally over for 2013. I was barely able to get to the test much less put in serious study time the whole month before because I was in the process of moving, which is now thankfully...
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JLPT BC 127 | Sex and Lies (about Sex) in Japan from 2013-11-27T15:04:09
There was somewhat recent Guardian article that got a lot of Facebook love about a month ago. It was essentially the rehashed news report of an annual survey about Japan’s sex habits, to put it bl...
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JLPT BC 126 | Boiling Down Japanese Vocabulary from 2013-11-13T00:29:12
Lately, I’ve gotten more and more annoyed at doing vocabulary drills. A lot of this has to do with it getting tremendously boring to do the same thing over and over. But, also because of being at a...
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JLPT BC 125 | City Life vs. Countryside for Expats from 2013-10-30T06:30:14
Japan is known for its cities. If you ask someone to imagine Japan, one of the first things that probably comes up is the scramble walk in Shubuya, where hundreds if not thousands of people cross t...
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JLPT BC 124 | Boiling Down the Grammar from 2013-10-16T04:46:54
After the July test, I’ve been moving toward more natural study methods and keeping my nose out of drill books. I started doing some reading of PHP, a small magazine with short essays that have rel...
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JLPT BC 123 | Is the Sky Falling in Japan? from 2013-10-02T14:50:37
It doesn’t get much mainstream press these days, but Japan has a bit of a debt problem. The national debt will be an estimated 245% of the GDP, which seems simply unfathomable. In order to pay such...
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JLPT BC 122 | Speed Reading Update from 2013-09-18T15:02:08
After the test results last month, I’ve started to rework my studying a little more to get ready for the December test. At this point, I feel like I know the skills I need. I just need to over-lear...
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JLPT BC 121 | Just Call me Mac from 2013-09-04T11:48:55
Your typical full name in Japan is made up of 4 kanji – 2 kanji for a first name or given name and 2 kanji for the last name or surname. There are somewhere around 600 or so extra kanji that are us...
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JLPT BC 120 | Building up Reading from 2013-08-21T15:23:13
Last month, I said I was going to start reading Kazoku Geemu, but I got sidetracked for technical reasons. Apparently, you need a kindle device, or kindle for Android to read the eBook version (Kin...
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JLPT BC 119 | City Vision from 2013-08-07T14:55:26
Tokyo and Osaka are two massive clusters of people living fairly close to each other. Tokyo is ranked as the largest metropolitan area by population in the world with about 32 million people, where...
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JLPT BC 118 | Adventures in Translation from 2013-07-24T14:10:37
One of my original goals when I first decided to study a little harder and take my Japanese to the N1 level was to become a translator. I’m currently teaching English now, and I enjoy it, but trans...
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