All of Yamasa's programs include teaching communication skills, however the 3 Academic Programs also devote considerable class time to learning how to read and write Japanese proficiently. ie, if you intend to study at Yamasa for 6 months or longer, then we would not be able to provide a conversational skills ONLY program at your level. You could of course still make use of the electives to maximise the number of hours you spend in classes focused on communication skills.
If you want to concentrate your learning time in Japan only on conversational skills and are going to be at Yamasa for 3 months or less, then you have a wide range of choices available from our Continuing Education (Extension) Programs. Please note however that we don't provide any programs using Romaji (Roman alphabet). This is because we feel that to learn Japanese effectively, you need to learn at least the basic writing system (hiragana/katakana). If you would like to try to learn how to speak Japanese without learning the phonetic pronunications of the hiragana/katakana syllabaries, please try another school.
In addition, customizable programs such as Private, Corporate and to some extent the C.A.L.L. Seminar can be designed with communication skills as the core focus.
CONTINUING EDUCATION (EXTENSION):
Short Intensive Language Acquisition Course - (SILAC)
15 seminar or 23 standard classes per week.
Minimum duration of study is 4 weeks.
Japan Discovery - (Study tour)
15 seminar or 23 standard classes per week.
Minimum duration of study is 4 weeks plus 5-8 day tour.
Internship Program - (Experiential)
15 seminar or 23 standard classes per week.
Minimum duration of study is 6 weeks plus 4 week placement.