I find it harder to learn kanji than vocabulary, so think I’m okay with that ^^
I agree, I’d preferably learn the vocab first and then kanji. It’s more natural that you learn a word before you can write it.
Before applying the reorder script at this low level, you might want to do something about your pathetic [your words, not mine] progress (or lack thereof). I don’t know your reason or drive for learning Japanese, and I’m not saying you’re not doing anything. At level two you have already 41 items enlightened, so there must be something. But you haven’t answered the question of what is “too slow progress” for you. If you wanted to serious input, you’ll have to lay out your reasons for learning Japanese, what you want to do with it, and your timeline. You must have expectations if you’re talking about your progress being too slow. So really, what’s your motivation?
I wish to (eventually) get a career in Japan’s aeronautical industry, and if I’m going to work there, I need to able to speak Japanese. My degree will take 5 years, and on top of that, such an opportunity isn’t available instantly. So I’d say I have time, but not enough time that I can continue at this pace
From what I can tell, the only set route to success is, “Keep going.” The key seems to be to keep at it and do whatever number of lessons feel comfortable for you.
If you want to go fast, use the reorder script to put radicals and then kanji before vocab (as Kumirei said) and then do all reviews and lessons as soon as they unlock. If you want to speedrun it, you can even set yourself reminders or alarms for your upcoming review blocks.
If you want to keep yourself paced so things are spaced out and manageable, just do a set number of available lessons or reviews everyday when they’re available, and you’ll level slower, but your reviews will naturally spread out so you don’t find yourself inundated with a massive chunks of reviews.
At the moment, my personal guidelines are:
- Do available reviews before available lessons
- When lessons are available, do 2 to 3 sessions per day (20 or so items, no more than 30)
- Do reviews as they become available, and try to keep soft caps of 50-60 per session and less than 200 per day
- Login every day. Do something every day
- Accept that learning is a process and a marathon, not a cram session or sprint.
- Remember that Wanikani is a system and a commitment. Even the fastest users to Level 60 still put in nearly a year and a half of work. Whether it takes a year and a half, two years, three years or twelve, the goal is to end up with a functional knowledge of 200+ radicals, 2000+ kanji (and their readings and common uses), and 6000+ vocabulary words. The prize is not in getting to the finish early, it’s in merely continuing to go forward.
6 Likes
managing your apprentice count is indeed a good way to manage your review workload, but i’d suggest going for 100-150 apprentice items as opposed to “2 lessons a day.”
That’s far too much; even if I completed all the lessons in one day, it wouldn’t get to that high ^^
You should at least do radicals and kanji the day you get them. Its not that hard if you use the mnemonics. You can learn the vocabs 10-20 a day. If this is too hard for you, do half of kanji + radicals the first day, and the second half in the next day. You should level up in 7-15 days. Dont procrastinate leveling up more than that.
1 Like
I don’t want to do that filtering thing; it’s like using console commands in a game. Just feel like I’m going to mess everything up. With everything said though, the next best step is making an effort to do more lessons; I mean, we’re looking at doing a lesson every 2 days or so. Even if it’s one lesson a day, it’s a significant improvement to leaving days between learning something new.
If you dont want to use the reorder script, you should try to do all the lessons in 2 or 3 days max. Seems hard, but its totally possible. I work full-time everyday, and Its taking me 8 days to level up doing what I told you to do. If you want to keep your pacing, its fine, but you should complement your study with a lot of grammar and anki. Otherwise, you will need more than 10 years to learn japanese.
What do you mean by grammar and, ‘anki’?
You wont be able to learn japanese with just Wani Kani. You should use your free time to learn grammar and vocab.
For grammar, you can use the Genki books that people suggest all the time (personally dont like it) or Tae Kim free guide.
For more vocab, you can try memrise or anki. But if you dont want to learn vocab, you should at least learn grammar.
1 Like
Tae Kim free guide looks pretty good, I think I will try that as well as those flash cards from Anki. Thanks
work hard and you will definately be rewarded! Tae Kim is really nice for self-learners. Have a good time studying!
1 Like
With two lessons a day you are literally going to get to level 60 in over 10 years. Sorry, but it just ain’t gonna work if you actually plan on learning kanji and vocab. As someone who is still level 3 (though I think I’m gonna be to 4 in 2 days, had to go to vacation mode for 4ish days), I really, really advise you to just do the damn lessons. You aren’t going to have 150+ items in apprentice at these levels anyways. You don’t need to do them all at once, but sit down for like half an hour, and try to memorize with mnemonics while you do them. It’s fine if you don’t get them all in your reviews either, just quickly repeat the mnemonic again when you fail an item. If you have let’s say 50 items in apprentice and you fail half it’s still way better then doing like 15 at a time. I take like 30 minutes to an hour a day to do reviews and lessons and since the 16th of january I have (well, almost, like 30% of kanji to go and most of them are one review away) done 3 levels. Seriously, do at least like 5-10 a day so it will take you less than 10 years.
1 Like
Over 10 years is scary; I will make an effort to do as much as I can ^^
This might seem a little obvious, but:
- If you want to read Japanese, practice reading.
- If you want to speak Japanese, practice speaking.
- If you want to write Japanese, practice writing.
WK is built to do one thing well and that’s to read kanji.
Your princess is in another castle.
1 Like
She is? xD
I am projected to reach the final level by 2033. Thread justified.
1 Like
As a European aeronautical engineer, I’m interested to know what kind of job you want to have there. Do you have a more precise idea?
As for Wanikani, I have always tried to do between 20 and 30 lessons per day, when available. It worked quite well for me.