I took Nogami Sensei for J4, J5, and J6 and I had to say, she was pretty strict, and can seem a little intimidating, but as long as you make an effort, she's really an amazing teacher. She constantly drills the language into your head and doesn't really give your brain a break, but its totally worth it and my Japanese is way better for it. She always puts hard work into her lectures and even though the textbook is silly, she finds ways to make the class fun and funny.

Although you really have to be on your toes at all times, there's no better way to go about learning a language, and I think Nogami has it down. The teaching I mean. I've had her for a year straight, and she really gets to know you and figure our what your strengths and weaknesses are so you can improve. Really amazing.

I took J100A. There seems to be lots of Japanese class reviews on this page even though it is not offered as an option.

I'm sure Nogami is a great teacher, for the majority of her class.

For the minority that did not take the prerequisite classes with her and instead took the J10 summer class, she is one of the worst teachers at UCLA. Skip trying to take 100A unless you got an A (Not an A- which I got in J10), are gregarious, and are confident in your Japanese skills that you've picked up outside of class.

Several students who I had taken the summer class with were forced to drop from the class due to "low performance" and being threatened with low and failing grades. Indeed many students from the summer class got passing grades as well. Out of the ones I personally knew, it was because of kanji proficiency from knowing Chinese, or due to lots of study and knowledge of Japanese from outside the J10 coursework.

Her reasoning? "I don't know who taught you, I don't know Takase-sensei, and I don't know how good the education you received was"

Things in quotes, no joke. These are things she actually told me.

Her solution? Systematically pick on and be unhelpful to non-suck-up students who took the Summer class.

Starting off with availability; she was not at her office hours half the time. Not to mention the fact she would scold you for not visiting office hours when she wasn't even at her office hours in the first place. I went many times and many times she was not there. Firstly, she changed her office hours from what was printed on the syllabus, and this caused confusion for students even towards 9th and 10th week. I remember going to an appointment office hour which was incidentally on the day posted on the syllabus. She told them that she did not have normal office hours that day and it was by appointment only. A couple other times I went and she was not there despite it being her revised office hour. Another time she was busy with another student, so I went to get some lunch. I got back half way through what should have been an office hour, only to find out it was an office half-hour. She had already left. Now besides office hours, her availability after class to summer students was limited. She would gladly answer the same question asked by a student she liked, and then scowl and respond "I already said it in class" to a summer student. Yet another summer student asked her questions frequently since J4-6 is different than J10 in order to make sure he understood, and she would always be irritated and give a "You again" look.

Availability - 1

As for instructor concern, I think it was close to not caring in the least. She refused to give any help outside of class to summer students because "she doesn't tutor or give private lessons outside of class or during office hours" despite the fact that she assumes people in J10 know things they don't. Instead of being helpful and trying to facilitate J10 students, she instead blamed them for not learning it. When a group of J10 students got together to consult with her because they were struggling, she took it as personal insult and got offended. Humble or helpful? Not in the least. "I know I'm a good teacher, it's your fault you're getting poor grades, other students are getting A's proves that it." What a wonderful logical fallacy, let us not forget who is deciding those grades. And when you have questions about the red marks on your paper, the paper that you got a lower score on despite having fewer red marks than the person next to you, she refuses to explain what the red mark and comments even mean or the proper way to address them. Her concern is limited to telling people to drop out of the class so she doesn't have to hand out failing grades.

Concerned - 1

She is a hard teacher. She is an even harder teacher when she systematically picks on summer students. A tally kept for a couple of weeks for the number of questions asked to J10 students, and "first" questions (New questions that have not yet been asked, but once answered, it becomes a simple substitution for the answers of the following people, or sometimes even an identical answer) was much higher. Coincidence? Not really. When you take notes in class because you don't already know what she is talking about since you took J10, she interprets that as you not paying attention. This was a systematic issue with several of the J10 students I knew. "I'm proud that I notice that and call on you then. It makes me a good teacher." So not only are you now unable to answer the question, you're unable to go home and research it so you can. One student resorted to simply spacing out and just staring at the teacher to avoid getting called on so often. It worked. There's also the issue of her not explaining the connection between mistakes made on an essay and the grade given. No rubric either. It often seemed arbitrary. So were partial credit answers on tests. She would give higher scores for what appeared to be worse answers depending on the person. She apparently does give extra credit though and extensions. Not to J10 students though. Only to "people trying very hard" in other words people she liked. I am sure every one of us was struggling and working hard just trying to pass the class, forget even aiming for an A. She will be nice-ish for the first two weeks of class, from what I understand, an instructor's paycheck relies on the students enrolled which gets finalized for administrative purposes at the end of week 2.

Difficulty - 1

Simply put, many people who took J10 are going to have a difficult time. There are differences between J10 and J4-6 and she refuses to reconcile them. There is also her attitude towards J10 students, stemming from her questioning the quality of our education. To make matters worse, there was no text book and no reference materials making it even more vital to know what was taught in J4-6.

Effectiveness and Overall - 1

I know many students love her, but this is just a warning to J10 students out there. I really can't say anything nice about her because my experience was pretty negative.

In the end I took the J100I class and got an A- with Ikeda sensei (who is extremely nice and helpful) and does not rely on being devious in class to inflate his ego and instead teaches in an easily learnable way. The class is tough because it is an intensive class as takers of J10 should know well, but it is fair and you can learn if you work at it. I only had to ask him for help a few times, and that was in a few specific situations. (Naninani to iu hito, can you use it for the sentence of person who says naninani instead of person called naninani, or a high ranked person age-ing something to a low ranked person)