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Sayaka was born and raised in Okinawa, learned English as an investment in her future, and moved fifteen times following military life across the world. In this episode of Connected By Language, she explains how living in survival mode, setting up a new life again and again in a foreign language, shifted her mindset from speaking perfectly to simply getting her point across, and how that philosophy now shapes the way she teaches Japanese.

The heart of the conversation is kanji. Having taught the writing system to both Japanese children and foreign adults, Sayaka discovered a gap: Japanese kids learn how kanji works, while foreign learners are handed lists and left to memorize thousands of characters alone. Her answer is the Super Kanji Map, a poster organizing all 2,136 kanji by their readings through a parent-and-child system, so learners can guess the pronunciation of characters they've never seen before. She shares why building it took years, and her advice for anyone stuck between understanding a language and truly speaking it.

About the guest: https://www.youtube.com/@wrightjukuonline

About the poster: https://superkanjimap.my.canva.site/

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Tandem is a global language exchange app on a mission to connect the world through languages. Members build confidence and improve their language skills through real life conversations with native speakers in 1:1 chats or live audio rooms.

🔗 Connect With Us: https://linktr.ee/Tandem_App

0:00 Intro

0:38 The Island, the Bases, and the Language Between

33:52 Making the Invisible Visible

36:29 The Super Kanji Map and Why It Exists

53:22 What the Intermediate Wall Feels Like From the Inside

🌟 What topics/language should we explore on the next episode of the new tandem podcast? Let us know in the comments!

Thanks for watching Connected By Language: Polyglot Interviews, the new Tandem Language Exchange Podcast.