はるやすみ: Recap

 こんにちは、みんな！

Before I head on だいがくのやすみ (university break) or better known as はるやすみ (Spring Break) for this time of year, I wanted to share with you a recap of what I've learned. 

Creating basic sentences:

• [noun] です。
• みずです。(It's water.)
• The purpose of this is to make a statement or an answer a question asking what something is. 

• [subject] の [noun] です。
• わたしのほんです。(My book.)
• の modifies "わたし" from "I" to "my".
• だいがくのやすみ (university break)
• の shows the relationship between "だいがく" (university) and "やすみ" (break) to create the compound "university break".
• The purpose of this is to show possession of something or to modify the noun as a relationship marker.

• [subject] の [noun] も...です。
• ブラウンさんのせんこうもせいじがくです。(Brown-san's major is also political science.)
• The particle "も" attaches to the phrase "ブラウンさんのせんこう" to show similarity between something that was previously stated. 
• This particle also functions in the way a topic particle (は) does.
• The purpose of this, as stated above, is to show similarity between a previous statement. 

• [subject] の [noun] は ... じゃないです。
• わたしのせんこうはびじゅつじゃないです。(My major isn't art.)
• "じゃない" is what makes a statement false.
• An important note being that は is used to show that something is the topic of that sentence.
• The purpose of this is to negate a statement, to say something isn't true.
• Primarily used with Yes/No or True/False questions.

• [subject] は [noun] がだいすきです。
• わたしはアヒルがだいすきです。(I really like ducks.)
• "が" is used to denote the subject of the sentence.
• "だいすき" is used to state when one really likes something.
• "すき" is used to state something one likes.
• The purpose of this sentence is to show what one really likes.

As sentences become more complex and begin to include verb phrases, there's something I found to be useful to remember the order: 

    [topic] は [time] に [location] で [direct object] を [verb] です。

      *For an explanation of these particles, continue reading to the particles section of this           post.

Telling Time (for this section, I'll be using military time in the English Translation):

• [AM/PM] [number] じです。
• ごぜんいちじです。(It's 01:00.)
• ごごいちじです。(It's 13:00.)
• "じ" is the marker for o'clock.
• The purpose of this is to state the time on the dot.

• [AM/PM] [number] じはんです。
• ごぜんいちじはんです。(It's 01:30.)
• ごごいちじはんです。(It's 13:30.)
• "はん" is the marker for 30/half past the hour.
• The purpose of this is to state the time with an inclusion of half past the hour.

• [AM/PM] [number] じはんごろです。
• ごぜんいちじはんごろです。(It's around 01:30.)
• ごごいちじはんごろです。(It's around 13:30.)
• "ごろ" is the marker for an approximate time. This will always come at the end of the time phrase.
• The purpose of this is to make an estimate for the time.

Particles Introduced in Class:

*Something worth mentioning is that English doesn't use particles in the same way that Japanese uses them. It will take time to understand how these are used in relation/comparison to English.

"が": used as a subject marker for the sentence.

"は": used to denote the topic of the sentence.

"じ": used after a time of day and number to denote the "o'clock" in time. 

"も": used to show what is the same between statements.

"と": used to connect nouns to create a noun phrase.

"で": used to show where something is taking place.

"を": used to show the direct object, which is a noun that receives the action of the verb.

"の": used to show possession between a subject and a noun or a relationship between two nouns.

"に" is a bit complex of a particle

• Used for a specific point in time. This can be time of day or day of the week.
• This particle can be conjugated with the particle "と" for both time and day of the week before the particle.
• Used for indicating where something is. Think of it in this context as a destination particle.