ＨＥＬＬＯ！ Ｉ　ＡＭ　ＱＵＩＺＢＯ™！Welcome to the final week of Kiki+Koko: Let’s NihonGO!! Online’s special corner: January Japanese Word of the Weekday! During this month, we have been providing students and visitors with Japanese language learning opportunities every weekday in order to help them form positive habits, making learning part of a daily routine.

The vocabulary and sentences we present are meant to assist you in communicating about and through your Japanese language learning experience. The first week, we went over some useful introductions, greetings, and questions that you would most likely use when first speaking about your plan to learn Japanese language. The second and third week gave some useful vocabulary and sentences that you could use during your studies and throughout your Japanese language learning journey, such as how to inquire about words, meanings, and more. And, now, in our fourth week, we will continue with other ways to talk about the future of your Japanese language studies.

Do not worry if you are an absolute beginner and if you struggled with the sentences. There is plenty of time during your Japanese language learning journey. Everyone learns at their own pace. And, for absolute beginners or intermediate learners alike, we recommend that you follow our Japanese Language Learning Essentials series, which guides you through many grammatical concepts and sets of useful vocabulary. There are fun themed vocabulary sets on everything from vehicles to space; There are lessons about verb conjugation and grammar that quite literally guide you every step of the way.

In order to get the best chance of reaching your Japanese language learning goals, it is recommended that you start at the very beginning with learning to read and write 平仮名（ひらがな・hiragana）. You can practise writing using vocabulary words from the Word of the Week Wednesday with ＱＵＩＺＢＯ™! (That is me.) And, during many of those corners, Kiki and Koko join me with their Helpful Hints or Quick Culture Corners to explain more complex or nuanced cultural topics that are related to the vocabulary that day. It is also recommended that you take time to experience our Culture Corners, because as has been mentioned in previous Word of the Weekday corners, culture and language are linked inextricably. So, rest asured that there will be plenty of opportunities for us to meet again.

So, do not fret because this is the final week of this special corner, as you will be able to join us to enjoy our usual content, both evergreen from the past, and future content. This special corner is not relegated to the month of January. If you missed previous instalments, you can start and stop at any time. This month-long challenge is meant to be just that, but making one step towards your goals is better than giving up if a task seems too difficult. And, if you have already participated, be sure to return in order to make sure that the information is encoded into your long term memory instead of staying trapped in the short term. But, as long as you do your best and return to revise/study, I am sure you will be able to become comfortable with the vocabulary in time.

So far, it has been very enjoyable to be able to share so many words with you. It is the hope that you will be able to achieve your Japanese language learning goals. Speaking of which, today’s vocabulary is conveniently associated with this concept.

Without further ado, let us NihonGO!!

Word(s) of the Weekday:

目標【もくひょう】
mokuhyou

Noun (名詞)

1. Goal; objective; aim; target
2. Sign; mark; landmark

JLPT N3 |common word (常用語)

BONUS Word(s) of the Weekday:

目的【もくてき】
mokuteki

Noun (名詞)

1. Goal; purpose; objective; aim; intention

JLPT N3 |common word (常用語)

You are not seeing double, there is more than one way to express the concept of a goal using Japanese language. However, I am not a doctor, so do not use this as medical advice. Seeing their similar definitions certainly shows how these vocabulary can be easily conflated with one another. But, today, we have the honour of another insight from our resident Japanese teaching twins, Kiki and Koko. They will be joining us with another one of their Helpful Hints to quickly explain what is happening here.

Do not go away! We will be back with “Helpful Hints with Kiki+Koko” after these messages!

We hope that was interesting. (We did not know that is what you enjoyed.)
Now, we are back with “Helpful Hints with Kiki+Koko”!

Helpful Hints with Kiki+Koko:

Hello, there!

We’re Kiki+Koko, your guides to Japanese language and culture, helping you on your Japanese language learning journey every step of the way…towards your goals! Goal and goal? No, you’re not seeing double when you’re seeing today’s Word of the Weekday! (*Ring Ring* Hello?…What?… ＱＵＩＺＢＯ™ already made that joke…? …It wasn’t that funny when he said it either?…And, now we’re just wasting time by talking about it instead of actually helping you with these vocabulary words…?…We’re making a complete what of ourselves?…and now we’re stealing bits from a popular cartoon to try to make up for our inability to craft our own unique joke…?…Who is this?)

Japanese language, as most language is filled with nuance. A word that may seem obvious at first may actually hold a different intention. One useful way to analyse similarly translated Japanese words is by looking at their 漢字（かんじ・kanji）.

Looking at 目標 and 目的, we see the 漢字（かんじ・kanji） for “eye” which has dozens of collocations as a word and dozens of definitions…so many defintions that we don’t have time in such a short corner to present to you. But, you can trust us: simply defining it as “eye” does not do this character justice. So, seeing this character lets us know that these two words are related in some way or another. But, let’s get a closer look at their second characters.

標 （しるし・shirushi) , pronounced here as ひょう(hyou) has several meanings including signpost or mark. Keep this in mind for later. 的 (まと・mato) , pronounced here as てき(teki), means mark, taget, object, subject, or focus. And, there it is! This is where the more apparent defintion is expressed in these two words. But, how can you define these for yourself in order to truly understand their nuance?

As a rule of thumb, you can think of 目標（もくひょう・mokuhyou) as short term goals, and 目的（もくてき・mokuteki) as long term goals, or as an overall purpose.

A great way to think of this is that 目標（もくひょう・mokuhyou) are the milestones or landmarks along the way towards your overall 目的（もくてき・mokuteki) . You can have many 目標（もくひょう・mokuhyou) that lead up to one 目的（もくてき・mokuteki).

Nuances such as these are impossible to know with a simple dictionary definition, and that is why it’s so important to have trusted instructors or references that can guide you on your Japanese language learning journey. You wouldn’t want to get an incorrect word or definition embedded in your long term memory! It’s already difficult enough to learn things correctly, let alone unlearn incorrect things.

But, that’s why we’re here as your guides to Japanese language and culture, helping you on your Japanese language learning journey every step of the way! (*Ring Ring* Hello…? What…? We already said that just a few moments ago?…And now we’re repeating a bit that wasn’t funny in the first place…? And now we’re making it worse by pretending to be self-aware….? …..Who is this?)

We hope that helps!! Until the next lesson!

♡Kiki+Koko

Thank you Kiki and Koko for your enlightening definition as well as respecting the precious time of students and visitors alike. As a computer robot, it is fascinating to see the nuance unfound in dictionary definitions. Though definitions are helpful, they often require more information in order to truly provide context and mental connections to properly learn these words.

Example 1:

私の目標は日本語で家族や友達とコミュニケーションができるようになることです。
わたしの　もくひょうは　にほんごで　かぞくやともだちと　こみゅにけーしょんが　できるように　なることです。
watashi no mokuhyou wa nihongo de kazoku ya tomodachi to komyunikeeshon ga dekiru you ni naru koto desu.
My goal is to be able to communiate with my family in Japanese.

Example 2:

このスペシャルの目的は少なくとも平日か週末かどうかに日本語を勉強することを習慣づけるのを手伝ってあげることです。
このすぺしゃるの　もくてきは　すくなくとも　へいじつか　しゅうまつか　どうかに　にほんごを　べんきょうすることを　しゅうかんでけるのを　てつだってあげることです。
kono supesharu no mokuteki wa sukunakutomo heijitsu ka shuumatsu ka douka ni nihongo wo benkyou koto wo shuukandzukeru no wo tetsudatte ageru koto desu.
The purpose of this special is to help you get into the habit of studying Japanese at least on weekdays or weekends.

That is all for today’s instalment of Kiki+Koko: Let’s NihonGO!! Online’s Japanese Word of the Weekday! We hope that you will continue to join us for more of this special corner as well as more of our Japanese language and culture resources. Just because the activity of today is complete does not mean that your daily learning journey has to stop here. You can have a look at previous Word of the Week articles for even more Japanese vocabulary. You can be sure that you are caught up with the latest by visiting ieindigoeast.com, and clicking the sidebar link labelled 今週の単語 | Word of the Week, or go to ieindigoeast.com/kikiandkokoletsnihongo and scroll down until you see my monitor on the Word of the Week banner, and you can access the archives.

Be sure to subscribe to our Electronic Mailing List of Tomorrow, today, using the form at the bottom of the web page so you can be the first to see the latest from Kiki+Koko: Let’s NihonGO!!, Indigo East, and SpeRaToBo. And, remember to return back to previous articles and lessons to review/revise. Also consider following our new page on Twitter and Instagram to support the spread of this site in a friendly domination of Earth that will help more people. Or, if you are enjoying the content that we are creating, or want to spread this content to more people to be able to access it for free, you can join our patreon, patreon.com/ieindigoeast or you can leave a TIP in the TIP♡JAR to keep it going with no strings attached. If you cannot support in this way, then we are just super happy that you are here anyway! It supports the content when you participate, and it is appreciated!

Thank you so much for learning with us!

♡QUIZBO™

Follow SpeRaToBo || ieindigoeast on WordPress.com