Beginning Japanese

This is the first in a series of four books focused on high-school students. The series differs from everything else on the market thanks to an engaging storyline unfolding while the learners progress in their study, keeping things interesting and adding motivation to master new material. The narrative story underlying the textbook follows the life of Kiara, who has just moved to Tokyo as an exchange student. Kiara, Ben, and Kenichi get caught in a storm and end up in Tomo's time machine, through which they visit firsthand various historical and other famous events, places and people. The focus is very visual. The book's narrative is told with manga-style story pages, and the CD-ROM uses colourful video. Kanji is taught beginning with lesson 1, and together with current vocabulary rather than separately.