I just started WK about a week or so ago and I’ve made it through level one – hooray! – and I’m noticing lots of gains in my Japanese learning. Things are clicking, I’m recognising more words, and I’m really happy!
One of the things I’ve been doing is having an accountability partnership with a friend and we WhatsApp every day to say we’ve done our things (her running, me Japanese). It is working really well to keep my focus.
My friend might not want to continue accountability stuff every day for the next year though! But I want to make a commitment to myself to learn Japanese every day for a year. I’m toying with the idea of a study log, but I don’t really know how best to do one or whether it’s a good use of time.
I think what I wonder about is that as someone in middle age with a family and a job, could it be a waste of time? Am I best just doing my language learning and leaving the study log? Or are there ways it could be motivating for me?
One thing I thought was, I could keep the focus on the ‘core daily learning’ of WK, anki and grammar videos, and then if I have spare time write up my log…
I have this profile and I’ve found it useful to have a study log though I don’t update as often as others, some update daily, some weekly, I update only monthly. But it’s great to check in, see the progress made, compare methods of learning, get feedback and encouragement from others!
Yes, having a study log is pretty helpful! First, it will hold you accountable. No more slacking off when we’re watching! It’s also a way for you to keep track of your progress: instead of just wondering, you can look back and see exactly what you were doing six months ago, which can be pretty motivational. You also get to ask for advice and chat with people currently going through the same struggles as you. Plus, new users might look through it in the future and get inspired, or find some guidance in it.
And it can take as much or a little time as you want it to. I update weekly, so I take a few minutes each day to write some things in a draft, then on Sundays spend about 15 minutes editing and formatting it.
You can make tables with boxes as well and organize them into weekly/monthly charts and then you don’t have to constantly type out “Hello today I once again did my reviews and my lessons” as well.
Personally creating a study log made me really push myself harder on “do more reading!” and that’s been really helpful. I also like having a space dedicated to my studies so I don’t feel like I’m spamming updates.
But if you think a study log might be too much there’s things like the Read/Listen Every Day challenges (where you don’t have to actually read/listen every day, but you can still use to log how much you are reading/listening).
That’s so helpful, thanks @Akashelia - and yes maybe if I just set no rigid expectations on when I’ll update. And can I ask, how do people follow a study log? Through the ‘watching’ bit at the bottom? Do many people comment or is it more folks like your posts from time to time?
I think this is a brilliant reason. It’s so hard to see your progress sometimes isn’t it. Maybe pretty easy at the very start (where I am now) but less so as you go on. You’re selling it to me @hotdogsuplex
The watching option is definitely useful here. Personally, I already have too many threads set to watching, so I don’t have any study logs set to watching. I do however have a list of my favorites that I make sure to check at least once a week.
As for engagement, that will depend on how often you post vs how engaging your content is. If you post daily about general stuff like “I did 10 lessons on Wanikani, read chapter x from this series, and worked on Genki chapter 7…” then you won’t get much attention. But if you post less often, weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly, where you’re asking people for their advice and opinions, or posting your thoughts that people might possibly be able to relate to, you’re much more likely to get responses.
I think having a study log is helpful, even if you don’t really get any engagement at all. Sometimes you just need a place to share your thoughts, your dreams, your disappointments, and even your failures. Even the act of writing about these helps you understand yourself better. Some people spend a lot of time journaling with pen and paper with the expectation that no one will read their writing, but I don’t think they’d consider it a waste of time. Some study guides I’ve seen are very matter-of-fact and consist of lists and checkboxes, while others are more introspective and talk more about the users’ daily lives, and that really just depends on your goals and your personality.
I think engagement, when you do get it, helps keep you interested and invested. This is generally a pretty friendly community and people will leave encouraging messages or talk about their own experiences. I think it’s harder to quit if you spend a little time on the forum when you visit; I wouldn’t consider that wasted time. I like to see what other people are up to and watch the progression of people I’ve interacted with over the past few months.
And just to add, I started on a daily challenge thread (read every day), and then after that went well, I wrote a monthly log. And the conversations have been so useful, it turned into a weekly log.
At some point I let go of the daily challenge thread updates, though, that got to be too much alongside job and everything else
I’ve really noticed this, and it has been keeping me much more motivated than using some other apps I’ve had. And you start to get to see who is a regular contributor too, which is nice
I don’t think I would have gotten this far in a year if not for my study blog. I only update monthly (i think I would be discouraged if i did weekly…), and in it I set reasonable goals for myself each month and keep a running compilation of resources I’ve finished, books I’ve read, etc. It’s very satisfying for me to keep a running log where I am able to chart continual improvement (went up two levels, finished one tadoku series, read this manga), and the fact that the goal is written on my study blog (go from level 40-42) gives me an extra boost somedays to do more lessons and more reviews to not only reach my study blog goals, but surpass those goals.
So long as it is propelling you to study more and you’re not spending more time on any given day writing the log than studying I think it’s a good motivator!
I tried writing a study log and then it seemed like every time I updated it something went majorly wrong in my life… so I decided against keeping it up (not the study logs fault… but I’m superstitious )
I’ll put a pitch for a study log - even though I don’t have one.
Actually I do, in a sense, write one, I just don’t save it in one place.
If you don’t just log what you did, but how and “tips and tricks” kind of thing - what worked and what didn’t for studying a particular thing, then you can share it with someone else. You can read it over periodically and try to see commonalities and trends - what do the items I have trouble with all have in common? And don’t forget that “sharing with someone else” → that “someone else” might be you, 6 months from now, after you forgot the whole thing.
I had an item that was driving me crazy. 白. Could Not Remember the reading - or rather I could! Easily! For hours after I looked at it. But then I would get it wrong on the next review EVERY TIME. I even taped an index card with it on my bathroom mirror so I had to look at it several times a day. You know what finally worked like a magic light switch? I posted a complaint about it online. Then every time I saw it after that, my mind associated it with my whiny complaint, and indirectly the correct answer, はこ. just kidding If nothing else, the study log is a place to do that without making a new thread every time.
Other times, I’ve come across someone who’s got a better mnemonic or trick for remembering something that also works for me. I could write that down to share with someone else, or even (as mentioned) my later self, in a study log. I could wait until someone asks in a thread to share, or I could just pre-emptively write down all my tips and share that all the time - that’s a study log.
For me, I find that I don’t ever read them later, it’s just the act of writing that makes me remember. So I have a scratch pad at home to write stuff down, then I throw it away later. I guess that cheats any potential “subscribers” out of my brilliant insights though.
I don’t use Watching on study logs, would get too many notifications. However I am interested in reading them, so I just go to the Study log category and read unread messages there (they are counted and written in a blue circle, if it’s a log where I commented on before).
I would say it’s more likes than comments, but that’s fine by me, if someone has something they can related with wants to comment it makes for a good discussion, but otherwise I can read the like as a token of support and that’s good enough for me!
Nice hope you’ll find it useful! Next step: join a Book Club
Personally I don’t find them very useful, and my experience has been that the more focused I actually am, the less I remember to update the log.
Maybe rather than something daily or even weekly, it would have been cool to do some read a long every month or so and record it. Wouldn’t be useful to myself at the time, but it would have been neat now (7 years later) to be able to go back and see my progress month by month or something. I’ve tried to do something similar for multiblind rubiks cube solves but it’s really just a pain in the butt when your current self wants to just do the task unfettered.
Some people seem to like them, I really didn’t. Maybe the only way to know for yourself is to try it.
though I don’t update as often as others, some update daily, some weekly, I update only monthly. But it’s great to check in, see the progress made, compare methods of learning, get feedback and encouragement from others!
that’s a good point! 
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hope you’ll find it useful! Next step: join a Book Club 