Stuff like this is why I don’t sweat it when I have mixed-up stuff in my head, it’s an inevitability that will happen when learning just tons of stuff via what are essentially flashcards. They’ll be codified in my head as their proper forms through immersion and reading real things in the language. You can’t get fluent on flashcards alone, and this is just one of the main reasons. You’ll trip up and make mistakes in real reading and practice, and that’s how you fix all the things you learned wrong.
8 Likes
Me watching the Greasy Fork page like:
Seriously @rfindley let me buy you a coffee or a beer or something! 
11 Likes
Huh… I’m not going to argue with someone who has many more kanji than I. But I hope very much you’re wrong.
I can read languages that use the Greek and Cyrillic alphabets, and I can still read Arabic, Hebrew and Sanskrit phonetically (though I haven’t kept up the languages). To learn those (all in adulthood) I only used mnemonics for a very short period of time; the goal was to get to automatic recognition, otherwise there was no hope of reading at anything approaching a normal speed. I knew the kanji would be a far larger and longer project, but I didn’t think it would be unattainable, that I’d always have to know the “why” because it’ll never just be there…
Assuming you’re right, are kanji just different in some way due to their complexity or sheer number? Is it a brain plasticity thing, where only children can learn them at an automatic speed? I mean, I see Japanese people read aloud, I know it’s possible to become automatic, though maybe only for children…
Honestly, my personal reasons for deciding to systematically learn the kanji assumed I would get to a normal reading speed for a large amount (say, 80% at least?) of the Japanese I might want to read. If that’s just not attainable, and if I’m going to have 2000+ kanji at my command I’m always going to have to stop and think about mnemonics for each of them (or at least the 80% that I don’t see constantly)—I’m not sure what the purpose is, really, since machine readers are so good and fast now.
This project wasn’t just intended as a way to exercise my mind. If I’m going to devote time to a project involving memorization, I might as well go back to trying to shave another few seconds off solving Rubik’s cube, and try to get consistently below 20 seconds. It’s more impressive at parties than, “show me some Japanese and I may be able to tell you what a lot of it means—slowly….”
1 Like
Instant recognition is absolutely the end-goal. @ajdgaoigjaoirgjo 's concern is valid, but this is what SRS is for… if you still instantly recognize it the 12th time (or whatever it takes to burn it), when you haven’t seen it (in the app) in a couple months, then you’re in a pretty good place. If not, you’ll fail and have to study it again 12 more times.
This also highlights the importance of combining kanji drilling with reading practice (where, yes, you may rely on your memorization of only some elements of the character + context in the sentence or with other paired characters) and, if you really want to memorize the kanji, handwriting practice.
For me, I’m content being able to read in-context and type on a computer or phone. If there are kanji I often mix up, I can take my own time to memorize the difference between them. If one really wants to memorize kanji deeply, WaniKani is probably the wrong tool; instead, go buy a 小学生 workbook and start learning stroke order!
Edit: I think Kōichi actually pointed out in his New Year’s email that one may eventually graduate from relying on mnemonics to memorize Kanji in the first place as they continue to building the skill of memorizing kanji, though I’m sure this would depend on the complexity and frequency of encounters.
4 Likes
Hmm, I think I’m unclear what the distinction is… I am practicing handwriting (using Skritter, an SRS app originally for Chinese but extended to Japanese, into which you can import wordlists from elsewhere). But I’m doing that because I had Japanese without much kanji (only the first 200 Jōyō, if that, from school, of which I could write maybe 75) for a long time. And I’ve discovered that with that few kanji in my head for that long, I have general shapes that I’ve never looked all that closely at competing for attention (the “visually similar kanji” problem). But for me, writing feels like an additional dimension that happens to have a little knock-on effect, rather than an increase of mastery.
Like, I get dinged on Skritter because I just can’t remember exactly how in 路, the last two strokes of the 足 part are at a weird skew—even now, when I look away I forget which direction they skew. But I also have to try writing (of all the kana to have an issue with in writing vocab lists, this must be the worst!) る three or four times every time it comes up before Skritter accepts it (I can never remember the exact proportions the top bit is compared to the middle and loop and sometimes I’m off on the angle a little bit)—and I thought I “mastered” hiragana decades ago. I’m not trying to become a calligrapher, I’m just trying to tame the distinctions in my head so similar-looking kanji don’t all melt together in my brain.
(I just checked my stats on that app, and at this point, I must have “correctly” written る over 900 times (so who knows how many times wrong!) as part of the many many verbs in the vocab lists, yet I failed writing it several times today, so whoever said “practice makes perfect”… well, wasn’t me, anyway 
)
Pssst… Y’all’s conversation is worth having, but since it has evolved into a multi-post tangent, I’d recommend creating a new thread so you’re not making a super long chain of off-topic posts in a thread meant to track the development of Double-Check. 
(I’ve got a number of thoughts and suggestions related to y’all’s topic of improved retention, but I don’t wanna add to the snowball. 
)
Y’all are welcome to ignore me, of course. 
Just thinkin’ about folks who may be watching this thread for updates about Double-Check.
39 Likes
@WaniMeKani roll 6d6
2 Likes
Geez, using WK without this script has really been a struggle. I never realized how important it was to make this site usable for me.
Really makes me feel like a lot of these features should be just regular options WK could let “power users” enable, but I digress.
Genuine thanks for all that you do, rfindley!
27 Likes
I know, right? As someone who makes typos very easily without realizing, it’s really unfair if I mistype にん as みん and don’t get chance to rectify that when I clearly knew the answer anyway. Wanikani is nearly unusable to me atm until this script gets updated. 
7 Likes
yeah, i don’t need it so much for the meaning as my usual spelling gets a pass (have to be wary of that even 
) but my typing accuracy for the kana is … bad. I’ll often fat finger a whole load. My way of keeping myself in check is to say it out loud as I put in so that I know I’m not cheating.
4 Likes
I often end up with slight variations on the English meanings that aren’t in my synonyms lists yet. Or fat fingering it badly enough to get it wrong. Or mistyping the kana and hitting enter too quickly. This script saves me a lot of frustration.
I second the notion, @rfindley let me buy you a beer or a coffee or something.
7 Likes
Even discounting the mistype/double-check/correction features, this script has QoL options that help make reviews go much faster and with much less repetitive, pointless clicking and typing.
Lightning mode, automatically showing the reading/meaning after an incorrect answer, just these two things speed up reviews enormously and really ought to just be basic, built-in WK features and not things users have to go to a script for, IMO.
14 Likes
Yeah, I think that’s getting at what I was talking about “automatic” reading. Like, I just got 入学試験 at Master → Enlightened, so it had been a month since I’d last seen it. I typed “school entrance exam”. Then without Double-Check I read it carefully again, was happy, hit ⏎ and—boom!—red.
Nope, according to WaniKani, 入学試験 is “Entrance Exam, Entrance Examination, Admission Test, Admission Exam, Admission Examination, Entrance Test”. Not “school entrance/admission exam/test”.
If I really wanted it marked right, I could quit the review and start over. But no—I already got some review items legitimately wrong, and I’m not going to remember exactly which ones so that I can force them wrong again on a review restart. With Double-Check I could just add the synonym and mark it right (which, specifically, should be a built-in WK feature if you asked me…).
tl?dr:
I don’t think my failure to remember the specific WaniKani translations didn’t include “school” was worth demoting this 6 weeks. And I added school entrance exam to the synonyms, along with school admission exam, school admission test, university entrance exam, university admission test, college admission exam and college admission test just to be on the safe side for next time.
It really feels to me like, Double-Check or no, WaniKani should offer the choice of “add my answer to the synonyms and mark it right”. Sure it can be abused—if WaniKani has schools or universities as bulk clients (do they?) they could allow them to disable it. But for the rest of us, we should decide if the distinction matters or not.
As others have repeatedly pointed out, complaining about one item is silly—it just means I’ll see 入学試験 at least three more times than otherwise, and probably exactly three more times since I added those synonyms. But this isn’t a weird one-off, it’s pretty common, especially as you gain more conceptual/automatic and less mnemonic/eidetic/visual/conscious memory of the vocabulary.
7 Likes
Yeah, that last part. Sure, THAT item is only three more times, but when it happens a LOT it becomes so many, so much bouncing that you get so swamped with failures of the SYSTEM that you don’t get to focus on the items that matters: those you actually forgot.
I have such a fun mi of ADHD (concentration issues), Autism (I can struggle with finding words/making my own), non native English and a crappy keyboard so not all keys register properly.
With this great mix I can fail half my items by typos/ non counting errors!
It also doesn’t help that other Japanese programs I use like to phrase the English differently. Your example I’m pretty sure is the correct meaning in my others.
So yeah, those are obviously a correct answer, just not registered. So shouldn’t get penalised.
I’m doing my reviews on a mobile app till this absolute must of a script is back up. I can’t work without it. If I didn’t have this workaround I’d just vacation my account.
4 Likes
yeah true . . .
1 Like
I noticed I’ve been getting so much frustration over these last days’ review sessions that I don’t even bother looking into why I’m getting wrong anymore and I feel it’s largely impacting my learning. I’m just not interested anymore. =/
8 Likes
For now just use the workaround. Not so many options but working with many configurations. [Userscript]: Double-Check Workaround
7 Likes
I just switched from ‘ignore answer’ script and am little confused. After typing answer, nothing happens. Am i doing something wrong? Only after 2nd time i hit Enter the application moves on. BUt then, it does NOT state whether the answer was correct or not…
This is quite confusing. I’d prefer it clearly informs me whether it was correct or wrong.
Sorry for asking this here, but if this can’t be modified, is there some alternative script that allows to ignore a wrong answer?
OK, i found what is causing the issue. When Dark Mode (via Stylus extension) is turned on, then somehow when using Double-Check , green/red colours do not appear after typing an answer… not optimal, but turning off the Dark mode solves the issue.
1 Like