I am German as well, and I must say that initially I got along very well, but from level 11-something onwards they introduce more and more “conceptual” words that I find increasingly hard to get right (in English, that is ^^).
Words like “conviction”, “reception”, “enjoyment” - I knew these words before but sometimes it takes me more time to figure out what the correct English word would be than what the meaning of the Japanese word is 
Then again, I dare not add German words to WK because then I’d need to remember which words I can express in German, and I doubt that that’s helpful… So I stopped worrying about getting a word “wrong” because it’s not the WK score that helps me memorize stuff, it’s the fact that I knew its meaning although I put in the wrong English word.
A person is seen as being in a lower class if they have a ひく (hick) accent.
That’s right. Same here.
And: hi😀
Yes, that’s why I only add the German words to the “notes” section, not as a synonym. 
I’ve had to look up quite a few words =P
Cleat and mullet I had an idea, but needed to confirm. Hick still confuses me O_o
I found some items difficult because I didn’t even properly know the difference between the English terms so of course I kept mixing them up. Or I kept entering something that was a bit of a too literal translation of the kanji – I meant the right thing and it translated correctly in my mind but the English term just wasn’t quite right.
I do my reviews with the Anki userscript now and it has been better. If I get the meaning right but just use an incorrect English term, I define that as a passed (edit: haha, I initially wrote “passt” here; brains are weird and now you can guess that my naative language is German 
). But you do of course have to be strict about it and not end up all "ah of course that is what I meant, I know that one… " all the time.
Thanks, that really helps! Not gonna forget that one anymore! 
I like this mnemonic too, thanks @jprspereira !
I’m kind of amazed by this. My school does track, and I hear about them all the time.
I think it’s understandable not to know what “cleats” means, since it’s easily connected with sports. I only know the word because of football.
That’s fair. I’m just amazed because “cleats” is practically a household term where I live XD
(then again, I never heard it before I lived in nebraska so)
The “cleat” radical is better remembered as “claw” or “hand” I think.
My first language is French. I use the fonction “User Synonyms” to put french translation of the word. It takes time but without that, I would not use WaniKani because it is already a challenge to learn Japanese, no way that I am going to learn it via another language! It is like a double translation in my head, I would be exhausted!
Because I entered the translation in French for all the words, I can type the word in French and it works. Good luck!
Oh hell!! I’ve used more english dictionaries than any japanese ones so far… But then, when it comes to remembering kanji, I usually don’t have much trouble. Radicals on the other hand… I’ve had a bit of trouble getting it sometimes.
“Loiter” was horrible to learn for me, as I had noooo clue what it meant. I only remembered it after linking it to “otter” in my mind. I could visualise the otter and get a sound that recalled the right pronunciation. It’s a bit of a stretch, but it worked out. I’m working a lot with sound-alikes!
well, sometimes I don’t know the word in english and I’m to lazy to look it up right away, so just continuing lessons remembering the new word that I don’t know.
But then it comes to reviews and of course I didn’t check what that word mean but somehow managed to guess right the kanji.
The problem starts when I guru’ing kanji that way and have to remember some kind of word which utilizing this kanji meaning. You can guess how well it then goes…
And sometimes when I don’t know the meaning of some word which is mnemonic to reading I trying to guess what it is and then use it in mnemonic (because looking to dictionary is too hard…)
For example for some time I used to imagine shin(しん) as part of the body under the chin
I agree, I’m a native Dutch speaker and I’m picking up a few new English words, too
What really throws me off are the readings though. For example “to remember the reading ‘kai’ we use ‘coyote’.” 
Heh? So now I have to remember that reading with an American accent. That’s the part I find most difficult.
I slightly change those mnemonics to involve a yelping dog (“kai kai kai!” in Dutch) instead of a coyote, which tends to work well for me.
Same here. If the mnemonic is too far away from my natural understanding I use German words instead. Sometimes that leads to a funny “Germlish” mixture…
I was surprised that there are (native speaking) adults who don’t know “cleats”. I’m a huge sports fan/player, but that didn’t strike me as being obscure to non-sports folks.
Yeah pronounciations and the English words are sometimes completely off if you have another native language.
But what really is hard and forces me to come up with own stuff is when the used words don’t resemble the pronounciation at all because the word used has a completely different pronounciation in your native language.
ざい for xylophone is so far away in German, that I just couldn’t use that as the first word appeared with the mnemonic…