"Cheating" with Anki

[MidoriUma]

Having fun making my way through WK, seems a bit slow right now but I know from reading other posts it will pick up considerably in the 20’s and 30’s.

I have an absolutely boring job right now at work, my employer basically pays me to sit there and I’d spend 4 hours a day staring at the wall if I didn’t entertain myself somehow. So I downloaded a 2200 kanji deck for Anki, and am doing like 50 kanji a day, only memorizing the meanings (not the pronunciation). I’ll be done all of them by Halloween, is my goal (also when this stupid job ends).

Is this a good idea, or am I somehow sabotaging myself down the road with WK? Will the WK system still work if I’ve already learned new (possibly slightly different) mnemonics for kanji? I assumed it would make things easier in the latter half, but now I’m not so sure.

[UInt2048]

@MidoriUma

Will the WK system still work if I’ve already learned new (possibly slightly different) mnemonics for kanji? I assumed it would make things easier in the latter half, but now I’m not so sure.

@ekg Tagging you because of your Death posts…

What if you went through some non-WK vocabulary? (e.g. 下る)
I don’t think it would hurt you to study more, but that much at once might be overwhelming…

[Joeni]

You might get, as @UInt2048 suggest, more value out of learning additional vocab rather than pre-learning kanji.

May I recommend [Vocab] WaniKani Expansion Pack v1.0 - 1/13/2016 - Now on Memrise! which will teach you 4000ish bits of common vocab that wanikani doesn’t teach, organised by WaniKani level. I have a version of that deck in Kitsun.io and it’s been a great way to expose myself to common grammar that would be useful to know, but wanikani can’t fit in.

The example given of 下り is a good one for the kind of vocab you’d learn. It means downhill, for example, which you’ll agree is common and useful.

[LastStand]

I’d rather advise you to learn non-kanji vocabulary if you don’t already do. You’re gonna learn a of stuff on here that is in your Anki deck anyways so it would also reduce redundancy.
On top of that, I think it’d also be more worth to study カタカナ-only vocab since that’s also something that definitely won’t come up on WK as well.

But in my personal opinion and experience using KameSame, you’re not hurting your WK journey. On the contrary, even. Studying a language is all about quantity. There is an article about that topic on ToFugu somewhere.

[Jerricent]

Out of curiosity, have you studied anything besides kanji?

Sounds like it would be a good time to work on grammar and other non-kanji studies if you can

[MegaZeroX]

There is no such thing as cheating yourself in SRS

First: what is this thread about? Well, something I’ve seen regularly posted in the WK forums is that doing any reviews outside of the scheduled ones will actively harm your learning, which sounded strange to me. I spent much of today delving into research of the field, and the post below is my findings. There will be a tl;dr at the end of the post. Let me give a disclaimer. I don’t do research in this area, nor do I know anyone that does. This is primarily just what I got from reading two meta…

[smarts47]

Maybe Remember the Kanji would be better suited for your goals at the moment. They have an SRS system here: https://kanji.koohii.com/
Plenty of people learn the kanji first and then the readings, and probably the same number of people look at readings alongside meaning. I have done a little of both, and I find that the vocabulary words can be quite different than what it appears to be if I just consider what the kanji translates to, so I prefer something like WK (I didn’t before. I needed to learn vocab by rote for a while before the kanji made sense to me). You just have to find what works for you.

[ekg]

@UInt2048

@ekg Tagging you because of your Death posts…

Well, I can’t view them anymore. ^^; And can’t remember everything I put on there, but I don’t see any problem with using your own mnemonics, because the main point is the SRS-system anyways. (the mnemonics are helpful but not really necessary)

[UInt2048]

@ekg

I’m still trying to figure it out. At first it was the bombardment of similarity in meanings at the beginning of the level. Now though, I’m not sure it’s very different from any other level I’ve faced.

Part of the reason is that I still, much to my own surprise, know about 90 % of the vocab taught. I really though this prior knowledge advantage would have been over at level 20. For it to continue, and for me to sort of expect it going forward is odd.

I was a total rogue learning Japanese through BL Drama CDs and what not. The fact that I have retained so much vocab is very promising as for the effect of encountering vocab in the wild. Do it now, it you are not already doing it. It really sticks with you. That’s the advise I can give you.

For me, WK is about cementing my previous knowledge into something I can actually use (not imagine), as I truly have mastered words at the pint when I know their kanji and can read them. That is irreplaceable.

@ekg

Believe it or not, but tomorrow is gonna be The BIG day , when I might get out of the DEATHs! So, I though I might type up some of my thoughts about these levels, before moving on.

At first, I felt the increase in difficulty at lv 21. There were more items with strange readings that I had to really beat into my head before they semi-stuck (I’ve increased my leeches thanks to the past levels being more of the same >_>).

But, it also felt like I’ve settled into a WK-routine when faced with the new radicals and kanji for each level. So, I never did slow down which I thought I might have to do.

So what have I learned?

That I still can’t keep apart all the words for criticism, but somehow managed to learn the difference regarding words for territory, zone and area , not to mention judge . I recently failed one of the law words 法規 (ほうき), even though there really is only one of the vocab that means rule instead, 規則 - きそく (which makes me think of 貴族 - きぞくi.e. nobles & aristocrats who might come up with unfair rules for everyone else).

But, all in all, Death hasn’t bee too unpleasant I find. ^^;
(I hope you all also have a more or less pleasant journey down ^>^)

Now the anticipation is building as to what I’ll find as I descend into hell

Maybe just quoting this will help…

[ekg]

Thanks for reminding me of my many typos! I remember them well!