I am interested in doing Bunpro in reverse.
For example, you are given a sentence then you translate into Japanese. Is this option available?
Kind of like KaniWani for WaniKani?
Are you thinking translate the whole sentence? Or a specific grammar point is highlighted in the English version, then the user translates that part into Japanese?
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I’d definitely be interested in something like that too. I think it would need to be the whole sentence, that way it would not only reinforce the grammar you learn buy also the vocabulary.
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It would need to be the full sentence. And the user should decide if they got it correct.
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I am also interested in that, I have been studying grammar and kanji for 2-3 months but I realize I cannot express ideas and make my own sentences and would like a tool like that to guide it.
Since it’s been 3 years since last reply on this topic I wonder if there are new tools to do just that now, anyone knows?
If there is no such tool, is there a good website that teaches you how to produce sentences based on topics? Like how to ask what time it is, ask for direction, order food etc…
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I speak Japanese daily (I live in Japan) and the unfortunate truth is that your speaking ability will trail behind your comprehension ability. A rough rule of thumb is that unless you can easily understand something (totally automatic and without thinking at all) then you almost certainly can’t produce the same thing during a conversation - not without significant thinking time, at least. Even if you can understand something when reading or watching TV or something that is a very different thing to comprehending what the person you are talking to is saying and then producing a natural response.
You say you have only been studying for a few months so I guess your comprehension level is still relatively low (I could be very wrong and I don’t like making these kind of assumptions so I apologise if I am wrong). I personally wouldn’t worry too much about speaking ability until your comprehension is more solid. If you live in Japan and need to use Japanese then that is a different matter and there are various strategies for making communication easier but if you are outside of Japan and learning as a hobby then I would, personally, recommend relaxing a bit as you could end up getting frustrated.
Having said that, I am not one to say that people shouldn’t output when their level is still low but I would say that expectations need to be realistic. Sending short text messages, where you have time to think and re-write, to a language exchange partner is probably beneficial - especially as you will realise what grammar/vocab you really know compared to what you thought you knew (especially true for nuance and synonyms, in my experience). I promise it gets easier. Just keep at it!
A tool where you translate from Japanese to English probably isn’t that useful or efficient compared to just actually outputting with natives or simply getting more input (reading more, listening more). Constantly translating from English to Japanese is also a bad habit and something that should only be done if you really really need to communicate something and you really really don’t have any idea how to do it in Japanese. Probably a sign to get more input, in general. That is my opinion, at least.
In terms of basic phrases - use a textbook like Genki or just buy a phrasebook. Rote memorising phrases won’t give you the ability to speak Japanese though (in the sense of being able to have a conversation).
TLDR: Output ability will always be limited by input ability. Relax and just keep going.
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Skip all this italic stuff: I’ve used Deepl to do that, but of course you can’t be sure if it’s correct or not. For example you think of a sentence in English, type it into Deepl IN JAPANESE and have it translate back to English to see if it looks the same as the sentence you were thinking of. But then I immediately reverse the Deepl translation to see how it would create a “natural” Japanese sentence. You play around with the alternatives and you get a feel for what might work. NOT a great solution to your request, but worth playing with if you feel like it. After reading the response to this post and doing further research, this plan of mine was NOT a good idea!
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May not be exactly what you’re looking for, but the only thing that pops into my head would be this resource based around Genki I & II.
The exercises here give you the option to do it in a written style, and the very early lessons seem to be kind of in line about what you’re asking for. Not perfect, but it should help to be a little bit of a stepping stone into the foray. Anyways, play around with it a bit if you feel inclined, hopefully it helps out a little bit!
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For these things this might be what you’re looking for
There are a number of language options
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I wouldn’t do that. Deepl (like every other machine translator) is incapable of detecting bad input. You’re literally just asking it to make a reasonable English sentence out of a few words you enter in Japanese.
Deepl works for its use case, which is given correct input in a foreign language, produce something intelligible to a native speaker of the target language. For learning though it’s pure poison because it will produce something intelligible out of complete garbage too.
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So NOW you link this incredible resource when I’ve nearly finished studying Genki! 
This is really cool, wish I’d know about it earlier.
I’ve been waiting to post that link for awhile but I needed to make sure you specifically wouldn’t get any use out of it before I did 
Although if you’re planning on using the tobira textbook then actually I’ve failed at my objective since apparently the site does that book too.
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@EdBunpro I thought as much! Sneaky duck. Well I wasn’t thinking about using tobira next, but I might do just to spite you!
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Thanks for all the answers, I will look into https://tsunagarujp.bunka.go.jp/ next! Also planning on looking into genki.
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This is perfect for what I was searching for in my earlier post! I was looking at the Kanzen master series for N3, but would getting Tobira be good for N3-ish (happy to cover more N4 as well) level as well?
I’ve never really used Tobira much before (only skimmed through it just to get a general first impression, etc.) but from what I’ve gathered online it seems to be highly regarded as a very good stepping stone after you finish Genki II. Seems like it covers N3 primarily, don’t think there would be too much N4 stuff getting explained in detail.
Actually, I think there’s some Bunpro threads that brought up Tobira in the past, let me pull them up for you
Seems to be like a common toss-up is either Kanzen or Tobira, but I honestly don’t know enough to give you a suggestion. Feel free to make a topic on this though if you want, I think there’s probably a lot of people who may have the same question and also want to ask!
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Thanks for the response. I’ve edited my post to “cancel” it. I’m now using example sentences to find what I want, like on tatoeba.org or in jisho/jpdb.