I did it! last time i posted here, i was saying I had to go away, pause my lessons (but never reviews) and learn Katakana! it took… embarrassingly long XD but its done!!! and now today i did my daily 10 lessons!
it feels so good to be back, although I am forever conscious i am moving far slower than those on here claim they can move 10 lessons a day is a lot for me, but maybe i could do 20 like most people recommend? after all, I am just level 4 seeing some people say they can do 100 in a day makes my jaw drop!!! i am sure one day I will be good like them!!
For now, even though the tofugu guide i am following has told me to just focus on wanikani until level 10, i feel i should at least look into grammar to better understand vocab im learning here!! so any recommendations for that, as well as the best textbooks for when level 10 arrives would be awesome thank you friends!!!
thanks for all the lovely support and help on my previous posts <3 i love you all like family <3
Welcome back! Just to be clear 10 lessons a day is fine. 20 lessons a day is pretty much max pace, and that’s a heavy workload. Reviews can get up to hundreds a day depending on how many lessons you do and your accuracy but not lessons.
20 a day is… a lot - I did it briefly a LONG time ago over the first few levels - it was largely sustainable because I already knew some of those kanji. Now… nope, can’t do that. That said, you may gradually find some lessons easier - I can do 20 vocab lessons in one go if the vocab isn’t too difficult - I cap out at 4-8 kanji/day - so I use lesson filter to interleave my vocab and kanji and go with that.
10/day is often pretty manageable, and I prefer it (although sometimes I just want to clean out the vocab lessons and do more). Sustainable is better than speedy
Don’t worry about your speed, is completely fine, just focus on having a pace that is comfortable to you, one advice I can give you is to not compare yourself to others, otherwise you’re going to make your life harder and possibly lose motivation, everyone is different and there’s nothing wrong with that we all have different circumstances.
But generally taking it slow at the beginning is advised, as burning out is a real problem (Yeah it happened to me too part of the many reasons why even after 5 years I’m still below level 10. )
Remember the end goal is to finish Wanikani so you can read whatever you like, hopefully you can do it no matter how long it takes
I must confess I’ve never even thought about the exact number of lessons I do a day. I do them when I feel like I can handle more, and I pause them when I think my current workload is fine. Also, I believe doing lessons/reviews on kanji is way more stressful than on radicals or vocabulary… so it all changes throughout the level! Don’t worry too much about speed, as long as you’re learning and enjoying the ride.
As for grammar, I’m using Genki (and still kind of in the beginning). I believe Genki 1+2 covers all N5 grammar and most N4 grammar (please, to all who’ve done Genki, correct me if I’m wrong!). The textbook is nice and I like it so far. Good explanations, and tons of exercises, although many are like “do this with your classmate”, which I just ignore.
I would also personally recommend Cure Dolly’s series on YouTube. I know a lot of people will roll their eyes just thinking about the weird and uncanny energy this emanates lol, but once I got over the odd voice, I honestly found her grammar explanations incredible. It’s really insightful and makes you think twice about the explanations given on Genki, which is still very good on its own! I use her videos as a (great) complement.
try not to compare yourself to what other people achieve. learning is something very personal and every one has different needs, speeds and assimilation times
as long as you enjoy and see some progress you should be fine also you will get used to kanji learning very soon and things will become less hard
spoiler alert: regardless of the level number some of them will be super pleasant and you will learn things super fast and others will take longer
for the grammar i also recommend genki 100% even if i dont like that some “translations” are not totally right, just because there is no translation for it. always keep in mind that japanese cannot be translated 1-1 to english, so when learning new things, especially those who are super different to english like comparison, try not to find a translation and just think it is the way it is.
also genki (and i think many other books) do not explain very well (or nothing at all) the different levels of politeness that japanese has so another book i would recommend (a more fun one) is “Japanese The Manga Way” where grammar is explained through real examples and those level of politeness and gender differences are exposed.
The important thing isn’t the pace, it’s consistency mostly. Just work with a workload that you are comfortable with. What’s the point in rushing if you don’t finish it? Better to finish in three years than not at all.
10 lessons a day is a lot for me, but maybe i could do 20 like most people recommend? after all, I am just level 4 
we all have different circumstances.
)
also you will get used to kanji learning very soon and things will become less hard