Feedback on Study Plan

You mean that’s not the right one? :scream:
I probably shouldn’t have spent 2 years learning Vietnamese for this… :sweat_smile:

I’m gonna be giving slightly different advice than the others, but if you are a level 16 and you’re getting ready for the N4, the two things that are gonna be blocking you the most are going to be grammar and listening comprehension, not kanji or vocab.

If you aren’t yet at N4 level and are only at 16 in WK, I have a hard time believing that you’re going to be able to read native texts at this point without needing to pause on literally every sentence. That’s not bad mind you, but it means that it’s not an effective way to practice what you’re learning so much as a way to keep you motivated and introduce you to higher level grammar before you reach it. So yeah, I would not advocate immersion- you want an N+1 difficulty for optimum learning efficiency, and that’s more like N+25.

I’d also recommend dropping the memrise completely– since learning superficially is the problem over vocab, you want to make sure you are using every word you learn, not trying to cram more in.

I took a quick peek at JFBP, and there are plenty of decent grammar exercises that will give you practice, but there are two flaws I’m seeing. One is that it’s all short answer– nothing asks you to write more than a sentence or two at a time. The second problem is the sample dialogues are by and large far too short. Given that, I would recommend:

  1. Get a pdf of the Genki textbook online so you can take them with you digitally. If you feel bad about pirating the material, buy a real textbook first.

  2. Keep using your JFPB, but supplement with the Genki beginning of chapter dialogues (using the listen and repeat shadowing method), and beginning of chapter reading passages, as well as all the genki listening/speaking drills in the review section (they’re robust and at a natural speed). This will guaranteeably build your N4 grammar while practicing reading comprehension and listening at a level that is probably more rigorous than what you’d get on Japanese Pod.

  3. Do also get the genki workbooks (not the textbook)– again, you can skip the written grammar drills if you want, but each chapter ends with a page of listening comprehension exercises, and an open-ended mini-essay prompt. Do these– they will be the most valuable in consolidating your grammar knowledge and building your listening comprehension level up to N4 level. Have your italki tutor correct the essays, and do a practice dialogue using at least one of the grammar points you studied that week.

  4. If you’re going to go to a Japanese class, make the most of it– be overly talkative, especially with the teachers. Make small talk before class, and bring specific questions about grammar to ask them after class. If at all possible, ask those questions IN JAPANESE. This will go a long way towards helping you think in Japanese, which will in turn increase your listening comprehension fluency.

Hope that helps!

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Thanks so much for putting so much time into your answer. I really appreciate it.

I think you are right that grammar and listening are probably the biggest roadblocks. Even when I was at Uni, I struggled so hard with grammar and general sentence construction. I only studied via the textbook which was similar to JFBP and had only short exercises. Genki does sound like a good idea. I don’t have any moral qualms about downloading the pdf. I will buy the workbook though.

I already have some Q’s ready for the teacher for the Japanese class, I’m writing them down as I’m doing the exercises. You are so right about being proactive and interacting more in classes, I will try my best! With hindsight I can see so many flaws with how I used to study Japanese and tbh I’m carrying those habits with me.

Thanks again :slight_smile:

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Again massive thank you to everyone who has contributed. This is my revised plan -

Continue with JFBP 2, ~1 hour per day, making note of any vocabulary that I’m not familiar with on paper and transfer to an Anki deck, make note of questions and ask in evening class
Continue with WK but organise the times that I do lessons and reviews better
Download Genki 1 workbook pdf and answer key, buy workbook, do listening comprehension and mini essays. Work on Genki ~1 hour per day, *oops I meant download textbook pdf but buy workbook
Check exercises with italki tutor ~1 hour per week
Evening Japanese class ~2 hours per week

Things to add (but not right away)
Downloading Houhou (the actual version) later
Get a graded reader book
Practise N4 questions closer to the test time

Things to drop
Memrise
Japanesepod as primary listening comprehension

This seems more manageable to me but I’m always happy for more feedback.

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If you’re doing the listening exercises from Genki, and want more practice, you might like mykikitori.com. It’s not made by the Genki authors, but it goes along with the Genki 1 chapters and has dialogues with quizzes.

And just a clarification, unless they changed things in the 2nd edition, the mini essay prompts are found in the Reading/Writing section at the back of the textbook - not in the workbook.

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Thank you!! That’s a great suggestion and I definitely need more listening practise. Hopefully I will have the time to do extra. I’m expecting to finish JFBP within the next month or so then I can spend more time on Genki (dependent on weekly homework from the evening class).

Sorry my bad, I did mean to download the textbook and then buy the workbook. But now I also know where to look :slightly_smiling_face:

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Good luck! If you’re able to keep to your revised study plan, you should be progressing quite quickly!

(The mykikitori exercises shouldn’t take more than 30 minutes per chapter, and considerably less than that if you’re doing well.)

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Happy to help! Best of luck to you!

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