Reached level 10 - Need a little guidance on learning and my situation

Japanese Language
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So. Let’s start.
-20 now, but been trying to learn Japanese since I was 13.
-Read both Genki books when I took Japanese at the JC in high school ( :sunglasses: ) but skimmed over a lot, I felt like.
-Know a lot of words just from trying for so long off and on.
-I text a pen pal in Hokkaido a couple of times a week and have Japanese conversations with her.
-Was talking to Japanese people in VRchat, but I don’t really have anything to talk about with them.
-Not really into Anime or Manga that much… But freaking LOVE video games.
-Do Wanikani every other day for an hour. Trying to be fluent in like, five years, I guess?

Thank you for reading this so far. I know it’s kind of contrived, and I don’t expect you to solve all of my problems - but I think I need a better approach for everything besides Kanji.

For grammar, I was using JLPT Sensei’s website with an Excel spreadsheet to copy down each grammar, its conjugations, and some example sentences - but I haven’t done it for a week because it’s just kind of frustrating, especially when I have no proper way to practice it.

For vocab, I haven’t used Anki since like, last year. But I’m constantly surprised with how much I learn from the WaniKani vocabs.

For speaking/listening… :roll_eyes: I got nothin’.

I read Noursaidana’s inspirational guide and was thinking maybe I’d play an RPG in Japanese or something, but IDK.

I really like WaniKani for its humor, community, and its fruit-flavored colors that make me happy when I learn things. So, how do I get more of that? Buy Tobira? Start watching Game Center CX again, but without subs? Keep making more awkward Japanese language acquaintances on Tandem?

This is an unruly post, but I’m the kind of person who kind of needs the confirmation that they’re doing the right thing, haha.
Wow, thanks for reading all that

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As for grammer i really recommend bunpro. It is an SRS just like wanikani. However since it is grammer not kanji. It is definitely going to feel different. Once you get used to it i think you are going to find it useful.

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Unruly posts welcome! For listening, I really like Nihongo con Teppei’s short (4 min) post casts. Good to clock up time with active listening. Practice really does help you comprehend more in spoken Japanese as well as learning language rhythm etc.

For speaking, I recommend finding a language exchange partner somewhere (italki?) who you can have regular convos with. Suggest keep them short (half hour) and regular. Might not work for everyone, but its working for me, as have no one else to talk to in Japanese. The lag is a bit of a nuisance but I’m still finding it beneficial overall so I persevere.

Not sure if any of those suggestions will work for you, but all the best with your studies! Rule number 1: have fun. Enjoy your kanji is a great start, and you sound like you’re doing that, so keep chipping away at your studies. :slight_smile:

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Postscript - yes, but try to find someone who will do regular so you can move beyond awkward. I went purposefully fishing for someone with these upfront expectations: I wanted half hour language exchange partner, 15 mins English, 15 mins Japanese. And we keep it to that. Now I have a new friend and we don’t have awkward. Perhaps you could try that.

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:+1: awesome! Will do.

Wow, looks good. I know a lot of grammar so I wonder if I could start it further in - Well, relatively a lot of grammar. Most all of N5, it seems, and a heck of a lot of N4, like half.

I’ll check this out.

I’ve heard of italki… Hmm… Will try it. And this sounds good, 30 minutes.

Thanks guys, these seem like pretty good practicing options. Seems as if my problems may be solved with these solutions… :hugs:

One more thing - how much vocab DOES WaniKani give you? Because it seems like a huge amount, all things considered.

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Bunpro doesn’t have a pacing like WaniKani. You can do as much as you want. You can go in order or you can pick and choose what you want to practice.

I think they give you a month free as a trial if you want to try it out. Just click on grammar and you’ll have a list of grammar points that you can add to reviews. It’s also searchable by English or Japanese. The settings are also very customizable so I’d check that out too.

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I’m probably not the best to answer this as I haven’t tried other vocab resources much. I think the main missing element is vocab that doesn’t use kanji and so isn’t covered by WK. But someone else may like to add more on this point. But yes 6000 vocab words does sound like a fair amount. :slight_smile:

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Just know that reading my post was the right move because most people end up wasting a lot of time(myself included) using JLPT N2 as a reference for fluency(or something close to it).

You can see me here trying some JLPT stuff after 2 years(even though I never prepared for it).

The reason why video games are great is that they are an all-in-one package. Not only they have a bit of everything(a lot of reading, a bit of listening with cutscenes and dialogues, vocab acquisition with repeated words like 攻撃(attack), 魔法(magic), etc…) but they also have natural Japanese. By that I mean they incorporate daily Japanese interactions.

A good example of this is Legend Of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild. When I started the game, there was a tree branch on the floor. Once I got close to it, it displayed ひろう(pick up) with the A button. So you learn that ひろう means picking up something. When you get close to something, it’ll display 調べる(to investigate, to check) so you learn that 調べる means to check something.

There aren’t any other media that can do this for you. Playing with menus, buttons and windows will allow you to have “functional” Japanese. Just make sure that you are practicing Kanji every day. The better you are at Kanji, the more you enjoy the game that you are playing. You don’t necessarily need great grammar at the beginning because most of the menus have words so you will be able to do things just by knowing words(Kanji to be more specific).

For listening, take whatever you like in English and do it in Japanese. It’s that simple. No one forces you to watch anime.

For talking, you can start once you have at least an intermediate level. iTalki is by far the best choice here. Just pay for it because it’ll save you a lot of time. Hellotalk is cool but you waste a lot of time using your own language and it also breaks the immersion.

Anyways, good luck with your Japanese journey. You better be fluent in 5 years!

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Thanks so much for the reply, wow!
So, since I posted this, I started Bunpro. Sheesh, what a deal it is for all that grammar study! Totally up my alley

I’m gonna try to work italki into my schedule along with a game.

In the mean time, I’ll be around on the forums asking Q’s. Thanks Noursaidana and others! :sunglasses:

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