I think it really depends on the kind of learner you are. I learned a bunch from Tae Kim regarding grammar and I remembered it to this day without doing exercises.
EDIT: This is the grammar I used to get around Japan while I was there a couple weeks ago, so it’s not just learning for the sake of learning, but learning and then using it months after learning it.
I didn’t use Genki, but I used Minna no Nihongo.
Ooh, I got it, yea. Thx
I’ve been using NihongoMaster since I started WaniKani. It helps me with grammar, vocab, reading, listening, and even writing. It’s slower on teaching kanji, but sometimes I learn it there faster than in WK. It’s also a gamified learning resource, with timed drills. You can go at your own pace, I try to take on a new lesson every 2-3 days.
I am also trying to use Genki, but it’s mostly review for now, so I can’t say I’ve used it to learn grammar first-hand.
I’ve realized I prefer to learn online with built-in drills and motivation techniques.
Well, for what it’s worth I get what you mean.
Trip and journey definitely have different implications even if they are technically synonyms. Helping English learners on HiNative has definitely taught me that the main challenge for advanced language learners is teasing out small implied differences in very similar words.
House vs home. Trip vs journey. Authentic vs genuine. It’s one thing to use a word and know essentially what it means, but native speakers may have very ingrained assumptions about words that you won’t find explained in a dictionary. Just like a person on HiNative told me that they tend to find it childish when someone spells out わたし whereas 私 seems more mature and refined.
Also FWIW 旅行 is taught very early in genki so it makes sense to me that that is the more widely used word for travel.
How far can you get on the free version of NihongoMaster? It looks interesting, but $20/month is a lot to just jump into, so I’m cautious to try it unless the free version lets you get a really good taste of it.
Just the Introductory level. Which teaches hiragana and katakana and some basic vocab/sentences.
It does follow the same pattern as the rest of Beginner (I’m 30% in), Intermediate and Advanced. You get a lesson, learn some vocab or kanji, and get about 25 drills that first time. Then you have to master those drills 5 times (you can specify more or less, or turn them off completely) until they don’t show up in your daily drills.
$20 does sound like a lot! I am on their bi-annual plan, which comes to $8.33/mo. It’s still a lot, but I’ve gained a lot out of it.
Thank you for understanding my point!
People seem to have obsessed on that without really getting what I was saying, so thanks.
The main point I wanted to make was that there is no one right way to learn Japanese. It will depend on the individual, their goals, strengths and weaknesses, learning styles and time per day to dedicate. My way is effective for me, but my advice to the OP would be to test different ways and resources, and experiment to find out what works for him (or her).
I started at the same time, initially with Human Japanese. I think a combination of HJ and WK works really well, because from WK you get kanji and vocab, from HJ you get grammar and vocab (kanji is only in HJ Intermediate → upper beginner actually really).
HJ teaches a lot of different kinds of sentences and grammar points, even if you don’t know much kanji/vocab at all! When I went through it, I felt like I didn’t learn much because it felt easy, but looking back on my notes and what sentences I can construct, I realise I’ve learned a lot. 
Since I was happy with Human Japanese, now I’m in the middle of Human Japanese Intermediate. I use Genki concurrently too, and Nihongo Challenge Grammar & Reading N4 (hard stuff for a few months into Japanese, but too late to chicken out of JLPT N4 now.)
Oh, and if you start grammar as soon as you start Japanese, you’ll be able to read real texts earlier too, which is exciting :3 I remembered NHK Easy used to be sooo hard at lv 8-10 (“I don’t get the “Easy” part!!!” flips table), now it’s getting better.
I love Human Japanese too. It’s almost like curling up with a good book. Which I do on my tablet at night, I read a bit of HJ. I’m halfway through their first app, and I was just wondering when I might see any kanji!
It explains things nicely, has audio, and has beautiful pictures.
Yeeesss Human Japanese made me wish there’s a version of it or something just as cozy for every foreign language I ever want to learn :')
Kanji is only in HJ Intermediate though, and even then it’s like 5 per chapter. Since we have WK, that’s fine anyway 
WK + HJ = I’ve never learned a foreign language this effectively and fun before! huzzah!
I wish the Human Japanese peeps did more advanced stuff! I loved Human Japanese Intermediate, but it was too easy. But the way they had made it was amazing!
I have started on the Japanese from Zero video series. It’s really nice to actually have a spoken lesson and I think George is good teacher that keeps things interesting! It’s on Youtube and free https://www.youtube.com/user/yesjapan/videos (find JFZ 1, however you probably can start learning from JFZ 10 but I found it nice to watch through the first pretty quickly).
I have thought about getting the textbook but reading the Tofugo review got me a bit of because of pretty basic quizzes, which is what I wanted from the book so now I don’t know. I do still recommend the videos though, they are great!
Satori Reader is very nice too, however I’m still need a bit more basic training before I can take that on in a good way.
I believe he his referring to the Minna no Nihongo series, which is a series of Japanese text books similar to Genki.
Yea, he is =) But thanks
Its an abbreviation of みんなの日本語, or just Minna no Nihongo, Japanese for Everyone, a grammar book oriented to teach japanese to foreigners living in japan, but it is used abroad too along with a translations book. Its main difference with Genki is that the book is completely written on japanese.
Yes. It is written in Japanese, except for vocab parts and translation parts.
This topic was automatically closed 365 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.