For those of you who don’t know what All Japanese All The Time (AJATT) is yet, here is my attempt at defining it in one sentence: AJATT is a method for learning Japanese language by creating a Japanese immersion environment around yourself while having fun every step of the way. Khatzumoto’s AJATT website contains incomparably more information about the whole method, so please check it out, but I’ll try to explain its basic philosophy in the nutshell.

Writing
Khatzumoto suggests learning the writing and meaning of all the basic kanji and kana characters before ever trying to learn anything else in Japanese. The reasoning behind this approach is this: knowing the writing system will put you at the same starting point as a Chinese person studying Japanese. Kanji is considered the greatest obstacle for westerners in learning Japanese, so overcoming it right from the start will greatly help learning other aspects of the language. Being literate will enable you to read real Japanese (books, manga, signs, forms, websites, documents, etc.) from which you will learn real Japanese sentences.

Sentences
Sentences are another big part of AJATT method. Instead of learning words and grammar rules, Khatz recommends just learning complete sentences. Why? Well, it’s actually pretty simple when you think about it. When you learn vocabulary and grammar rules, you have building blocks to make your own sentences. It should be fairly easy to put them together and express your meaning, right? Wrong. It would be almost like learning to walk by training one muscle at a time and then learning different positions your legs will be in while you are walking, and then trying to go for a stroll in the park with all that information and trying to figure it out in real time how all those small pieces of information fit together. Not very practical.

However, when baby is learning to walk, she is learning it all together. All muscles are working at the same time, and even though she doesn’t know what to do with all of them in the beginning and stumbles a lot, she is still slowly developing a fluid walking motion. Even if she can’t really walk, she will be able to go from point A to point B in her clumsy fashion. Over time, she’ll figure out which muscles to use to move the right foot, which to use to move the left, which are used for moving forward, which for moving back, which lift the foot off the ground, which keep the torso upright, etc. and refine the motions of walking until she achieves acceptable level of walking skill.

Same goes for language learning. By learning complete sentences, you will get a feel for the language and where each word usually goes. You may not know the rules and reasons for that particular order, but let’s face it, you didn’t even know what irregular verbs were until you were in elementary/middle school when you already knew your native language well enough to read comic books and used those same irregular verbs just fine. It is no different with your second or third or any other language you decide to learn.

Immersion
Immersion is yet another important component of AJATT. By exposing yourself to as much Japanese as you can, you will slowly start picking up words, phrases, mannerisms, etc. without even noticing. People adapt to their surroundings. When you spend a lot of time with a new friend, you will most likely pick up some of their jokes, phrases they often use, their ideas about things you haven’t thought about before, and so on. You might even pick up their accent, and yet you’ll probably be oblivious to all these changes in yourself until someone who knew you before and hasn’t seen you in a while tells you that you’ve changed.

That’s why you should make Japanese your new friend and just spend a lot of quality time together. Just by being around Japanese all the time, you will slowly pick up stuff without even noticing. You will just be able to understand more and more of it, and then one day you will even speak it and make your own sentences.

FUN
Most importantly though, while spending your time with Japanese, you MUST HAVE FUN! If something is boring, it will become a chore and thus you will run away from it. So whatever you do, make it fun. If it’s not fun, stop it, and do something else. Japanese people have fun in their language, so you can have the same kind of fun in their language too. Or your own kind of fun in their language, whichever you prefer. Like to watch movies? Watch them in Japanese. Like to read books about whales? Read them in Japanese. Like to play video games? Play them in Japanese. Like to cook food? Cook it from recipes that you read in Japanese. Looking for a new car. Read reviews in Japanese… You get the point.

Don’t make Japanese the goal, make it the means to the goal, and you will have a lot easier time learning it.

SRS
In my opinion, Spaced Repetition Software (SRS) is not a required part of AJATT, but it makes it a lot quicker. SRS is basically an intelligent flash card application that makes sure you see the cards you need to see when you need to see them before you forget them or just after you’ve forgotten them. This makes remembering stuff you once learned much easier and reduces the time necessary for review, which in turn gives you more time to learn new stuff.

Well, I think this covers most of the basics. You really should visit AJATT and see it for yourself.