Hi, it’s your boy Draga with another annoying topic.
Do you still use other apps with WaniKani or do you only use textbooks?
Before WK I tried a countless number of apps and there was always something pissing me off which was seeing complex Kanji right from the start. You can see such a thing with the first lesson made by Memrise or in Duolingo. These are great apps, I know they aren’t made to teach Kanji but it’s frustrating when you keep seeing awful Kanji while you don’t even know what a radical is (maybe it’s just me…).
Don’t get me wrong I still like apps (human japanese is freakin’ awesome) but I am gonna take a break from some of them until I know a respectable number of Kanji.
I was wondering if anyone was in the same situation.
Don’t be shy, tell me if I am idiot and give me an advice if you have one
I really only use WaniKani and KaniWani in conjunction these days. I sort of get what you mean, though–I’ve played with Memrise and DuoLingo in the past.
From what I’ve experienced, most language learning apps don’t start with simple kanji, they start out with simple words and concepts. In this, they attempt to mimic the way a small child learns a language for the first time. Those apps are not specifically designed to teach kanji the way WaniKani is–they intend for you to eventually just recognize the kanji on sight as part of a word, without a deep dive into its construction or individual meaning. Not an inherently bad strategy, but certainly not as focused on learning kanji itself.
WaniKani, KaniWani and LingoDeer is all I use, once I have a better knowledge of more kanji then I’d feel more comfortable with continuing courses on memrise or duolingo.
I also find that some of the Japanese courses on Memrise don’t introduce difficult kanji too quickly. With how much you can set what part of a course you do or do not want to learn, maybe look into some of the beginner courses, but then turn off all the lessons that would have you going over known things - like the kana stuff? That way you can do beginner stuff, but without having to tediously go through lessons of things you already know.
I went through all of LingoDeer and I like using Kanji of the Day and Kanji Tree casually. I used to do Memrise but have replaced that with the reading of and listening to native material, and my own grammar studies.
I use the KanjiStudy app a lot. It’s awesome. Jisho dictionary and Memrise too for extra vocab practice. I love WK a lot but I wouldn’t give up any of these.
Bunpro is incredible as a grammar subsidiary to Wanikani. I can’t focus more than 5 minutes on grammar, seriously it’s not for me, but Bunpro gives me the drills to learn the basics fast, review often, and the deep learning happens with more playful resources like reading and watching.
I pretty much exclusively use wanikani and then LingQ for in context learning that I can use to really bump up my vocabulary and get used the language.
I use Obenkyo for writing Kanji. It has a test mode where it gives you the meaning of a kanji and you have to draw it with your finger. It also recognizes mistakes in the stroke order, which is neat. I always add my new WK kanji to my list of kanji on Obenkyo. I also want to be able to handwrite kanji so it really helps.
I use… Anki … which surely sounds like nothing new… as many people with a more visually oriented style of learning will say
BUT using this particular system, where I rip material from my shows and get all that sentence lines with the audio and snapshots of the actual show, it’s tons of fun!!!
I get to practice vocab, reading, listening and shadowing recycling the same content… how is that for a sale??!
Well, jokes aside, it’s a great system, self made and adjusted to whatever you’re into. It’s work, but very well worth it
I’m squeezed for time so the only other study I use right now is Bunpro and watching Nihongo no Mori videos and reading a few pages out of Genki now and then. I like Torii a lot but memorizing vocabulary lists on top of WK’s vocab lessons was too much new material for me. I’d like to go back to it after finishing WK.
I like to use Kaniwani and Bunpro as well Bunpro is like Wanikani but just for grammar, and it’s pretty helpful. The website isn’t complete but I think it’s good for what it has right now.
Not really an app, but I also love Tae Kim’s Complete Guide to Grammar book as well. I used that about a year ago when I was just learning Japanese and it really helped!
Also, I love Hinative.com It’s a great place to check how good you know your grammar, check your pronunciation, etc.
I like to use Jisho.org as an online dictionary. It’s a dictionary for kanji, vocabulary, phrases, and names (And it also shows you the stroke order for kanji).
Also, if you like Japanese simplified, I would use Maggiesensei.com This was the only website I found that successfully taught me how to use よう and という properly, and now I feel like an idiot for not knowing!
Once you’re really advanced, you can also use the app Hellotalk which allows you to chat with natives.
Hope that helps I just realized most of these aren’t even apps, but they’re very useful
I did KaniWani for quite a while, but the frustration of synonyms just became too much and had to drop it. I want to give KameSame a try once I have some burned kanji to study.
I have Human Japanese and have done some chapters. It’s good, but all my learning energy is going into WaniKani right now.
I plan to give Bunpro a try once I hit level 20 and have more vocabulary.
I’ve tried DuoLingo (very weak for Japanese), LingoDeer, and Memrise, but didn’t really connect with them. Especially hated the timer on Memrise - I know you can install a script to disable it, but only on some reviews.
I use iKnow for vocab. I find it’s a pretty good companion to Wanikani, and it works similarly.
I tried Bunpro, but SRS applied to grammar wasn’t doing it for me like it was for the rote memorization pieces like kanji and vocab, so I’ve stuck to books for that.
I highly recommend Anki for learning vocabulary words outside of WaniKani. Right now I’m using it to nail down all the vocab from Genki 1 & 2 before I start Japanese 301 at university this fall. You can set it up so you have to type the answer to each item before answering it, which I find enormously improves my learning.
I use good old fashioned Anki. If there’s a word I think would be particularly useful to know, I put it in there (especially if it’s not covered by any level of WaniKani).
Not an app, but Kumon’s Kanji workbooks are excellent for practicing writing and reinforcing the readings.
Japanesepod for listening comprehension, Kaniwani for vocabulary production and recently started through a few Memrise courses to get more vocabulary (and most of the vocab from Genki I and II). I should do more Bunpro but I find I’m not really comfortable with the interface yet.
