So, happy birthday to me! It’s been a really long time since I’ve last touched WK, mostly because I was so fixated on other life stuff (school, work, family). As it happens, though, it took some life stuff (say, an internship) falling apart for me to remember my dreams of teaching English abroad and becoming proficient in Japanese. Since it’ll take maybe at least a year to teach abroad, working on my Japanese is the next best thing.
WK Review
Over the past couple days, I whittled my review back down to something much more manageable from the 300 I was greeted with. I also finally started on the final radical in Level 3, so I hope to start on Level 4 within a week or two.
Hiragana and Katakana Practice
To review what kana I’ve forgotten, I took Tofugu’s hiragana and katakana quizzes. My hiragana was around 90%, but after struggling halfway through the katakana quiz, I knew for sure where I’ll need to focus my study. So I made a kana AnkiDroid to work on that, starting with アイウエオ and カキクケコ. By next week, I hope to go as far as タチツテト.
Much Needed Pep Talk
It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been away. There is always an opportunity to start over. You haven’t truly failed until you quit trying.
Thanks for the suggestion! I’ve tried it out a bit, and while I find it useful for quizzing, I find that my study preference is to have that spaced repetition. I think what I’ll do is use Real Kana to occasionally practice those kana I’ve mastered.
Level 3 has a few katakana-only vocabulary like リンゴ and コーヒー and some other vocab that is mostly katakana with 1 kanji. If they’re not already in your review rotation, maybe you could prioritize them using the lesson picker for extra katakana practice!
I don’t know if I’ll be recording a daily log after this Thanksgiving weekend, but I’m happy with the progress I’ve made today.
So I looked through my vocabulary, and it looks like I got to Guru level with the katakana vocab. I might need to do some research on how to force lessons, because it didn’t appear obvious for me. But thanks for mentioning it! I forgot that it was a possibility.
WK Review
I’ve been able to keep my 0/0 streak, even with 10 new vocabulary. It’s also nice to see that I don’t have any critical condition items either!
Look at that Guru level! I’m really pleased with how much I’ve remembered!
Kana Practice
I’ve done pretty well with my kana AnkiDroid. Even with adding サシスセソ, I only missed one card, and that was more due to typing in the wrong kana. Sure, it meant that I still knew it since I had to type it, but I don’t want to fall into the trap of “well, I know what I meant, so it’s okay”. It looks like I’ll surpass the goal I set yesterday, but since I’ll start traveling home tomorrow, I’m not going to try and push it.
Another Pep Talk
While it may be fun to speed-run learning, it’s best to go slow and steady. Not everyday is going to be a good study day. If you know that life is going to happen, give yourself grace to go a little slower.
I don’t know yet how frequently I’ll be posting, but I want to try a halfway point and see if that helps at all.
WK Review
Sunday and Monday, I kept making little mistakes, and I wondered why. Tuesday, I realized, “Oh, duh, I’m using my phone instead of a computer.” I thought it would keep me from remembering the pronunciation, since I was using the Japanese keyboard on my phone, but I realized today that typing the romaji is much more useful for me right now, especially since I keep forgetting it’s きって（切手） instead of きて, and きょ（去）instead of きょう. I still think the Japanese keyboard is good practice, but perhaps not for a while.
I’m happy with my progress, in spite of the typos (I’m particularly embarrassed by 方, autocorrect kept changing my “way” into “ear”)! Now I need to keep at the practice, so I can keep my apprentice items below 100. Now that I’m making sure to avoid typos (thank you, computer) and the pronunciation, I’m hoping I won’t be overwhelmed with them for long, if at all.
Another issue with doing it all on my phone was I didn’t get in practice with my Anki cards until today. I keep forgetting that I download the app and have access there, but it’s obviously a blessing in disguise. After getting back on that bandwagon (only 1 error! ), I went ahead and added タチツテト to the mix.
Pep Talk Ahoy!
Don’t fight what works right. Be humble enough to make the changes that will help you succeed! You’ll thank yourself later!
This is probably the case for Mac as well, but on Windows computers specifically you can add a Japanese keyboard and swap back and forth using a keyboard shortcut. WK’s kana parsing is the same as if you were using a real romaji keyboard anyway, so it’s also fine to just keep using that.
You can get really fast using the 12-key keyboard on a phone, and it definitely helps teach hiragana/katakana, but there’s nothing wrong with using a romaji keyboard even on your phone if you have the option.
Made it to the end of the week, and I don’t think I skipped a single day of studying! I’m very happy with my progress, especially now that I have the Wallpaper Generator by the wonderful @Masayoshiro ! I did not realize how big of an impact this wallpaper would be, but I get excited every time I update it.
I really love the 12-key, and I think once I have more levels under my belt, I’ll go back to using it in earnest. But right now, because I rely a lot on mnemonics, it’s only confused me. I’m glad I was able to go back to romaji without feeling guilty, because I know myself well enough to see I could have ended up making it not fun again, which would mean I would’ve fallen back out of studying for another long period. As for the Japanese keyboard on laptop, I love it. It’s helpful for Anki, and for typing stuff out here.
WK Review
Progress is steadily growing. Over half of the level 4 radicals are now at Guru level, and I believe I should have all the kanji unlocked by the end of tomorrow at the latest. I’m also below 100 on apprentice items, which is a great feeling.
Another great feeling that has me excited is that I’m able to give the context portion of my vocab more than just a cursory glance. It’s become a lot easier to read the examples out loud, and I’m excited to figure out how to incorporate that into my studies in the future. If you have any suggestions from your personal experience, I would love to hear from you!
I’m glad that I was a little ahead previously, because now it’s getting harder. I added ナニヌネノ to the deck, and I think this is the point where I’ve struggled and stopped in the past, since the previous ones were easier to remember/learn. I know some katakana have some visual similarities to their hiragana pair, and I was hoping to find more similarities as I went on, but seeing as I haven’t given it as much attention as I think I should, it’s been slow progress.
I know this is typically the point where it’s easy for me to give up, and I think the best way to combat that is to either find a way to make it fun or find a way of tracking my progress that has the same impact as the WK wallpaper. Have you experienced any unique ways to make it fun or to track your progress?
Next week's goals
By December 14, I aim to:
WaniKani: Start Level 5
カタカナ: Incorporate ハヒフヘホ and have a way to make review fun
Pep Talk Ahoy!
If learning is starting to get hard, you’re doing something right. But remember that learning a language works best as a marathon, where it’s vital to learn to pace yourself. Test your limits, but give yourself room to let up if you need to. Keep at it, and you’ll go far!
I met my goal to reach Level 5! This is the furthest I’ve ever been with WK, and I’m really excited.
Despite lacking in motivation, I persisted in my studies. I’m relieved, because in the past, this is usually the point where I drop off and give up for a while.
There are quite a few radicals and kanji I’ve come across that I already know from my semester of Chinese. The meanings are very similar, and the pronunciations are close enough that I’ve basically got a mnemonic already built into it.
What could be improved:
My learning almost fell to the wayside due to a busier schedule and motivation issues. I will try blocking time out in my schedule to make sure that studying happens daily. Progress through the lessons might slow, but I’ll at least secure time to progress through reviewing.
Morale and thus motivation went down to repeated mistakes. I need a second method of review so I can avoid repeats. I’ll restructure this study log and try separate journaling to evaluate my mistakes and implement changes. I’ll go into more detail about it in my WK review blurb below.
I did not attend to my kana review at all this week. I switched back to the phone again for WK review without connecting Anki to my phone as well. I’ll go into more detail below on how I plan to fix this issue.
WK Review
In case you don’t want to read my wall of text and just want a view of my progress:
So the idea behind this journal is that I’ll interact more with the language and my learning, ensuring I don’t stagnate in progress and motivation. I’ll do my first bit of journaling here, since today (tonight?) is my first crack at it. After today, I’ll journal separately in either Notion or a post in the Private Study Logs. I like keeping this as the weekly review, so I don’t want to bog it down too much.
Recent errors:
体 (on’yomi) - I keep forgetting the reading (たい). I’ve updated the reading notes to include a mnemonic that helps me.…This makes the fifth Naruto mnemonic so far. No, I’m not embarrassed, what are you talking about? Me, embarrassed that I used a show I haven’t seen since I was in middle school? Pfft.
見える - I frequently get the meaning mixed up with 見せる. I’ll write up a meaning note that will help me distinguish for now, but I know there are some grammar rules going on here that I’ll need to know eventually. Just from observation, it looks like せる indicates a transitive verb, whereas える indicates intransitive. However, I don’t know if that’s just a coincidence. If I have time this next week, I’ll try to do research into it to confirm or deny.
言 (radical) - My mistake was saying “speak” instead of “say”. As far as I’m aware, there aren’t any radicals that force this distinction, so I added “speak” as a synonym.
それ - I became careless with my answer. I know it means “that,” but I typed “this” instead. I’m not sure just yet what to do to avoid this in the future. Maybe a motion I can do when reciting it so I distinguish it from これ easier.
上手い - I didn’t read the reading explanation when initially studying this, but I also knew it wasn’t like 上手 (じょうず), so I tried applying the on’yomi and turned it into うてい. Now that I’ve read the reading explanation (it’s cool to see a native Japanese word!), I know that this will rely heavily on a suitable mnemonic:
It's not exact, but it's close enough
声 (on’yomi) - This is another case of a weak effort in tailoring the mnemonic for this one. Coupled with my motivation dip this week, this one’s been tough to remember. I’ll make this one a priority to work on this next week, since I’m still not sure what sort of mnemonic will help me remember.My brain’s tendency to attach a meme or a song to everything is suspiciously silent right about now…
切手 - There are two issues happening here. First is the meaning. It’s not automatically clicking that “cut-hand” links to “postage stamp”. I’ll simplify my meaning note to see if that improves recall. Second is the reading, and this is one that I’ve noticed for the past couple weeks. While I can hear the stop in きって, I have a hard time recalling it in this word and others. 四日 is another one that took me longer to learn. I wonder if there’s a rule to this that might make it easier to remember. In the meantime, another motion while reciting will hopefully help.
村人 - Another on’yomi mistake; I keep writing むらじん instead of むらびと. I feel silly saying this, but I’m now realizing the distinction between on’yomi and kun’yomi are more complicated, and perhaps the way I’ve been distinguishing them in my head is incorrect. I should do more research into on’yomi and kun’yomi so vocab like this will be easier to recall.
去年 - This has the same type of reading mistake as 切手. It all boils down to my difficulty in distinguishing between similar sounds. I keep typing きょうねん instead of きょねん. I find it interesting that while I can remember 去 just fine as a kanji, all that recall gets thrown out the window once it’s paired with another kanji. I’ll need to modify the reading note on this one to associate it more with the 去 on’yomi and see if that helps it stick.
今日 - Maybe this is why I keep forgetting the 去年 reading? I’ll need to add a note that will help me distinguish between them.
多 (on’yomi) - In this case, my knowledge in Chinese is not so helpful. In Mandarin, this is pronounced as duō, which has led me to typing と instead of た. I had a mnemonic in place, but it’s clearly not strong enough to override previous knowledge. I need to make the mnemonic catchier.
仕方 - I added a rendaku info userscript last week because I knew I’d have trouble with knowing when to rendaku (totally not a verb, but I’ll verb it anyway). In this case, it says that 方 almost never achieves rendaku (poor thing). Reading that would have helped me from the beginning. Hopefully now that I’ve read it, it should be enough to get this correct in the future.
二十日 - The explanation provided for the reading on this is a little confusing, but I didn’t think to do some outside reading or ask any questions about it. As a result, I repeatedly mixed the reading up with 二日. I should do some reading into count days to see if there’s a pattern that will make remembering this one easier. Still, I’ll need a better mnemonic whether or not there’s a pattern there.
Phew, that’s a lot to review! And based on the bolded bits, that’s a lot to work on this next week. Though now that I think about it, a lot of these should be quick fixes. …So long as I remember to actually tackle them.
かな Review
Like I said, it will help a great deal to download Anki onto my phone and sync it to my desktop app. The challenge will be to remember how to type katakana on Gboard. So far, the only way I know how is to look through the Google suggestions. If there’s an easier way, I can’t find it, even when I Google it. Fingers crossed though this doesn’t become too much of a barrier.
On the plus side, I’m interacting with more words in WK that utilize katakana, like コンビニ and デパート, so it’s not like my katakana learning has completely stalled. I don’t want to settle for just that, though, so I’ll do what I can to make Anki work for me. At least, until I find a better way to learn katakana.
Pep Talk Ahoy!
Learning is meant to push your boundaries, and it’s meant to be intentional. If you’re not intentional about how learning and improving, you’re going to stagnate and end up frustrated that you’ve stagnated. Making a mistake is not the end of the world. It’s something to learn from, and should be something to look forward to. Mistakes mean you get to keep learning, so celebrate the opportunities that mistakes bring! You’ve got this!
Something that helps me remember the pronunciation of 二十日（はつか）is a similar vocabulary 二十歳（はたち, twenty years old). It’s not necessarily just the day part that’s special - twenty is too! Both of these pronunciations are carryovers from old Japanese, and I found an interesting explanation here about the は coming from 果て（はて）or “limit”, in this case the limit of counting using fingers and toes.
It’s been a really long time since I’ve last touched WK, mostly because I was so fixated on other life stuff (school, work, family). As it happens, though, it took some life stuff (say, an internship) falling apart for me to remember my dreams of teaching English abroad and becoming proficient in Japanese. Since it’ll take maybe at least a year to teach abroad, working on my Japanese is the next best thing.
I also finally started on the final radical in Level 3, so I hope to start on Level 4 within a week or two.
Thank you for pointing it out!
