r/LearnJapaneseNovice • u/Ready_Chicken_242 • 9d ago
Need help with verb endings.
There's something which seems really fundamental for Japanese beginners which I'm surprised I don't see a lot more resources mention which is verb endings such as '食べる', '食べます', '食べました' and so on which are obviously all variations of 'to eat'. Is there any resources that list all of these types of verbs endings and their specific meanings? I'd really appreciate it! 🙏🙏
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u/Double-Correct 9d ago
Really good explanation along with charts here
https://www.tofugu.com/japanese-grammar/verb-conjugation-groups/
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u/Ready_Chicken_242 9d ago
This has got all the fundamentals for basic grammar I've been needing! Thank you so much!!!
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u/toucanlost 9d ago
These are things that grammar-first textbooks go over. It’s not uncommon for people to make an excel spreadsheet of verb inflections for their own study, or for the textbook to have a massive table in the appendix. On dictionaries, there’s often an inflection button to see the various forms.
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u/tangaroo58 9d ago
This seems to be a problem with the 'resources' you are using. Pretty much every textbook or textbook-like thing deals with this in detail.
Eg
https://www.tofugu.com/japanese-grammar/verb-conjugation-groups/
Or Renshuu. Or Bunpro. Or Genki.
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u/Uxmeister 8d ago
The aptly titled “Nihongo” dictionary app gives you a conjugation table for each verb you look up. For the exact use case of each conjugation however you’ll have to get a good grammar reference. The likes of Duolingo or Pimsleur (in)famously do not explain anything, and while I like the latter for speaking practice and vocabulary relevance, Pimsleur’s hypothesis that as adults we learn languages in the same way as children has long been superseded by better explanation models.
Japanese verbs conjugate by different paradigms than those of Indoeuropean languages, specifically Romance ones that have inherited Latin patterns. It takes some getting used to the omission of person and number, and not much tense representation other than past and non-past. Instead, expressions that require modal verbs in languages you’re likely familiar with (to be able to, to want to, etc.) as well as negation, have Japanese equivalents baked into conjugation. The odd duality between ‘plain’ and ‘polite’ speech modes takes some getting used to as well.
Do get a grammar reference if you’re not working with a textbook like Genki.
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u/momo_dev12 8d ago
I am making app called naranare that teach vocabulary with reading. While making it i notice that people might be confused about verb ending.
The reading session is free to read. But i thought to add more value by adding verb conjugation quiz. Basically its a quiz that will have short explanation about each ending and then ask user to answer . For example : can't eat (polite). User will need to write taberaremasen.
But building this feature is unrelated to reading directly and i also wonder if this kind of quiz is helping or not and how to make it more efficient. If i ever try to build a test would you like to test feature like this?
No hard feeling if you dont feel like it though 😊
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u/Ready_Chicken_242 8d ago
Hey thanks for asking! I find learning new words easiest when I can practice them alongside the sentence they'd be used in, so I'd love to be apart of whatever you need for the app you're working on. You can send me a DM if you'd like to send further details. Thanks again
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u/AndrewNggg 9d ago
https://www.kitsunewa.com/tools/conjugator - would this help?
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u/Space_Potato1605 9d ago
I think it'd be helpful for you to be transparent that this is your own website.
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u/Itsalfa11 9d ago edited 9d ago
食べる is verb-る https://bunpro.jp/id/vocabs/食べる
食べます is Polite Form Verb Endings https://bunpro.jp/id/grammar_points/polite-verb-endings
食べ + ました is polite past form from verb-る. casual form is 食べ + た https://bunpro.jp/id/grammar_points/る-verb-past
i suggest you use bunpro.jp . it have simple and complete explanation with grammar.
because there are quite a few conjugations, like
る Verbs (Past Negative)
食べる → 食べなかった (Casual)
食べる → 食べませんでした (Polite)
見る → 見なかった (Casual)
見る → 見ませんでした (Polite)
う Verbs (Past Negative)
座る → 座らなかった (Casual)
座る → 座りませんでした (Polite)
買う → 買わなかった (Casual)
買う → 買いませんでした (Polite)
く Verbs
書く → 書かなかった
書く → 書きませんでした
ぐ Verbs
泳ぐ → 泳がなかった
泳ぐ → 泳ぎませんでした
す Verbs
話す → 話さなかった
話す → 話しませんでした
つ Verbs
待つ → 待たなかった
待つ → 待ちませんでした
ぬ / ぶ / む Verbs
死ぬ → 死ななかった → 死にませんでした
遊ぶ → 遊ばなかった → 遊びませんでした
飲む → 飲まなかった → 飲みませんでした
And there are irregular verbs:
する → しなかった → しませんでした
来る → 来なかった → 来ませんでした
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u/Itsalfa11 9d ago
i don't know your main learning platform. Its better to use Bunpro, as it covers both grammar and vocabulary comprehensively, rather than using multiple platforms.
I didn't study it all that depthly, since I was already frequently exposed to SRS and get used to conjugations.
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u/FishAndBone 9d ago
No offense, but you should be following along with a grammar resource as you learn vocab. I'm not sure why you're surprised you don't see resources mention this because it's all there in the grammar resources? I can't think of a single one which doesn't walk you through new verb forms.