Japanese for Busy People Kana Workbook: Revised 3rd EditionIncl. 1 CD (Japanese for Busy People Series) Paperback – May 15, 2012

First, I thought that this is the workbook to accompany the book Japanese for Busy People I: Kana Version includes CD (Bk. 1). I was mistaken, as this workbook does not accompany the lessons of that book but prepares the student for that book by teaching the Kana. Unfortunately, there is no Kana variant to the first volume, you need to use the same one that was prepared to the romanized version (Japanese for Busy People I: Workbook; includes CD (Bk. 1)). That was the bad news. The good news is that the few pages of picture dictionary that gives the words of some Japanese food and a Japanese room are a treasure because all the picture dictionaries I have come across so far are not Japan-specific but have images and therefore the words of western culture only, which may be useful for a Japanese tourist or a Japanese immigrant to the US or Europe but not to the student who wants to get familiar with Japanese culture as well as the language.As I bought this book after I had learnt reading and writing the Kana, I cannot tell if it gives an effective way of learning them. What I can say for sure, however, is that it gives a good reference when I grow uncertain how to draw a hiragana or katakana nicely.

I knew absolutely no Japanese when I bought this book for an introductory Japanese course. This book is well-organized with handy reference charts at the beginning and pages with spacing to help you practice writing each character. There are useful exercises for identifying and translating each character with the answers to the questions printed conveniently at the bottom of each page. There are also reading challenges with the answers printed in order in the back of the book where they are easy to find and follow. The first section of the book focuses on hiragana; the second section on katakana. The book also addresses long vowels and double consonants, and includes a cd that is very helpful with learning correct pronunciation. Overall, I highly recommend this book, especially for someone who is new to Japanese.

I bought this book before my trip to Tokyo, and found it OK, if I had tons of time ahead of me (which I did not).This is not a speedy learning of basics. This is a part of your consistent, thorough, long study of Japanese language.I have no idea why they called it "For Busy People". I am busy and it served me little.Much better served me the free lessons from online, that are plenty there.

*** AWESOME WORKBOOK, 2 QUIBBLES ***Both the texts and workbooks in this series are *EXCELLENT* for learning Japanese on your own. In fact, these are some of the best books/tools I've found.However, the publisher's description on Amazon is somewhat misleading. The *CD* has the conversation exercises, *not* the workbook. Make sure the CD comes with your workbook. (If you're buying a used book, ask the seller.) The workbook is *only* vocab and Hiragana/Katakana practice. (I'm reviewing the Kana version; I don't know if the Romaji version has additional lessons, more vocab, or less pages.)That said, I heartily recommend this to anyone learning Japanese in any setting. Vocab (such as Japanese food) has drawings, not descriptions. Pictures are preferable to translation when learning vocab, unless the meaning would be unclear. I have a *quibble* about the illustration, though. Sometimes you can't tell what a few items are. These are simple line drawings, so they're easy to *see*, but you'll see a bowl of mushy stuff with dots in it and say, "What is that? Rice? Something else?" In those cases, I have to use my dictionary to figure out what I'm looking at!Also, I wish they would *name* the *actual audio files* before putting them on the CD. A CD player isn't good for practice because the conversations are real-speed. You can't back up just a bit to repeat a phrase several times in a row! You want the audio as electronic files. But when you rip them from the CD to put on your iPod or other MP3 player, the files are random numbers. To use them, I had to stay up *ALL NIGHT*, listen to the announcment at the start of each exercise, and rename *EVERY* file. (There are several files per lesson!) I'm glad I got it done -- because now I can pause and back up -- but it was a *real pain*.If you need a lot of practice listening, be prepared for this!This workbook is a *great* way to reinforce your vocabulary (and your Hiragana, though I knew them already). And the textbook is *TOPS*! It's not just me; I run a Japanese-English language group and *EVERYONE* loves this series! My learning is going much faster since I started using it. Plus, it's not expensive, so it has helped our group have more focused practice without breaking our wallets. VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

I bought it because although I had been taught Hiragana in Japanese language school, I skipped one grade and must have missed learning Katakana. Whenever I go to Japan, I struggle reading items written in Katakana so this book is really helping me to master Katakana. I think when I go to Japan in November, I'll be better able to read items from foreign countries for which the Japanese people write in Katakana. Thank you!

The book is absolutely perfect. Everything is well explained and it has some good excersizes. I do have one small detail: the exersizes are good but there are not a lot of them were you mix hirigana and katakana (only 1 page). I would have given it 4,5 stars if it was possible but since it's only a minor detail it does deserve 5 stars

This book is the perfect companion to a class. I use it for my online lesson at TokyoMokyo and it is easy to follow along and learn. I don't think it is good for self study unless you already have a bit of background knowledge in Japanese.

good textbook and audio cd to learn business japanese