Am i expecting too much?

Bunpro
#1

hey i have a quick question, im still super new in learning japanese and im not sure if im expecting to much or not, on WaniKani im only lvl3 and honestly dont have to much problems learning the vocabs but grammar is something else, i have only 27 lessons(?) in the n5 category and already struggle to keep up my 70%. grafik
Now im not one to give up that fast so id like to hear if thats normal or if i should try and change my study habbits, if so i would really appreciate some tips or your stories of the beginning !

Also i hope the category is right if not im sorry mods.

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#2

Japanese grammar is something really alien to most people except for people knowing Korean, Turkish, and some Hindi languages. Pace yourself if you feel overwhelmed.

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#3

It will get better. Once you finish N5 it will start becoming a little easier.

But if you still struggle - I recommend resetting the progress to zero and covering N5 again. This way you will properly sort all of the knowledge in your brain and make a good foundation to proceed to N4 and later N3.

I myself reset different levels several times and it makes it so much easier to learn the second time. Basically think of the first time as a preview, and then second time as the real study where you really understand everything.

Edit:
Btw, for reference my averages are
N5 - 93%
N4 - 88%
N3 - 78%
N2 - 75%
N1 - 71%

They could have been higher, but I am of the opinion that it’s better to “fail” a sentence on purpose if I want to study it (or the grammar point as a whole) a bit more. I’m not trying to win a competition here, but learn :slight_smile:

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#4

You may be interested in discussion here:
https://community.bunpro.jp/t/bambis-h1-2021-study-plan/29207

In that thread some smart people and me share theirs opinions about how to study. They speak about a tiny little bit higher level but you look like unassuming person so you should be able extract something that is working for you :hugs:

Hope it will help :hugs:

If I can I would like to point out opposite perspective: it is hard if possible to really understand everything so it is not unreasonable to try just understand what is necessary and move on. After that you can come back when you know more Japanese, and deepen your understanding of that part you allowed yourself to understand in “shallow” way. And after some time do it again and understand even more.

I would consider learning to be iterative process.

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#5

@Knuzax
Like others said, the foundation, that is N5 and N4 are the hardest. It will get easier later, because most of the concepts are repeating. Don’t worry about the percents, just keep learning.

You can try using some mnemonics (memory palace for example) to make the remembering easier. I strongly recommend something like pomodoro (there are many apps for it) to increase efficiency. You can also decrease the number of new grammar points per day. No need for haste :+1:

:+1:

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#6

Foundation are most difficult thing. After that it will only be +1(adding to it) . It is what it is after all grammer is all about understanding and finding a pattern(like solving a puzzle or some sort) my N5 took me around 160 days

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#7


 and even if our percentages are 88+% plus today, they were lower when we started
 as you learn points and time goes by the percentages almost always climb. I read somewhere (can’t remember source sorry) that if your over 70% in a normal SRS, then you should be ok.

é ‘ćŒ”ă‚ŒïŒ

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#8

I believe it worth to spell it out, what you assumed to be obvious: Bunpro is an SRS. It is meant to do reviews. You need to get to other sources to study grammar to used it as intended. You can use links provided, but is not silly to have some other overarching structure that governs your grammar study (hence we have paths).

Bunpro is great but it is not some mystical golden tool to solve all grammar learning problems. Creators are smart enough to not pretend that and are even providing us with links to other sources which is great idea :smiling_face_with_three_hearts:. It is worth to not forget that.

Of course nobody is under the obligation to use Bunpro as intended - I don’t - but it better to do so in premeditated way :hugs:

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#9

I came to BunPro pretty early after starting wanikani and I didn’t connect with it at all, nothing felt like it was sticking and compared with the rapid progress that wanikani was giving me I just wasn’t getting the dopamine hit over here and it faded away. Coming back to it about 3 weeks ago after breaking level 20 at wanikani and having a bit of a study break over the festive season it’s going great now. I can see that back then even N5 grammar wasn’t +1 above my ability level - I didn’t know most of the vocabulary words in the sentences, I didn’t know the kanji readings, and even my hiragana reading was pretty slow. Now the grammar of the lesson is the bit of the sentence that I don’t know, I can see how BunPro is layering in the grammar concepts nicely so lessons build on each other, and everything is clicking and it feels like I’m making really good progress.
I will say I should have come back here a bit sooner, wanikani still feels really rewarding but ultimately knowing all those words is not equal to being able to read Japanese so I should have committed a bit sooner to progressing in harder areas, but I think I’d have had the same problems with being overwhelmed by the amount of new information here until I was at least lvl 10 over at wanikani. I also found the same with Genki, initially I crashed when it stopped holding my hand with romaji but going back when I was reading hiragana much more comfortably made it much more engaging. I’m sure there are plenty of different paths to push through to that basic competence, but I found wanikani really nailed the fun and engaging part so that’s what worked for me.

12 Likes
#10

You’re totally fine! :slight_smile:

SRS depends on you missing reviews to help reinforce the material, anyway. It wouldn’t be very effective if the plan was to just show you each grammar point 12 times over the course of a year
 right? Because that’s what would happen if you aced all of your reviews :stuck_out_tongue:

FWIW, I grade myself fairly harshly, but here’s what my accuracy looks like:

image
image.png1550×292 24.8 KB

I’d already studied the basics before I started æ–‡ăƒ—ăƒ­, so those N5 stats probably aren’t as meaningful as the rest. I’m actually surprised that my N4 accuracy isn’t at least a little higher, but whatever, more misses means more practice :wink:

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#11

Don’t worry so much :slight_smile:
Unfortunately, initially Japanese grammar takes a bit more time to understand.

I reset my account at least twice just to figure how to use Bunpro and what works for me. Experiment from time to time and try to enjoy the process.

Here are my averages:

image
image.png1613×430 28.4 KB

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#12

Also keep in mind that the global average might be a little skewed high. My thinking is that there is a not insignificante number of people who already know a lot of N5 grammar before they find their way to Bunpro, and are therefore are pulling higher percentages on N5.

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#13

You don’t need to worry. You have no quota to meet. Learning Japanese is just like having an argument on the internet - if you never give up, then you never lose.

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#14

This. It’s probably a minority that start BunPro as their first experience of Japanese grammar. It’s reasonably new and still in development so it’s not widely known about. Most of that N5 global %accuracy will be people that already have gained some degree of proficiency before they discovered BunPro.

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#15

I don’t understand why people are sad because they have a “low” accuracy when they learn something new. Of course you don’t always get it right, if you would you wouldn’t be learning Japanese you’d already be fluent. The whole point of learning is that you acquire something you couldn’t do before.

Maybe try to look for other resources or try to clear up things that you don’t understand properly. But otherwise just give it time to settle.

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#16


Survivorship bias - Wikipedia

worth keeping in mind while looking at numbers.

Good point, I keep forgetting to think about it xD

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#17

Also — this from an earlier post ^,^

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#18

I also struggle to get good accuracy with grammar on Bunpro. Unlike WK, you’re not memorizing things in a one-to-one match. For one grammar point you might have to memorize 5 or more things (different conjugations, matching with nouns vs verbs, etc) and the initial study test only tests one of them.

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#19

That probably why Bunpro is better at its job. It frees you from an illusion that there even 1-1 correspondence between Japanese and English in any important for memory way.

There is no even 1-1 correspondence between Polish and English (my favourite example: https://www.diki.pl/slownik-angielskiego?q=get Look how many “meanings” word “get” has) so expecting it between Japanese and English make it harder in long run in my humble opinion :hugs:

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#20

I agree with almost all the advice I’ve read on this thread! Don’t feel discouraged, and be aware that the stats are skewed by people like me, who entered this website after being familiar (though not proficient) with most N5 and N4 grammar.

Also, keep in mind that a difference in strategy is going to cause a difference in accuracy. Someone (like me) who uses BunPro to reinforce points they are somewhat familiar with is going to have a higher accuracy than someone who adds points they’ve never encountered before and starts reviewing them cold turkey. Also, the average number of points per day will affect the mental load and over time could affect accuracy, so keep that in mind, especially if you have been speeding through.

However, I wanted to add a little bit of a contrarian opinion: if you continue to have low accuracy percentages, do not be complacent about it. Don’t be super concerned about off days, but if it’s a persistent trend, consider reading points from multiple sources first, and taking detailed notes, and then only adding the points the next day. In other words, chew the information before you swallow it with BunPro!

Being more proactive at the beginning stages is especially important, for, as others have mentioned, this stuff is the foundation of later material.

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