Bring it on!! You can do it @Jerred がんばりましょう
Go for it! I’m sure you’ll catch me at some point. 
I’ve been decently quick, but I’m going to slow down a tad bit for 2021. 
You’ve got some nice competition in this thread though. 
Welcome! You may well catch up to me, haha - I raced to level 10 for the end of the year as it seemed like a fun milestone but going to take the next few levels a bit slower and focus more on grammar I think!
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I’ve put together a discord for the group we got going if anyone wants to join the link is here Caution Students Leveling Here
I figured it may be a good source to link the resources you are finding and what’s been working for you! Made a variety of different channels to post in and keep things a little less messy. Hopefully, we continue to grow the small leaderboard group we have living on this thread.
If you decide to join please keep your names the same as on wanikani forum, or change your nickname once you’re on the server so we don’t get confused XD
I’m no wizard with discord so if you want moderator roles just let me know.
@quimda If you’re not okay with me linking to discord let me know and I’ll take it down >.<
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oh, awesome! i was actually thinking about using discord for some of this stuff 
so it’s totally fine 
i’ll join once i can get on my computer again, i’m using mobile right now >_>
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Sweet! If you have more channels or want to change anything I’ll just give ya mod as well to go wild with whatever ya want 
I’ll jump in if you’re still taking additions
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yeah, welcome! we’re always happy to have new members 
don’t forget to add yourself to the list in the op
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So, while browsing the forum… I’m not procrastinating, shush
… I’ve seen that quite a lot of people are way, wayyy, ahead on their kanji studies compared to grammar. I’m talking like WaniKani Lvl 30 and about to finish Genki 1.
Because I didn’t want to call out specific people, which seems like it could only come over unnecessarily critical, I thought I’d ask here 
Is there any reason, other than that leveling on WaniKani is easy and tackling grammar can seem a bit more daunting?
Personally I feel like a lack of vocab/kanji is much easier to overcome when using your Japanese (reading/listening/writing) because you can simply look up words, so if anything I’d want to do it the other way around 
I’m on track to finish Genki 2 grammar before I hit level 15, which, if we’re arbitrarily going by JLPT levels, would still be quite a bit ahead with kanji studies. (JLPT N4 ~300 Kanji, WaniKani Lvl 15 ~500 Kanji, while Genki 2 doesn’t even nearly cover N4 grammar)
Not gonna lie, I’m mostly just curious what’s going on there 
Also, is this a good time to wish everyone a happy new year? Some of us have probably already passed on to 2021
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Personally, depending on the grammer point I just take way longer to get a grasp on some of them then any single kanji.
For know going fast with wanikani is not a problem for me, but if I do the same with grammer I’ll get overwhelmed pretty quickly.
(I’m about half way through N4 grammar stuff according to Bunpro)
And yes it’s time for happy new year wishes I guess 
Though the new year is still a few hours away for me. Is there a similar expression to “guten Rutsch…” in english?
I also hit lvl 11 today so the new year is gonna be painful I guess 
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Im only just now finishing N5 stuff.
For me grammar is way harder than WK/Vocab, i need to be always reviewing it (thx bunpro) and always trying new conjugations and testing myself. I use those for that:
https://waniconjugation.herokuapp.com
And another thing, some of the basics in grammar fundation are not really organized in a good way in most of the books. For instance, i just now REALLY learned about だった vs でした, about when i can and can’t use it (NativShark lesson).
"だった and でした are the past-tense versions of だ and です, respectively
We put です after the past-tense conjugation of an i-adjective. For past tense sentences that do not end in i-adjectives or verbs, however, we do need to use だった and でした. In other words, if a past tense sentence is ending with a na-adjective or a noun (including question words), then it needs だった or でした.
This makes sense when you think about it because i-adjectives and verbs can be conjugated, but nouns and na-adjectives cannot.
今日は仕事(だ) — casual
I have work today.
今日は仕事です — formal
Past
昨日は仕事だった — casual
I had work yesterday.
昨日は仕事でした — formal
For formal language, we use です present tense and でした past tense.
For informal language, we use だ present tense and だった past tense.
I thought i had already understood those nuances, but this lesson was really helpful today. I realized that i rushed grammar a little bit, so im now reviewing basic topics to build a stronger fundation for future lessons…
Happy new year to everyone! I hope to achieve N4 grammar by february! JPZ book 2 + Misa YT + Bunpro will help me with that. (hopefully)
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I don’t know if it’s also partly people following the Tofugu guide (Learn Japanese: A Ridiculously Detailed Guide) which recommends starting with grammar pretty late on (after level 10 WK I think?). Generally from reading Tofugu articles and listening to the podcast it seems like they advocate for the kanji & vocab first → then grammar approach so I wouldn’t be surprised given that this is the WK forums if a fair few people share that opinion/are following that path. Also I would agree with the points made that progressing in WK is just so much faster and easier than progressing with grammar, especially if you are taking/needing to take the time to test and review things.
I’d started with Pimsleur and muddled about a little bit with Duolingo for maybe a week or so before finding that Tofugu guide and starting WK but then I don’t think I started working on grammar properly until maybe about level 4 or 5 (because I was trying to follow the Tofugu guide but by that point realised that just learning kanji and vocab out of context wasn’t all that motivating for me - it may well work for others though)- hence me only being about 70% of the way through Lingodeer 1 content which I think roughly maps to N5.
I’ve now come to think that focusing on grammar is the thing that will make the most difference for being able to read and understand things which is my main goal for this coming year - and if I was to go back and plan again I’d definitely start grammar studies right from the start but it’s always easy with hindsight!
Also happy new year all!
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Happy new year Grumpy! I’ve got about another 8 hours or so until we get rid of this year. It’s the first time in my life I am actually happy to see a year gone.
Essentially, I decided from the beginning to follow the musings of こういちさま but quickly found out the thought sounded better on paper than in practice, so by lvl. 4 I was diving into BunPro, which I have since dropped for Genki and JapanesePod101. @sycamore mentioned this but the WK mantra is basically the more words you know, the easier and more focused your grammar studies will be, so wait until lvl. 10 to do any work on grammar. This sounds like a great idea especially since there are no spaces in Japanese (most of the time), so it can be difficult to tell when one word ends and the next begins. Post-positional particles can also do a pretty good job at dividing up a sentence, so that could be a pretty decent counter argument to that claim. I think Koichi makes a good point though, and that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to implement that strategy, but starting grammar along with vocabulary has been the best for me personally, because I find the grammar fascinating anyway. I also have A LOT of time on my hands so it was very boring just working on my vocabulary haha
This is main reason I think, along with the fact that I am sure a lot of people follow the WK mantra. Also, I have not found anything for grammar as addicting and gamified as WK, so that may be indicative of the lopsided study.
Also, random side thing:
I was listening to Matt vs. Japan discuss his thoughts on language acquisition and input yesterday. He said something that floored me early on in the video. It was along these lines:
“If you’re watching this video right now, you’re probably fluent in English, so your brain can’t help but understand what I’m saying.” This simple statement blew my mind haha.
Let’s all work really really hard so that one day our brains can’t help but understand Japanese!!
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How is JapanesePod 101? I’m considering it for after I’ve worked through the Pimsleur courses as I really like having an element of audio learning but there seems to be so much of JapanesePod101 that it’s very confusing!
Well done @Faolon! You’ll have to warn us on whether the painful levels live up to their name!
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I like it a lot, but I definitely found out right away that it couldn’t be my only grammar resource. There is an enormous amount of information on the website, like way too much haha, but there are learning tracks you can follow if you have a subscription. I tested out of the absolute beginner track, and the beginner course is definitely challenging me. I use it as a supplement to Genki and as good listening practice because almost every lesson builds on the last one, which gives it a “+1” feeling, and you get to like the characters because, like Genki, you get to experience the progression of their lives. Right now Haruya is meeting his girlfriend’s dad and he accidentally uses 俺 to introduce himself, which is a super big no no. お父さん gets super pissed. The acting is good and I find myself laughing at some of the scenarios. There is a transcript of every 15 minute podcast in each lesson, vocabulary lists, lesson summaries, kanji practice, grammar explanations, all of it is awesome! My complaint would be that the amount of information on the website outside of the guided learning tracks is so weirdly organized.
If you’re interested, sign up for a free account and wait for a deal on a subscription. They will send you about 10 trillion emails with deals, which is off-putting, but I do feel the site is legit, or else I wouldn’t recommend it. I snagged a 2-year subscription for $120 which was well within my budget for a good learning tool.
Also happy new year!!
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I’m kinda late but I’ll participate once I install the thingy.
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Ah nice! Good tip Thanks for the info - it sounds promising. What kind of format do the lessons take - is it a kind of ‘interactive’ listen and respond type thing or more for listening alone?
Welcome! You’re not late at all
No problem! There are definitely some interactive components to each lesson. In the vocabulary sections I have come across so far they include a short audio where an English speaker gives you a few sentences in English and then pauses to allow you to translate it into Japanese, which I thought was helpful. Each lesson podcast plays a dialogue, then plays it again at half speed, and then the hosts go over the context, grammar, vocabulary, and even customs covered in the lesson. You can also read along as it plays. They give Kanji, English, Hiragana and Romaji (I would skip Romaji, the all Hiragana is super helpful though) translations for each dialogue. The cool thing is that you can play everything at different speeds, including 2.0x, but I have no idea why you would want to use that function. I find myself listening at .75x for more clarity.
I’m not sure how into quizzes and assessments you are but there are fair amount of them available to test your progress. I think they are valuable but I put more stock in the material itself. I believe almost all of the written material can be downloaded as a PDF.
One of the coolest features is that you can record your voice speaking any line of the dialogue and then play it next to the native speaker to see how poorly you did. It is very useful…and humbling.
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Oh yeah that’s great - Lingodeer does something similar to that with the “stories” it has at the end of each section and I find it really useful. I quite often have to record three or four times before I’m satisfied that things sound right! Sounds like Japanesepod101 may be a good post pimsleur option - thanks
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You’re welcome! You and everyone in this group have given me a lot of motivation and different learning tools to try out, and it’s fun to discuss the learning process too.
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