Genki is more of a classroom textbook - it is assumed there that when learning new grammar you will have a teacher to explain it more in detail for you and you will get tasks to make sentences yourself with the grammar. Still, it’s possible to use the textbook when solo studying as well. I think some grammar gets clearer once you start doing exercises related to it but if it’s still unclear I suggest you complement Genki’s explanations with the ones provided on “A dictionary of basic Japanese grammar”. There’s tons of examples and explanations for every nuance - tho for a beginner I don’t think it’s necessary to know all the small details about every grammar, as long as you get the main point. I personally think Genki is a great learning material so as long as you read up more on the parts you don’t get using other materials, you should be fine keeping on using it 
I feel like the workbook is very important. One of my main problems studying with the Tae Kim’s guide is that it completely lacks exercises.
I might purchase the workbooks in the future ^^ There’s 2, right?
Yea the workbooks are pretty good, but you need to purchase a seperate book for the answers, which is like a master answer book for both the textbook exercises and the workbook exercises.
I use Genki, and the explanations they give aren’t stellar, but what they do have that many other resources lack, are examples. The textbook itself has a review section after every chapter, and the workbook has A TON of examples and practice questions for every subsection in every lesson! So even if you don’t fully understand something while reading the explanation, after doing the reviews you’ll surely understand it.
Also, Genki has this resource: Self-study Room offers a variety of online materials to support your learning with Genki textbooks.
I just read the dialogues at the beginning, then check the translations to see if I was right (or how close to correct I was), then read the grammar points and move on to the next chapter.
But I also watch the Nihongonomori N5-N4 playlist. While things aren’t in the same order, there is still approximate overlap and great examples, in a quick format.
My formula for Genki has become:
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Listen to, then read dialogue, covering translation until I’ve worked out as much as I can;
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Listen to + read vocab, covering translation and trying to translate myself before the audio file tells me;
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Read grammar points;
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Do workbook exercises with the grammar section open in front of me for regular referral. Cry at how long this step always takes;
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Do main textbook exercises. If I can do any of the pair work exercises on my own, do those as well;
5.5. If any of the grammar points still aren’t clear, Google (though I’m starting to refer to Tae Kim more specifically);
- Kanji sections, which are a breeze thanks to WK but I still enjoy learning stroke order and doing translations.
Rinse and repeat for each chapter. Every so often I’ll go back and re-read earlier grammar points or re-listen to dialogues to make sure I’ve retained those lessons. I don’t really drill the vocab, because I’ve found a lot of it is covered in WK or whatever other exposure I have to Japanese.
I don’t follow. Every grammar point explanation has a multitude of example sentences, and the grammar practice section has dozens more, which you can listen to a native speaker pronounce. That doesn’t even count the workbook. I’m not sure I’ve seen another resource with so many examples for every grammar point.
I second the user who mentioned Japanese the Manga Way… it’s a much much more fun book to read. I went through that whole book concurrently. But in that book you’re going to get 1 or maybe 2 examples only per grammar point and zero practice exercises.
Genki’s content is fairly boring, yes. I hate Mary and Takeshi just as much as you. But it is a very complete resource. If you stick with it there’s a lot of potential for solidifying what you’re learning.
My 2cents 
My formula for Genki I and II was:
- Read the dialogue as a sort of preview for upcoming grammar points
- Take notes on 1 or 2 grammar points a day, which involved rephrasing everything in my own words until I fully understood it, and writing practice sentences
- Simultaneously learn the vocab using Anki and Memrise
- Do the workbook exercises after finishing vocab and grammar, and try to rely solely on memory for the grammar points to further reinforce them
- Correct any workbook exercises as needed with the answer key
- Do the readings in the back of the book. They’re actually somewhat interesting and fairly good for reinforcing a variety of grammar points
I didn’t do the kanji writing practice since it would take extra time and I’m less interested in it currently. I also limited myself to a maximum of 2 weeks per chapter.
Now that I’m finished with the books but am in need of listening practice, I find myself returning to them to utilize the dialogues included on the CDs. There are transcripts for these dialogues in the answer key, so it’s been a very valuable tool.
They sure know how to make money from desperate Japanese learners 
Thanks for the info!
Does anybody here study the grammar and vocab before reading/listening to the dialogue? Right now I’m just starting out with Genki 1 for review, but eventually I will get to the point where it’s not review. I think I might get frustrated trying to understand the dialogue without knowing about what’s going to be in it…or maybe there’s not that much new stuff per chapter…idk…
As far as additional resources, I’m using www.mykikitori.com for additional listening practice and this memrise course for vocab drilling.
It depends on the chapter. Most chapters only seem to add a few points, however I recall one or two really dense chapters (at least for me).
Also, the dialogue at the beginning (if reading it, I don’t know about listening to it) is pretty easy to guess at, based on context. I wouldn’t worry too hard - whatever you don’t get, just acknowledge you don’t, move on to the grammar, and then come back and be “oh, that’s why that means that!”… You just have to allow yourself to be wrong. It’s okay to make mistakes; we’re learning after all. ^^
[EDIT and UNRELATED: I’m pretty annoyed that Discourse changed something that will no longer let me make my favourite emoji to smile - it’s now getting converted into a yellow smiley, even with the previously cancelling backslash in there. ~(O.O)~ ]
If you find yourself thinking that you are suffering while reading Genki then it might be worth looking into other resources. Other people have suggested Japanese the Manga Way, which is a decent resource, but it does lack a lot of examples too. I think that book is better off as a supplement to a more dedicated grammar resource. Tae Kim is a little thin too, but each grammar lesson is relatively short to the point you could do one (or a couple) each day and not feel like you’re losing your mind from boredom. He gives a few examples, but nothing to practice which can be a problem for some people (although I think just reading native material and referencing your grammar sources is good enough practice).
You could try Imabi since quite a few people seem to like it and from what I hear its basically a more in-depth version of Tae Kim’s guide, so that’s something to look into. But I think the most important thing is to find a grammar source that doesn’t make you feel like you’re suffering, otherwise you will just get burnt out on it and lose focus altogether.
Genki books are based very much on the Japanese system of drilling (over, and over, and over again). Which, given the percentage of Audio/Visual learners in the world, isn’t necessarily bad. The books are designed with a teacher in mind (not for self learning, although they can be used that way). In addition to conversation classes and language lab components that compliment the books.
If you’re just following the text - read each chapter three times. First, skim it/read it quickly. Second, read it through (light notations). Third, really read and dig in and take lots of notes. Do the examples along with the text.
You should also have the workbook for the text (green or orange, depending on if you have #1 or #2), which you should be doing after the third read-through (trying to do it without the aid of the text, but refer to the text as needed - making adjustments as you go).
Finally, it is expected that not only do you use the kanji and grammar of a given chapter, but also all previous kanji and grammar taught so that you can compose target sentences on your own (by way of a daily journal, writing practice, retention practice, etc).
It requires quite a bit of discipline to self-teach using books meant for the classroom. And you’ll not see improvement unless you work on both of each of the passive and active skills (listening/reading and speaking/writing).
(I did 2 years of Japanese study in university via those texts in the classroom).
PS: ALWAYS have a printed copy of Tae Kim’s Japanese on hand to leaf through!
Woah woah woah, assumptions much? I personally am enthralled by their budding romance ever since they finally managed to get that Kabuki date to work out (silly Takeshi, waiting at マクドナルド instead of モスバーガー!). Who knows what will happen next???
I make a point not to, because I like to try to figure out new vocab and grammar from context, and then refer back to it after learning the grammar points to check my understanding. However, I can see the value in doing it the other way around.
Reading this just now made me giggle. I think that was the last chapter I read - or else, the one before… if it’s a separate chapter where he asks her out…??? It’s been a few months since I’ve touched Genki. ^^;
I really liked Genki but only when I worked out a good system for it. At some point much later than it should have been, I realised that the numbered grammar points related to the numbered exercises (at least in genki 2 it is like this). I would do a grammar point a day (or two days if it was tricky) around work (so not on the weekend which are my busiest days). By doing this, I created structure and achievable targets.
I am using this technique now on an integrated approach and it works well there too. One evening, I read all the conversations, using memrise for the vocab and then each day I do a grammar point and related exercises from the workbook. Grammar is never going to be fully fun. It will be hard work and we can’t game-ify everything. Certainly, we can game-ify the practise after what we have already learnt but we need to actually study. Equally, overly boring doesn’t work so study short amounts effectively.
This is very very true. I am thinking Genki 2 may be better for me as it is newer stuff. I suppose it is just a matter of pulling my socks up and getting stuck in.
Thanks for the help 
Pretty sure I found the answer key online.
Sometimes I do exercises by annotating a pdf of the workbook with my IME. (You can get Genki anywheres on the internets for free, kids. It’s only mildly illegal) It’s nice cause I can’t write in Japanese for shit, kanji especially, but my kana is also atrocious. The drawings in Genki are so charming.