Thank you. That makes a lot more sense. I had this weird idea about readings base on kanji or vocabulary.
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I have a feeling my accuracy is too low. Is it? Like these are words I SHOULD know… How do I improve it?
That seems totally fine to me! Very good, even!
getting stuff wrong is a completely natural part of spaced repetition - otherwise it would just be… repetition.
That looks like more than enough accuracy to keep the workflow flowing smoothly.
One other thing I’d mention is that “knowing something” is never really a binary on/off switch. Think of all the times you’ve had a word in your native language just on the tip of your tongue. It’s only natural that that kind of lapse happens far more frequently with new words in a new language.
So I don’t think it’s true that you “should” know any words in Wanikani - they’re all in some stage of learning, some stage of getting to know them. Some just snap to that easily, others take more reinforcement.
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You have a feeling 94% accuracy is too low?
I don’t focus on how close 94 is to 100, I focus on how big a number 5 is. You forget 5 words during a conversation, it’s over!
I also realized it seems like I want attention. “ooh look at me I’m so bad” when according to people I’m not. I swear that’s not what I mean.
But like, if yall say so, I trust yall.
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That’s 5 out of 75. Totally fine.
For burn reviews, I’d consider 60% accuracy to be good.
Ah, I get that feeling. I’ve had conversations in Japan that went so smoothly that in my memory they happened in English, but then they’ll say a word I don’t know or don’t catch, and everything comes to a crashing halt. My brain goes “what are you even doing?”
It’s really not actually like that, though. You can ask people to repeat or rephrase, for example. 
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Also the skill we are working on here is not conversation, it’s reading. When reading you have surrounding context, and there’s also a chance that not remembering that specific word won’t impact comprehension greatly.
Conversation is a different skill you need to practice separately, and so I wouldn’t make that comparison to forgetting items during a WK review. It has its own workarounds as well, like when you just give a simple definition if you can’t remember the word.
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114 will be the total for the whole day, so you probably won’t have to do those all at once (in fact you always have the choice not to do them all at once and not be dictated to!). But it’s always best to finish all your reviews by the end of the day so they don’t pile up even worse.
The way to get fewer reviews is to do fewer lessons. And answer correctly with the reviews that you do have 
(but doing fewer lessons, and so fewer reviews, means it’ll take longer to get through a level - if you’re bothered about that).
I guess you just have to find a balance that you can cope with and which doesn’t dent your motivation from being too over or underwhelming! You have to experiment a little bit to find what that balance is… it takes a little while maybe.
Good luck! Keep going!
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Does it ever get easier after level 1??? I’m moving to Japan in 2 weeks and I don’t know much Japanese yet.
Good news: my kanji memory has gotten much better. It’s surprising how easy it is to remember new kanji now. Even unknown kanji, I can pick out radicals sometimes.
Bad news: it took about fifteen levels before my visual memory adjusted and the first few levels were really, really hard.
Though I hear good things about immersion… 
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Don’t know where else to ask, so I’ll just post my question here.
I really like how the book clubs work here and I was wondering if something similar would be possible for discussing and watching anime, episode by episode and helping each other.
Has this ever been done before? I guess setting everything up would be a pain, especially making sure everyone has access to the episodes and japanese subtitles (Netlifx+VPN?), which just might not be possible.
And maybe the interest just wouldn’t be there, I don’t know.
I think it would be a pretty fun way to learn more though, especially because it allows for texthooking, easy look up and it’s nice having everything voiced.
Thoughts?
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I haven’t participated in any, and there’s definitely less of an existing infrastructure (and no obvious part of the forum to put them in, which I think is a drawback) compared to book clubs, but I think there’s a couple of threads like that around, like this one where at least a few people are watching Oishinbo:
That links to an 80s/90s anime thread in the campfire section that I think also has a thread going about a show right now… Escaflowne?
So those could be some examples to check out / potential types of places to ask around about interest in something you’d like to watch.
The new extensive listening thread might also be a good one to check out for general discussion!
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Cheers, thanks for the reply and the useful links, that gives me a better view on it.
I might start up a thread like that in the future, not too confident in making one myself as of now though.
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How do I deal with getting confused between two kanji but having them never pop up at the same time? For example, I got 草 and 苦 confused recently, and since I learnt them levels apart they don’t pop up together. It took me a while to realize that I was getting them confused to begin with. Do I just study them separate from the SRS?
Not sure I understand the question, but won’t they just downgrade to apprentice if you keep getting them confused? Then they will start appearing on the same day.
When you realize you keep getting two kanji confused, you can of course take a look at them separately, write them out to see the differences etc.
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That happens to me a lot with Anki these days, and I find a little bit of juxtaposition goes a long way.
When I notice I’m confusing a pair, I’ll look them both up and write at the bottom of either card (which I guess would be the notes section on Wanikani) - “this isn’t THAT - THAT looks like THIS:” and paste in the one I was confusing it with.
I think just that little bit of seeing them side by side and remembering there’s a difference helps make the contrast build up in your head!
It’s probably worth having a look at WK’s ‘visually similar’ section if you keep getting something wrong but can’t figure out why. If the kanji you’re confusing it with isn’t there (as is the case for 草 and 苦) maybe try radical search on jisho.
When you figured out which kanji you’re getting confused, review the memnonics (or make up your own), especially for the radicals that are different in each. Maybe even make up a memnonic specifically for that kanji, why it’s A, and not B. For me personally it also helps to learn the handwriting, as some kanji that look similar are written quite differently. Or find some examples to see them in context (text, pictures, whatever works for you.)
So yeah, I’d say drill them side by side a bit in whichever way works for you (ouside of the SRS), then resume regular studies, and take your time when reviewing them
Or, alternatively/additionally just keep studying as usual and eventually after so many fails the difference between 私 and 知 will stick… eventually xD (they’re not even that similar. brain, plz)
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