id
was set in the arguments array for the "Primary Sidebar" sidebar. Defaulting to "sidebar-1". Manually set the id
to "sidebar-1" to silence this notice and keep existing sidebar content. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 4.2.0.) in /home/bkerr/apps/extensivereading/wp-includes/functions.php on line 5665id
was set in the arguments array for the "Secondary Sidebar" sidebar. Defaulting to "sidebar-2". Manually set the id
to "sidebar-2" to silence this notice and keep existing sidebar content. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 4.2.0.) in /home/bkerr/apps/extensivereading/wp-includes/functions.php on line 5665id
was set in the arguments array for the "Tertiary Sidebar" sidebar. Defaulting to "sidebar-3". Manually set the id
to "sidebar-3" to silence this notice and keep existing sidebar content. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 4.2.0.) in /home/bkerr/apps/extensivereading/wp-includes/functions.php on line 5665id
was set in the arguments array for the "Content Sidebar" sidebar. Defaulting to "sidebar-4". Manually set the id
to "sidebar-4" to silence this notice and keep existing sidebar content. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 4.2.0.) in /home/bkerr/apps/extensivereading/wp-includes/functions.php on line 5665id
was set in the arguments array for the "Footer Sidebars (5-Column)" sidebar. Defaulting to "sidebar-5". Manually set the id
to "sidebar-5" to silence this notice and keep existing sidebar content. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 4.2.0.) in /home/bkerr/apps/extensivereading/wp-includes/functions.php on line 5665The main program pages all follow about the same format, so they’re easy to navigate.
All of the translations are my own; if there’s any official translations for any of these program names I never found them. Some are more literal than others. I’ve used an asterisk to show which ones have subtitles (which can be turned off, as well)
With more than 50 programs, even I haven’t watched an episode from each one, but so far I really like the “So Many Wonders” series (ふしぎがいっぱい), “Amazing History” (歴史にドキリ), “Smile” (スマイル), “I Can See Japan” (見えるぞ!ニッポン) and “The Master of Communication and His Lovely Assistant” (お伝と伝じろう; probably the translation I took the most liberty with!) If you find any you particularly like, write a comment about it!
Thanks to my friend Tsubasa for help with some of the title translations, and to Image Maps for the imagemap function!
]]>EhonNavi now has over 1,000 [...]]]>
EhonNavi now has over 1,000 Japanese picture books available for free! If you are new to tadoku, whatever your ability level is, it’s probably one of the best ways to start. I find that word count is, with a few exceptions, the best way to judge a book’s difficulty level, and so I’ve been reading through them and sorting them by estimated word count. So if you’re a beginning learner, pick out a book from the list! If it turns out to be too hard, find one with fewer words, and if it’s too easy, find one with more words. If you’re advanced enough not to need this kind of guidance, Ehon Navi split the available books by age and that’s probably the best way to find ones within your level. Either way, don’t forget Sakai-sensei’s tadoku guidelines: don’t look up words while reading, skip parts you don’t understand, and if you’re not enjoying the book, get another one.
To access all these free books, you’ll have to register. For help with this, please see my registration walkthrough. And don’t forget that the site is finicky; they want you to be using Windows and Firefox and it might not work otherwise, you have 15 minutes to load the story, and you can only read a story once. For more information on how to successfully use the page, please refer to the EhonNavi entry in my list of reading material.
]]>I’ve added a ♬ next to books I think have some cultural content. This is pretty subjective, of course.
I’ve added a next to books I particularly liked.
きこえる?きこえるよ
Can you hear? I can hear! No words. Use to see if Ehon navi works for you!
レインボウブックス ながれ
Flow, no words
レインボウブックス きもち
Feelings, no words
COLORS (カラーズ)
Colors, 11 words
するするすとーん
Slide, Slide, Plunk, 15 words
もこもこもこ
Bulge Bulge, 16 words
レインボウブックス ことば
Words, 16 words
ぐるぐるどぼーん
Spin, Spin, Plop, 16 words
GREETINGS(グリーティングス)あいさつのえほん
Picture Book of Greetings, 17 words
いっしょにあそぼう おめめ おはな おくち
Let’s Play! Eyes, Nose, Mouth, 17 words
おはよう
Good Morning, 18 words
いただきまーす!
Let’s Eat! 18 words
のれるかな? うかぶかな? ききゅう
Balloon, 20 words
ぽんぽんポコポコ
Thump thump, 20 words
ころころぽーん
Roll, Roll, Bounce, 20 words
いっしょにあそぼう あいうえお
Let’s Play! A-I-U-E-O, 20 words
おでこ ぴたっ
Forehead Bump, 22 words
おてて たっち
Touch Hands, 23 words
いない いない おかお
Where’s That Face? Peekaboo!, 25 words
もっと いろいろ ばあ
More Color Peekaboo, 25 words
おはな つんつん
Nose Kisses, 25 words
めくってごらん
Let’s Turn The Page, 25 words ♬
つみき
Building Blocks, 27 words
いろいろばあ
Color Peekaboo, 30 words
に~っこり
Big Smile, 30 words
しーっ
Shhh, 30 words
だっだぁー
Daddaa, 30 words
レインボウブックス リズム
Rhythm, 30 words
プララのとんねるぶっぶー
Purala’s Tunnel *honk honk*, 30 words
さがしてごらん
Let’s Search, 32 words
おやすみ ペンギン
Good Night, Penguin, 35 words
かんぱーい
Cheers, 35 words
ノンタンはみがきはーみー
Nontan Brushes His Teeth, 35 words ♬
どんぐりころちゃん
The Little Roly-Poly Acorn, 35 words
ぶっぶー どらいぶ
*honk honk* Driving, 40 words
みて みて おてて
Look, Look, My Hand, 40 words
赤ちゃんのための色のえほん
Color Picture Book for Babies, 40 words
赤ちゃんのためのことばの絵本
Word Picture Book for Babies, 40 words
おでんわ もしもし しましまちゃん
It’s for you! Hello, Stripe-Chan, 40 words ♬
アリのおでかけ
The Ants Go Out, 40 words
ねんねのうた
The Night-Night Song, 40 words
あるひ、こねこね
One Day, *knead knead*, 45 words
なに なに なあに?
What’s This, What’s This, What’s Thiiiis?, 45 words
おさんぽ さんぽ
A Walk, A Walk, 45 words
はなび ドーン
Fireworks! Boom!, 45 words
ありがとう
Thank You, 45 words
のぞいてごらん
Let’s Peek, 45 words
れんけつガッチャン
Connect! *click*, 45 words
ぼくのいす?
Is This My Chair?, 50 words
赤ちゃんのためのかたちの絵本
Picture Book of Shapes for Babies, 50 words
くるくる なあに?
What’s Rolled Up?, 50 words
ころころとんとん
Roll, Roll, Bounce, Bounce, 50 words
まねっこ にゃー にゃー
Copy Cat Meow Meow, 50 words
くらべてごらん
Let’s Compare, 50 words ♬
さわさわもみじ
Rustling Maple Leaves, 50 words
おもちゃのかくれんぼ
The Toys Play Hide and Seek, 55 words
ありさんぽつぽつ
The Ants Go Marching, 55 words
ゆき ふふふ
The Snow Falls, 55 words
ほわほわさくら
Fluttering Cherry Blossoms, 55 words
あめ ぽぽぽ
Raindrops Splash, 55 words
まゆげちゃん
Dad’s Eyebrows, 60 words
しろくまくんの このあな なぁに?
Polar Bear-kun, What’s This Hole?, 60 words
あかちゃんたいそう
Baby Exercises, 60 words
たどってごらん
Let’s Follow, 60 words
ぎょうれつ
The Line, 60 words
ねえ、あそぼ! 2さいのパンダちゃん
Come On, Let’s Play! 2-year old Little Panda, 60 words
いろいろバス
Various Bus Colors, 65 words
きょうのそらはどんなそら
What’s today’s sky like? 70 words
おばけのアイスクリームやさん
The Ice-Cream Selling Ghost, 70 words
まってるまってる
Waiting, Waiting, 70 words
ほっぺに、ちゅー。
A Kiss On The Cheek, 70 words
くんくん、いいにおい
*sniff sniff* That Smells Good,72 words
うみ、ざざざ
The Sound of the Ocean, 75 words
かくれんぼ しましょ
Let’s Play Hide and Seek, 75 words
ほらそっくり
Look, We’re The Same, 75 words
とーんだ とんだ
Blown Away, 75 words
青いヤドカリ
The Blue Hermit Crab, 80 words
とんとんとん
Knock Knock Knock, 80 words
りんご りんご りんご りんご りんご りんご
Apple Apple Apple Apple Apple Apple, 80 words
いろいろいちご
Many Kinds of Strawberries, 80 words
ココロのヒカリ
Soul Light, 80 words
赤ちゃんずかん(0・1・2さい)
Baby’s Illustrated Dictionary (For 0, 1 and 2 year olds), 80 words
スージー・ズー わらってるのはだあれ?
Suzy’s Zoo: Who’s Laughing?, 80 words
ないた
I Cried, 90 words ♬
おたんじょうびのケーキちゃん
The Little Birthday Cake, 90 words
おとうさん もういっかい ゆうえんち
One More, Papa! Papa’s Amusement Park, 90 words
おとうさん もういっかい うみあそび
One More, Papa! Papa’s Beach Fun, 90 words
おとうさん もういっかい たかいたかい
One More, Papa! Up High With Papa, 90 words
はたらく じどうしゃ
Vehicles At Work, 100 words
ものすごくおおきなプリンのうえで
On Top Of A Huge Pudding, 100 words
(Some text was cut off when this got scanned, unfortunately.)
ねんねしよ。
Let’s Go Night-Night, 100 words
かわいいね。
Cute, Huh? 100 Words
スージー・ズー はみがきだいすき
Suzy’s Zoo: I Love To Brush My Teeth, 100 words
スージー・ズー いやいやウィッツィー
Suzy’s Zoo: Witzy Says No, No, 100 words
スージー・ズー おふろだいすき
Suzy’s Zoo: We Love Our Bath!, 100 words
スージー・ズー おやすみウィッツィー
Suzy’s Zoo: Goodnight, Witzy, 100 words
スージー・ズー あめがふってきたよ!
Suzy’s Zoo: It’s Raining!, 100 words
スージー・ズー エリーファントのティーパーティー
Suzy’s Zoo: The Elephant’s Tea Party, 100 words
スージー・ズー ウィッツィーのおはなばたけ
Suzy’s Zoo: Witzy’s Flower Garden, 100 words
スージー・ズー あきを あつめたよ!
Suzy’s Zoo: We Gathered Fall!, 100 words
スージー・ズー もうすぐハロウィーン
Suzy’s Zoo: Halloween Is Soon!, 100 words
スージー・ズー いつまでもともだち
Suzy’s Zoo: Forever Friends, 100 words
スージー・ズー ふゆってたのしいね!
Winter Is Fun, Isn’t It?, 100 words
いろいろサンドイッチ
Various Sandwiches, 100 words
つきよのかいじゅう
Monster in the Moonlight, 120 words
すいかのめいさんち
The Watermelon Town, 120 words ♬
ぼくんちカレーライス
We’re Having Curry Rice, 125 words ♬
ノンタン いもうと いいな
Nontan’s Sister’s Great, 125 words
ノンタンがんばるもん
Nontan’s Gonna Try Hard, 125 words
こけこっこー
Cock-A-Doodle-Do, 125 words
おいしいおほしさま
Delicious Stars, 125 words ♬
ぴよちゃんのおともだち
Pyo-chan’s Friend, 125 words
いち、にの、さーん。
One, Two, Three, Go!, 125 words
ノンタンスプーンたんたんたん
Nontan’s Spoon, 150 words
ないしょでんしゃ
Mystery Train, 150 words
あいうえおべんとう
A-I-U-E-O Lunchbox, 150 words ♬
おかあさんだもの
Because I’m Your Mother, 150 words
ともだち くろくま
Black Bear’s Friend, 150 words
むしコレ
Bug Collection, 150 words
すごいくるま
The Amazing Car, 150 words
にんげんごみばこ
The Garbage Can For Humans, 175 words
けいちゃんのくすりゆび
Kei-chan’s Medicine Finger, 175 words
くいしんぼなめれおん
Lickelon the Glutton, 175 words
ありさんとぞうさんのおさんぽ
Mr. Ant and Mr. Elephant Take A Walk, 175 words
大阪うまいもんのうた
The Song of Yummy Osaka Food, 175 words ♬
(This video will put this book in context.)
クリスマス くろくま
Black Bear’s Christmas, 175 words
ぴたっとヤモちゃん
Clingy Yamo-chan, 175 words
なめれおん
Lickelon, 200 words
サンタのおまじない
Santa’s Magic Words, 200 words
あいうえおのえほん
A-I-U-E-O Picture Book, 200 words
◯×うさぎ
Good-Bad Bunny, 200 words
とこやにいったライオン
The Lion That Went To The Barber, 200 words
おしろとおくろ
The Black Castle and the White Castle, 200 words ♬
あかにんじゃ
The Red Ninja, 200 words ♬
おばけのくに
The Ghost Country, 200 words
たからじまの ぼうけん
Treasure Island Adventure, 200 words
おたんじょうび くろくま
Happy Birthday, Black Bear, 200 words ♬
りんごちゃん
Little Miss Apple, 200 words
スージー・ズー あひるのウィッツィー
Suzy’s Zoo: Witzy the Duck, 200 words
おせちのおしょうがつ
Osechi for New Year’s, 225 words ♬
森のイスくん
Mr. Chair In The Forest, 250 words
おやすみ、はたらくくるまたち
Goodnight, Construction Equipment, 250 words
ハローキティはじめてのこどもずかん
Hello Kitty’s Baby’s First Illustrated Dictionary, 250 words
妖怪食堂
The Youkai Cafeteria, 250 words ♬
かっぱのあいさつ
Kappa Greetings, 275 words ♬
コドモザウルス
Kidasaurus, 275 words
くものこくーのかぞくでおでかけ
Cloud Boy Kuu Shops With His Parents, 275 words
もうママったら!
Jeez, Mama!, 275 words
あたし、ようせいにあいたい!
I want to meet a fairy!, 275 words
ダットさん
Mr. Datsun, 275 words
たなばたバス
Tanabata Bus, 275 words ♬
たかこ
Takako, 300 words ♬
もっちゃうもっちゃうもうもっちゃう
Can’t Hold It Anymore!, 300 words
3ぷんもまてないよ!
I Can’t Wait Three Whole Minutes!, 300 words
ゆめたまご
Dream Egg, 300 words
だんろのまえで
In Front of the Fireplace, 300 words
おつきみどろぼう
A Thief on Moon-Viewing Night, 300 words ♬
ボクのかしこいパンツくん
The Wise Mr. Underwear, 300 words
かめだらけおうこく
A Land Filled With Turtles, 350 words
くまくんのたまご
The Bear’s Egg, 350 words
おにのいす
The Oni’s Chair, 350 words
へっこきよめさま
The Farting Bride, 350 words ♬
おしょうがつさん どんどこどん
The Spirit of the New Year, 350 words ♬
きおくのおうさま
The Memory King, 400 words
にゃんこおうじ
Prince Meow, 400 words
くらげのりょかん
The Jellyfish Ryokan, 425 words ♬
ねえ、おつきさまどうしてぼくについてくるの?
Say, Why Is The Moon Following Me?, 450 words
おばけにょうぼう
Ghost Wife, 450 words ♬
ともだちやもんな、ぼくら
Because We’re Friends, 550 words ♬
さよならぼくたちのようちえん
Goodbye, Preschool, 700 words ♬
なぞなぞのみせ
Riddle Stores, 750 words
星のベイビーサーカス フルーツ島のわんぱくパイレーツ
The Baby Circus of the Stars: The Mischievous Pirates of Fruit Island, 800 words
3びきのかわいいオオカミ
The Three Little Wolves, 1,200 words
みんなあかちゃんだった
Everyone Was Once A Baby, 2,500 words
From the home page, click the link on the right that says 全ページ試し読み to see the available books; click a book and find the green icon that says 全ページ試し読みする to read it. You have to be a member to read them; if you haven’t signed up already you’ll be prompted when you try to access a book. (Keep reading for my registration walkthrough.)
You can only read a book once, and apparently they’re serious about that: if you reach the end of the book, then try to go back to the beginning, everything will be pixelated. If there’s an error of some sort (the program crashes, etc.) you should be able to re-access the book, as long as you do so within 15 minutes. Once you have read the book, the option to read it will disappear, but you can still read the limited preview.
The recommended OS is Microsoft Windows XP Home Service Pack 3, with Internet Explorer 8.0 or Firefox 3.6 and Flash Player 10 installed. It may not work as well with WindowsXP Service Pack 2 or Mac. (I have a Mac and it loads sometimes, but when it does most of the images are pixelated; with Windows XP Service Pack 2, it loads up to 99% and hangs. So at the moment I can’t use it.)
The first row of books are new arrivals, the second is ranked by popularity and the third is sorted by sales. Underneath that, there are recommendations for babies (赤ちゃんにおすすめ), children 3 and older who aren’t in school yet (3歳から未就学児におすすめ), elementary school students and older (小学生以上におすすめ), and ones for adults as well (大人にもおすすめ). Underneath that, you can also choose by writer, theme and so on.
I hope that this will be a great resource for those of you who can access it! I think it might be the very best thing currently available online for beginners, too. I’ll welcome any reviews or information about any of the books, and probably make a separate page for that. There is a lot to explore on EhonNavi, and I’ve only just started really looking into it, so if you find anything else that might be of particular interest to extensive readers, please post a comment or e-mail me!
With over 350 fun-looking books and clearly marked difficulty levels, now there’s no excuse not to try tadoku! (Except, of course, if you aren’t running Windows XP SP3…) Happy reading!
Registration walkthrough:
Registration page. The only required fields are the ones with the red buttons that say 必須 (required); you can leave the others blank.
Confirmation page:
Welcome page:
And then go back to the main page and click 全ページ試し読み!
Choose a book, then on the book’s page, click 全ページ試し読みする:
You can see the list of stories by clicking タイトル一覧 or directly through this link. The stories are color-coded by theme, and the themes are not all that important so I’ll leave figuring out what they are as an activity for the reader. There’s an English version of each story, but pretend it’s not there. (All of the titles are the official English ones, though.)
The stories are sorted by the number of estimated words, so to find them search for
the title. There are 24 stories listed here, for a total of 270 pages and 5,464 words.
ポストマン
The Postman
11 pages, 25 words (est.) Level 1
おやすみ やまねくん
Good Night, Little Yamane
12 pages, 40 words (est.) Level 1
まてまて マロン
Wait For Me, Maron
12 pages, 60 words (est.) Level 1
うっき うっき O モンキー
The Eeky Eeky Monkeys
11 pages, 100 words (est.) Level 1
なぞなぞあそび
Riddles
12 pages, 100 words (est.) Level 1
だったらいいな
I Wish
12 pages, 144 words (est.), Level 2
6ちょうめのわんたくん
Wanta lives on the 6th street
11 pages, 165 words (est.) Level 2
らっこのろっこちゃん
Rokko the Sea Otter
11 pages, 165 words (est.) Level 2
まめとすみとわら
Pea, Charcoal and Straw
11 pages, 170 words (est.), Level 2
あらいぐまのクーちゃん
Ku-chan the Racoon
12 pages, 180 words (est.) Level 2
あやのいぬ
Aya’s Dog
11 pages, 215 words (est.) Level 2
ほしずなのうた
The Song of Starry Sand
11 pages, 220 words (est.) Level 2
わんたくんとカラス
Wanta and the Crow
11 pages, 225 words (est.) Level 2
あかどん あおどん きいどん
Akadon, Aodon and Kidon
11 pages, 235 words (est.) Level 2
すーちゃんのなつやすみ
Sue’s Summer Vacation
11 pages, 275 words (est.) Level 2
そばだんご
Buckwheat Dumplings
11 pages, 275 words (est.) Level 2
ねぼすけ クンちゃん
Sleepy Kun
11 pages, 275 words (est.) Level 2
やさしい トントン
The Gentle Tonton
11 pages, 275 words (est.) Level 2
るーぱくんのおべんとう
Roupa’s Lunch
12 pages, 300 words (est.) Level 2
つばめのおんがえし
The Swallow and the Old Man
11 pages, 325 words (est.) Level 2
おつきさまがみてた
The Moon Was Watching
11 pages, 325 words (est.) Level 2
ふたりのなまけもの
The Two Lazy Men
11 pages, 385 words (est.) Level 2
ぼく とびたくないんだ
I Don’t Want To Fly
11 pages, 385 words (est.) Level 2
みかづきいけのカッパ
Kappa in Mikazuki-ike
11 pages, 500 words (est.) Level 2
With over 1,000 free Japanese picture books, EhonNavi is like living next to a library! Sign up here, it’s quick and free. (I wrote a walkthrough to help with this part.) Once you’re logged in, click the link on the right [...]]]>
With over 1,000 free Japanese picture books, EhonNavi is like living next to a library! Sign up here, it’s quick and free. (I wrote a walkthrough to help with this part.) Once you’re logged in, click the link on the right that says 全ページ試し読み to see the available books; click a book and find the yellow icon that says the same thing to read it.
There are books for everyone here! The list of available books has a section where they can be sorted by age. I’ve also started sorting them by word count. The lower the word count, the easier the book. I’ve mostly focused on adding the very easy ones so far, so that even beginners can start reading.
You can only read a book once, and if there’s an error of some sort you should be able to re-access the book, as long as it’s within 15 minutes. The recommended OS is Microsoft Windows XP Home Service Pack 3, with Internet Explorer 8.0 or Firefox 3.6 and Flash Player 10 installed. It may not work as well with WindowsXP Service Pack 2 or Mac, and Chrome is not supported. I read them on a Mac with Firefox, and it works consistently for me, but I have to follow a procedure. When I open the book, the first thing I do is flip through the pages, waiting until each one loads. Once I’m at the end with all of the pages loaded, I’ll go back to the beginning and read. If the loading stops and some of the pages are still pixelated after waiting a few minutes, I have to shut the whole browser down, then open it back up again and start reading again. (Just closing the window with the book in it and trying to open that again never works for me.) Hopefully it’s not like this for everyone… Remember, you have a 15-minute window to load the pages, but once you have them loaded you can keep the window open indefinitely.
It’s a little picky, but I think this is the best resource out there for Japanese picture books, so please give it a shot!
福娘童話集 (Hukumusume’s Fairy Tale Collection)
With hundreds of fairy tales, short stories and fables, you’ll never be hurting for reading material as long as this site is around! Start with the stories that have been made into picture books. Many of the other stories don’t have pictures, making them better for more advanced readers. Try 日本の昔話 (Japanese Folktales), and if those are starting to feel like you’ve read them a billion times, try the 江戸小話 (Short Stories from Edo), or make a habit of reading 今日は何の日? (What Day Is It Today?)
心の絵本 (Picture Books For The Heart)
Nicely illustrated short stories, mostly little folktale types of stories featuring cute animals. (They are even written in all hiragana and katakana, no kanji; this is a pain for adult readers who already know and would like to practice kanji, but it is exactly what you’ll find in a real picture book.) Click here for word counts and levels for some of the stories. (Again, the lower the word count, the easier the story.)
デジタル絵本サイト (Digital Picture Book Site).
This site has around a hundred picture books, all illustrated by children. My only problem with it is that there are a lot of compression artifacts around the text for most, though not all, of the stories, and it really bothers me, considering that actual kids books start with nice, clear, large text. If the poor quality of the text is a problem for you, start with the stories in large text — there’s about thirty of them.
The Great Chokochoko Library
A collection of reading material, sorted by level. There’s various types of material available: stories, articles and so on. It seems to be geared towards a more traditional type of reading practice, with no pictures and long wordlists.
日本昔ばなし (Old Stories Of Japan)
I would recommend the other story sites over this one because it might be too tempting to rely on the English translation; there are, however, many Japanese fairy tales available here, and my impression is that they use more advanced kanji than the other two sites, so it may be worth a look.
Japanese books from the International Children’s Library
There are only a handful of stories in Japanese, but I do like to see kids’ books from the Showa era, so I’m including it anyway.
Gakken Books for Supporting Reconstruction
Gakken has made some of their books available for free in PDF form to help support the children and families still living in shelters after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, as well as volunteers and nurses. The page is divided into three categories: picture books/reading material, games that can be played without special equipment and disaster nursing.
船 (The Boat)
This is, unfortunately, just one story, but if you are thinking about buying the よむよむ文庫 Japanese graded readers (or of course, just for reading practice in general), try this Level 1 (beginner) story, which was put up as a sample of the series.
ふぁんた時間 (Fantasy Time)
More of a listening resource than a reading resource, but that’s good to have too! Each story has a link to its corresponding Aozora entry, so you can read along while listening if you like, or read the story first if you prefer. (This may also be a good way of finding more reading material by the same authors on Aozora, which I think is a hard site for a beginning reader to find suitable content on.) Stories with a green button marked 立ち読みする have lovely illustrations and text to go along with the audio.
These are generally more complicated than stories from Hukumusume or the Digital Picture Book Site.
ゆめよみおはなし ひなたぼっこ (Dream-Reading Storytime: Basking In The Sun)
This used to be available as a podcast, but I can’t tell if it is anymore or not. It’s a mother and her son reading stories from different sources such as Aozora and 福娘童話集, and it’s really charming! There are links to all the stories, so you can read along.
Intermediate Reading Resources
青い鳥文庫 ためし読み!(Aoitori Bunko: Trial Reading!)
Aoitori Bunko is a line of classic books and original fiction aimed at children between around 3rd grade and 6th grade; I would estimate most of their books are level 6 or so. This page has previews of dozens of their books, so check it out if you are a fairly advanced reader and looking for a new book or series to try!
マジック・ツリーハウス 立ち読み (Magic Tree House: Trial Reading)
The Magic Tree House series has been translated into Japanese, and you can read around a dozen pages from each of the books here, so you can test them out and see if they’d be at your level and fun for you.
「いろいろな場面/「4こままんが」(Various Situations / 4-Panel Manga)
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I find 擬音語 (sound words) and 擬態語, (emotional state words) to be extremely hard to learn just from context, so one of my friends was kind enough to find this site for me. It presents those kinds of words in context and in comics.
青空文庫 (Open Air Library)
Aozora is similar to Project Gutenberg, with impressive amounts of public domain material freely available. As far as extensive reading goes, though, I think it’s really only likely to be of use to someone already reading at a fairly high level (level 5 and up by my classification system), and they use the ruby tag for furigana, which displays kanji readings in parentheses if you’re using a browser that doesn’t support the tag. (Chrome, Safari and Internet Explorer support it.) If you’re not yet at the level where you can read advanced material without decoding it, I think even the time spent trying to navigate this site to find something interesting and suitable to read would be better spent elsewhere. Still, if you can handle advanced material without decoding, it might be time to try some authentic literature here. You could start with 宮沢賢治 (Miyazawa Kenji), who wrote children’s stories such as 注文の多い料理店 (The Restaurant of Many Orders), or 新美南吉 (Niimi Nankichi), whose 手袋を買いに (Buying Mittens) is a classic.
近代デジタルライブラリー (Digital Library from the Meiji Era)
I suspect there is fun to be had here if you are not only a fairly high-level reader, but also patient with the interface and able to cope with unexpected things like old-style kanji and orthography and horizontal Japanese read right to left. There’s Japanese kids’ books in the 909 section (use the テーマ検索 link to get there), you could search for stories you already know like 桃太郎, or start with this page about children’s stories, from the announcement of the merging of the 児童書デジタルライブラリー (Juvenile Literature Digital Library) with this site. I can’t say I’m seriously recommending this for most extensive readers, even if there are children’s books — I just think it’s so amazing that something like this is available to the world.
News Sites for Kids
NHK NewsWeb Easy
News written in easy Japanese. Of the news sites I’m listing here, this one is the simplest. The language is simplified and there’s a pop-up dictionary for words that a reader might not know. Plus, there’s audio to go along with it, you can make any place names or names of people show up in a different color and you can follow a link back to the original article if you want to challenge yourself a little more. I wouldn’t recommend any of these to a beginning reader, but if you’re an intermediate reader and you want to start reading the news, start here!
こどもアサヒ (Children’s Asahi)
News articles written for grade-schoolers and middle-schoolers from the Asahi Shimbun’s sister paper, こどもアサヒ. There’s also a digital version of the full newspaper that you can subscribe to for 1720 yen a month. If anyone actually does this, please tell me how you liked it!
毎日小学生新聞 (Mainichi Grade-Schooler Newspaper)
Articles and so on for grade schoolers from the Mainichi Shinbun. I haven’t spent much time reading this one, but the sense I get from it is that it uses harder language and fewer supports than NHK News Web Easy, and that there’s more types of content, such as interviews and explanations of words used in the news.
I’m always on the lookout for more online reading resources, so feel free to post them in the comments! I’m particularly interested in low-level resources, because those are the kinds of things that are the most useful, but the most hard to find if you’re a beginning reader. I presume that anyone who is able to read things like the texts at the Japanese Text Initiative already knows how to find them.
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When we moved from Michigan to Washington State, we didn’t initially have a very clear picture of where we would settle down. Seattle? Tacoma? Olympia? Bremerton? Bellingham? I admit it: “quality of the library system” was an important criteria for evaluating potential places to live — would you believe I had a dream that we moved somewhere with no interlibrary loan system — and I scoped out several different libraries even before we moved. (Later, when looking for apartments, “proximity to library” was another important qualification.)
Of course, I was most impressed with the Seattle library system’s Japanese language selection. We ended up moving to Tacoma, but it’s been in the back of my mind ever since that a Seattle library card could be mine for around $80. After all, there are more than 600 Japanese children’s books spread out between the various branches — that puts the 125 children’s books held at the Tacoma library main branch (no direct link, but you can search for JAJ) to shame. I just love any excuse to take the train up to Seattle, so getting there every so often wouldn’t be a problem… I was going back to look at exactly how much a prized Seattle library card would set me back ($85 per year, incidentally) and I saw something that hadn’t registered when I looked at that same page back when I lived in Ann Arbor: the Seattle public library has reciprocal arrangements with various other libraries in the area. Tacoma’s not one of them, but Pierce County is, and as it so happens, Tacoma and Pierce County have their own reciprocal system, where someone living in Tacoma can get a Pierce County card and vice versa.
So the question was this: are library cards transitive? I’ve never before in my life felt the need to have three separate library cards, but that was before I started running out of appropriate books. The day I suspected that this might be possible, I went out and got a Pierce County card — just in case. As it turns out, even though I’m from Tacoma, that Pierce County card and a valid picture ID with my current address qualified me for a Seattle library card after all! I called ahead to ask, then took the train up to Seattle the very next day. I returned home with 26 books♪ I had been to the main library before and had been duly impressed by the rows of Japanese children’s books, but I didn’t truly appreciate their value until I started extensive reading and had to start looking not just for any old book, but for books at a certain level.
If you happen to be in Washington State, take a moment to see if you qualify for a Seattle library card. For an extensive reader, it’s worth the trip. If not, are there any major libraries — public or part of a university or college — in your area with some Japanese books that you might be able to get access to? Hopefully, this may be a possible path to gathering more resources for other extensive readers as well.
Incidentally, the Pierce County library system has enough Japanese books to have made it worthwhile for me to pick up a library card in its own right. My parents live in Pierce County, and when we stayed with them for two weeks after moving while figuring out where we wanted to live, I borrowed my dad’s card to check out a couple of books. (He handed it over, and then, with some embarrassment, handed over a $20 to pay his fine. So that’s where I get it from, I thought. It hasn’t escaped my notice that getting books from three different libraries opens me up to three times the potential library fines…) Actually, a shiny new library in University Place, which is part of the Pierce County system and about 20 minutes away from me, opened in February. Had it been open when we moved to Washington, that might have bumped University Place up a few notches in my potential destination calculations!
By the way, the reason I divide my book reviews not just by level, but by library, is that I hope to be extra useful to other readers in the area and perhaps even to put together an extensive reading group at some point. I should have started that already, but to be honest I’m extremely shy. If you’re in the area and interested in something like that, feel free to e-mail me and maybe that will help me become more motivated!
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