I am fairly new to learning Japanese (6 months in as of writing) and my routine right now consists of WK, Bunpro, reading along with ABBC, and listening to Japanese with Shun. I just finished the N5 grammar deck on BP the other day, and while I feel pretty good about doing BP reviews, I’d like to get a better grasp of the nuances of these grammar points and really develop a solid understanding before moving onto N4 grammar.
I was wondering if anyone had recommendations for grammar resources that could help achieve this goal? So far, things on my radar are the Genki textbooks, the articles linked within BP lessons, and this conjugation website. I’ve seen advice on other posts that sticking with one grammar resource is best for consistency, and I generally agree, but right now I’m looking for multiple perspectives on grammar points I’ve already learned so diverse recommendations are welcome!
Since you haven’t done the Genki books, you could always watch Tokini Andy’s videos on them. He covers all the grammar for free so you wouldn’t even need to buy the book, since you’re just reviewing.
Also, Satori Reader is an excellent resource and has two grammar series: Human Japanese and Nutshell Grammar.
personally i’m learning grammar primarily with cure dolly’s lesson series (actually, i prefer to read transcripts here) which takes a rather different approach to many explanations compared to most other resources i’ve tried out. sometimes i find her methods a little difficult to understand - in which case i tend to cross reference with yokubi - but most of the time i think she covers topics very intuitively ^-^
i’m not sure how far these resources go beyond N5, since i’m still working thru it myself, but i believe they should at least be fairly comprehensive up to N5 level
If video games are your kind of thing, there’s a YouTube channel called Game Gengo ゲーム言語 that I really recommend.
There are a bunch of videos on sperate grammar points and conjugations from N5-N1 levels, and all of them use examples from different video games to show their use in native Japanese.
I personally watch the ‘Complete Grammar’ compilation videos to solidify my grammar knowledge before moving on.
If you like SRS, there’s are even official Anki decks for each video (N5-N2 so far I think?).
Even if you aren’t a fan of video games, I’d definitely recommend giving some of the videos a watch!
I really loved Tae Kims grammar guide for how systematically he explained things, which I think could be a bit of what you are looking for (though, nuances are not always explained).
Also, (no guarantees on this), my experience is that AI models like Gemini can give decent explanations. Particularly, if you already know the points, you can ask questions about nuances in particular, or sentences you have seen, which mostly works out quite well.
However, I’d put into question, if you need to extensively review the grammar for now. Most advanced grammar will build on more basic grammar, so you could then review the basic grammar, when studying the advanced point. Also, sometimes advanced grammar is actually a hidden explanation for some exceptions/nuances with what was introduced in the basic grammar.
Also, I think many nuances wil become more apparent from language usage (you write something and want to express a nuance, you see/hear a usage of grammar repeatedly), so working more on input and output studies will reinforce this.
I understand the desire to solidify the foundations, but I think this is a point, where having more shallow knowledge will be more valuable than having less deep knowledge. Missing a nuance is not as important in early practice, as missing an entire meaning, because it’s a grammar point you don’t know yet.
You make a good point about not necessarily needing to fully understand the grammar now. My priority is definitely moreso in reading & listening right now than grammar, and I do feel like that’s helped hammer home some of the most basic points. That said, I’ll keep Tae Kim’s guide in mind!
