I can't keep up with WaniKani anymore

WaniKani Feedback
#15

Between my work and commute I lose like 70 hours of study time a week for my summer job so I can relate. I personally just like do my reviews whenever I can at work. All my breaks and any down time where I won’t get in trouble for being on my phone. Even just knocking out 10 reviews here and there adds up.

The other option that I’m a fan of is just doing it in the morning. Wake up earlier and knock it all out before you even go to work. When you come home tired you won’t have to worry about studying and can sleep. From your post I can’t gather any reason why you have to do them in the evening and rather that thats just what you’re used to.

I personally think that its much harder to read in small increments when tired from work compared to wanikani or grammar study. Thats just me, but I wouldn’t recommend it. Regardless of what you do though, my suggestion is to do it in the morning.

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#16

I too had that idea of waking up in the morning and doing all my reviews before heading off to work, it sounds really good in theory.
So I tried it.
The problem is that I have an extreme case of being a night owl, so getting up early in the morning is really, really hard for me.
Above all though, and I don’t know if this also applies to others but, I have my own prime hours for studying (about 9 pm), during which I feel most comfortable just sitting down and engorging in some Japanese to finish the day.
That’s also the reason why I’m overwhelmed now: at 9 pm I’m just too tired to give WaniKani all the attention it needs.
Still though, I’m absolutely determined to get to level 60.
And I will one day get there.
I simply refuse to waste 2 years of work.

5 Likes
#17

Wait.
I’ve just had a really nice idea.
How about just learning how to write the kanji that I’ve learned up until now?
Simply being repetitive and all I feel it will be much less tiring than studying grammar.
And it would kind of stay in the spirit of WaniKani…

1 Like
#18

Any specific reason why it have to only be literature? It’ll be easier (especially when tired) and will serve as practice to start on easy to read articles like NHK News Web Easy or N5 level watanoc articles. You’ll get that easy dopamine hit when you understand an article which can fuel your interest to branch into more complicated subjects.

There’s also Tadoku Graded readers that increases in complexity with word and grammar usage as you level up. If recall it correctly, there’s a mix of children’s stories (about 妖怪), travel guide (to 別府市), the after effects of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, and others.

As for grammar, if I’m in your shoes I’ll go for Tae Kim’s Guide to Learning Japanese to have a general understanding of grammar. It’s free, have straight forward explanations, and covers N5 up to parts of N3. It’s advisable to have a general understanding of grammar (instead of trying to perfect it at an early stage) and then gain mastery by immersion (i.e. reading, listening, watching). You can also use an SRS system like anki and download a grammar deck of Tae Kim’s to test your knowledge or Bunpro (or is it bunpo, kinda confusing) if you have the spare cash and time for an another subscription based SRS.

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#19

If you wanna learn how to write, then yeah absolutely. Gotta practice it to be able to do it. Personally I never cared about it and its not the most practical thing to learn, but at the same time it would help reinforce stuff and still be a japanese related skill.

#20

I highly recommend starting grammar as soon as possible. Otherwise Wanikani feels pointless, because where then do you apply what you’ve learned?
I get motivated myself when I see the progress I’ve made. Wanikani is a program intended for learning kanji; I’m assuming you’re studying kanji to be able to read literature in Japanese.

Even a bit every day can go a long way. Don’t become fixated on how much you can learn in a short amount of time. Small things build up. In September last year, I started formally learning grammar. Each day, I would do one section in Genki 2, whether that be taking notes on a new grammar concept or doing an exercise.
I could not imagine reading even a book for children in Japanese back then, but now I’ve finished one picture book and two manga, and I can really see the progress I’ve made in speed and understanding.

You may have already seen this farmous guide linked around the forum: My Journey of 368 days (+ The Ultimate Guide for WK 📖 ) - #2 by jprspereira
Try reading the section “Building your own schedule.” Basically, three small sessions of WK per day is a lot more efficient and less demotivating than one huge one.

My own schedule is a loose version of this:
Lessons and reviews at 5pm
A smaller review session at 9pm comprising of the newly learned items
A longer session at 7am the next day. This is when I will do the bulk of the reviews.

For a better and more thorough explanation of SRS intervals and how you can use WK efficiently, read the guide :wink:

Good luck!

3 Likes
#21

Don’t use Google Translate, it’s terrible, rahter use DeepL Translate: The world's most accurate translator.

2 Likes
#22

Google translate is just convenient. I can scan screenshots and get a good enough idea.

#23

I have tried here with words in english into my native language and they show same meaning as google translante, and even the words google translate cant find a translation, same happens to this deepL

unfortunately for me it is 6 for half a dozen :frowning:

#24

The Japanese → English translations in DeepL are fairly accurate and sometimes even stylistically better than one would come up with aiming for a direct/literal translations. The only area it’s not very good at is nuances and dialogues, to my experience.

#25

As others have already said, go on vacation mode. I also recommend, once you start school again and have more time and energy, to slow down on Wanikani lessons and use the extra time on grammar.

1 Like
#26

I really doubt you can keep up with grammar study or reading if you can’t even invest time in WK. They consume a lot of mental power. I think you’d better stick to WK. WK reviews are really quick to do, just chipped out the reviews in your spare time and don’t do any new lessons. When you can get more time, invest in grammar.

#27

Hi Sammer, はじめまして

There is good advice above. I recommend you relax now and engage in something that is hopefully enjoyable. For minimal work on your part and (hopefully) a little bit of enjoyment, I recommend that you try my “Harry Potter Plan”.

You buy the first Harry Potter book in Japanese (in written and also in audiobook forms) (lots of people also like a copy in their native language for comparison, and it has been translated into almost 100 languages) and you just read through it at your own pace, and listen to the audiobook as you drift off to sleep and for a few minutes when you wake up.

A bunch of the words you will know from WaniKani, but you will hear them in action, read by a native (professional narrator).

I am finding that, although it is slow, the process is bringing all of that vocabulary cramming knowledge “into focus”, and also improving my “ear” and pronunciation.

(I have some well-written notes to review from)

1 Like
#28

Even if it’s hard doing reviews right now, if you keep doing reviews but don’t do any more lessons they should ease up a pretty good amount in a couple of weeks. Just another option.

As someone with a hectic work schedule, I also find it helpful to split reviews into a morning and an evening session, and do some on the toilet at work. :sleepy:

1 Like
#29

I don’t have much to add in terms of advice. Everything that needs to be told has been mentioned.

Remember to take care of your health. Nothing is worth losing your health.

Good luck @Sammer san :+1:

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#30

Don’t overuse vacation mode, the reviews are supposed to pile up - otherwise you’ll find yourself forgetting what you learn really easily. If you can, try to do at least a couple of reviews every day even if you don’t get them to zero. Stop doing lessons at all, if you’re still doing them.
Do a bit of grammar (I recommend Cure Dolly’s organic approach) then focus on immersion instead of SRS (It’d be best to do both, but if you have time only for one, then go for immersion). Try some basic listening e.g. Teppei for beginners podcast.

2 Likes
#31

you could just rip off the wanikani list and put them into anki and do things your own pace instead of relying on wanikanis ever so unhelpfully uncustomizable srs algorithm

and japanese is lawful and consistent enough that you can get relatively far with relatively little time. you will find that the grammar comes in like, individual bullet points, so you could read and look at a single grammar point in the morning and try to use it during the day in your head. i got “the living language - ultimate japanese” book, pretty concise, no excessive reading, nothing to get caught up on, might be a good fit? lvl 32 is more than enough to start grammar with, and i wouldnt recommend reading yet, so best of luck

#32

I was in a very similar situation when I started a full time job in January.

Before, I was going at a pace of 8 days per level, doing 20 lessons every day with an average of maybe 170-200 reviews per day.

I couldn’t sustain that pace with my new job, so I decided to just stop doing lessons and do as many or as few reviews as I felt like each day.

I went through some periods where I didn’t review and ended up with a pile of maybe 1500 reviews, but the backlog doesn’t really grow when you start working through it, so all you need to do is do reviews every day and you will eventually get through it.

I only started back up again at the end of June, but now I’m going at a more manageable pace of 10-12 days per level, and I’m spending more time on grammar and non-WK vocab since I’ve already spent a disproportionate amount of time learning kanji.

I also bought lifetime so I wouldn’t get stressed out over the slower pace, and so far it’s been working very well. There’s no shame in slowing down or taking a break like I did - sometimes you need focus on other things in life. The kanji will still be there later.

If I were in your shoes, I would:

  1. Stop doing lessons

  2. Keep reviewing, but you don’t need to reach 0 every day

  3. Get some grammar going when the reviews slow down!

The grammar especially is going to help a lot when it comes to reading literature. If you find something fun to read, just go for it, and look things up as you go. Even if it’s soul crushingly difficult, you will learn while doing it. That’s what I did with visual novels and I feel like it helped a lot.

The most important thing is that you don’t burn out. As long as you’re interested in learning, you can do it.

6 Likes
#33

I scanned the replies to your post and I didn’t see a tip that I found on another thread. The tip is: lower the number of your apprentice level items. Reviews are mostly apprentice level items, so the fewer you have, the fewer reviews.
I’m level 38 and I’ve just been doing reviews, no new lessons, for a month or more, and I’ve gotten my apprentices down from 180 to around 50. Now my reviews don’t overwhelm me like they did before, and I can start doing some lessons again.

4 Likes
#34

Hi sammer,
i can tell you something. There is nothing better than real literature to fix the language!!
I bought and started reading: 10分で読める伝記 （10ぷんでよめるでんき）

It’s a series of books directed to kids on primary school, starting with book 1 basic Japanese.
Book 1 = first grade
Book 6 = sixth grade.

all the books contain short biographies of famous historical characters of the world that it takes around 10 minutes to read (to normal Japanese people, to us it will probably take more than that).
You can get the full set or one book separate.
Each book is 990 yen
and the full set 5940 yen

1 Like