Finding N5 grammar unbelievably difficult

Japanese
#1

This is unexpected because I thought N5 was supposed to be easy, but I seem to be constantly tripped up by these random rules lying all over the place: “polite” can sometimes be です, sometimes ます, and sometimes the question will accept either form. Then ます sometimes comes alone but also sometimes comes with ある. And if I want to make an adjective formal, then I must use です, but if it’s negated AND formal then ます comes back into the picture. Then half the particles seem incredibly similar to each other: へ、に…and I’ve still never found a good resource that actually explains when to use が and when to use は.

When I go through my reviews I find myself often hitting 60% accuracy because of these small things. Is N5 grammar truly the “easiest” grammar, does it only get worse?

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#2

I’d say that N5 is the simplest due to it being the basic foundation (after all you are only expected to remember a few particles or characters は, が, へ、に etc) this, however, does not necessarily mean that it is the easiest since you are going from a state of not knowing anything about the language to suddenly engaging with it. I’d argue that some of the hardest stages of Japanese are those beginning stages since you have very little prior knowledge to link it to. For me personally, it got a lot easier after N5 and only started to get harder again at a few points in higher levels (Kei go and synonym hell specifically). These phrases probably won’t mean anything to you now and I wouldn’t be too worried about them at this stage of your learning journey.

I’d just encourage you to remember that a journey of a thousand miles always starts with the first step and oftentimes that first step is the hardest since it involves venturing into the unknown and entering completely unfamiliar territory. It most likely will get easier though. If you feel like you’re overwhelmed try slowing down a bit and maybe reading the extra links or watching videos about each point individually. Just don’t be discouraged in the beginning. You know what they say about Rome and all that.

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#3

N5 grammar isn’t the easiest, it’s the most foundational and ubiqitous. You will encounter it everywhere. Fortunately, that means that you’ll get so much exposure to it that you’ll get it down quickly as long as you keep at it.

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#4

Well if it makes you feel any better, I think nearly all the things you wrote about are problems all learners have.

I also think its hard to say whether N5 is "easy’ in comparison to others. The biggest misconception in Japanese learning imo is that you “move on” to the next level. You never move on, you will be adjusting your understanding of these basic principles likely for years to come if you stick with it. I do not mean this as some overly broad self help book method sort of way, I mean it very literally.

I will try and help with a specific point. は vs が. I will first tell you this is one of the most debated topics in Japanese to my understanding, so do not feel bad at any lack of concrete understanding.

The number one thing I would encourage you to consider about them from the outset is that they are not direct competitors, they perform different roles broadly speaking.

I almost treat them like this

Baseballは - We now are able to make statements and the presumed “It” within statements is now baseball. Our topic of conversation has been marked. The statement after could be very broad in scope.

Baseballが: - We are now about to state baseball as doing or being something, it is our actor. It will generally be more narrow in scope.

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#5

Hello,

I think you should have a look at cure dolly’s “Japanese from scratch” series as she explains many concepts about the foundation of Japanese that confuse learners.
While her android-like voice take a bit of adjusting (all her videos have subtitles tho), the information she conveys throughout her videos is invaluable.

When I first started bunpro I was also confused with basic grammar. But after watching cure dolly’s video, the base structure of Japanese become a lot clearer to me.

If you do the effort to watch her videos and understand what she is teaching, I guarantee that you will become a lot less confused from Japanese structure. But of course, cure dolly’s videos are only one resource, and you can always go look for other materials.

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#6

If I’m being honest with you, it is easy. Very easy. You’re probably trying to rush through the content before you understand each piece. Some of your claims about the language don’t even make sense. I don’t remember there ever being a question in which both です and ます are both accepted (they are used in entirely different ways). I’m also not sure what you mean about ます “coming with” ある. Also, what do you mean that you use ます with adjectives? It’s used with verbs.

As for particles, に and へ are actually similar, but へ focuses more on the journey (I am headed somewhere) vs. に which emphases the destination (I am going to somewhere).

は and が can be tricky, but just remember が really emphasizes the subject (especially if you are talking about one particular subject within a group). は is a lot more general. I wouldn’t worry too much about these because you will learn more specific grammar points and naturally pick up when to use what (and sometimes it’s acceptable to use either anyways).

You’ll likely look back in a couple months and laugh about this. For now, just slow down and really try to absorb each idea. I definitely recommend watching some videos for conjugations and early grammar.

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#7

From my personal experience, the first steps—learning and reviewing—are always the hardest. I was overwhelmed by N4 reviews; I thought it was too much. Then, suddenly, it became easy. The same thing happened at the N3 level (I went crazy with all the synonyms for “must”), and the same for N2 (I found it very difficult to deal with all the synonyms for “unless”). However, once it’s done, it’s done, and it becomes surprising to look back and realize how difficult those concepts seemed at first. You just have to keep going.

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#8

it doesn’t make sense for what feels like forever, then you kinda get it, then it sort of sinks in, and then you stop thinking about it because some other thing in grammar is driving you crazy

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#9

I recommend that you switch to read and grade review method. Grammar can be tricky and there is no point trying to practice writing sentences if you didn’t master reading them yet. As long as you grade yourself honestly, it is great.

Regarding the words sudenly using different rules when they are conjugated, remember that they may change word type. Like when you verb like 分かる and add “not”, you get わからない, but now it doesn’t end with る, it ends like an i-adjective, so when you are attaching further words to it, you need to treat it like i-adjective. And once you attach something else, different rules may apply.

Important thing is that as long as you don’t rush it and let SRS do its thing, soon you will naturally see the basic grammar and not even think about it anymore.

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#10

I think what’s tripping you up is a lack of understanding about the copula (だ / です).

Here’s two articles. The first is a summary of the copula and how it works, the second shows conjugations:

です is the polite form of the copula だ.

ます is used for polite verb/adjective conjugations.

Where it gets a little weird is that certain conjugations of the copula involve the verb ある or ます (or both). This is more or less because japanese verbs are often conjugated by adding helper verbs or other words onto them.

Ultimately, I’d recommend reading over the link I sent above to better understand how the copula works, and I suspect that will help you understand the rest.

#11

I also had the absolute worst time with N5/N4. Like you, my brain just couldn’t make sense of the information. I’d recommend going through some slow paced content where the grammar is broken down for you. (I’ll link you some) It really helped me a lot. For me, it also just took a long time to really internalize that grammar. Even now I still mess up/forget some of it. (and I just finished all the N2 grammar today)

I’ll forever recommend Game Gengo’s videos where he breaks down grammar in video games. (whether you like video games or not) and MonnieBiloney’s group read of the first Magic Treehouse book.

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#12

I second the Cure Dolly recommendation! Please check out both her YouTube channel and her book Unlocking Japanese! It’s a small but very useful little book that might clear up some of these questions for you. I also recommend going through at least one grammar guide alongside Bunpro, such as the classic Tae Kim, which is completely free. If you choose to combine all of these, I believe you’ll come out the other side with a lot more clarity.

頑張って！

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#13

I also had some crazy problems at first with a lot of Japanese grammar. First of all, you should try to understand the sentence as a whole and learn about 80% of the vocabulary used in the sentences themselves. Besides that, I think most of the grammar is fairly easy, as it’s quite flexible, as you will eventually find out. YouTube videos like those from Cure Dolly might also help you, and I would recommend them, even if her appearance and voice are deeply uncanny to me and give me goosebumps.

Besides that, ChatGPT is actually helpful in correcting incorrect sentences. What I mean by that is, when you think your sentence is correct but Bunpro says “no,” you can give ChatGPT both the original and your version and ask if yours is correct. It will then explain your mistake and is actually a reliable tool to use. That being said, I wouldn’t recommend doing the same with DeepSeek, which got me multiple points wrong in the past. From my observations, Grok 3 might become or maybe is a decent alternative, but for now, I would actually stick to ChatGPT, which has been the most reliable.

#14

Do you use any text book to guide your studies or do you use Bunpro by itself?

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#15

There is a lot of feedback in this thread already, but I will add my 2 cents. In my opinion, most of the actual grammar points in N5 are quite straightforward, but they can be hard to understand if you don’t have the ability to take a step back and process the sentence as a whole. For that reason, I would second the recommendation to take your time with each example, with an emphasis on vocab comprehension, and evaluating the role of each word or phrase in the sentence. For SRS to be effective as a review methodology, you need to feel confident that you have learned the information in the first place. If you finish an exercise and think “why is that the right answer?” you should do your best to figure it out before moving on.

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#16

This right here :point_up:.

If you don’t already use one, I highly recommend getting a textbook (i.e. Genki series), or going to a website (i.e. Tae Kim’s guide) or an app (i.e. Human Japanese) that explains the basics of grammar in a textbook format. The reason why is because there’s an order in how grammar is taught in textbooks.

On the other hand, if you prefer videos, but don’t gel with the Cure Dolly videos (as mentioned, her voice can be hard to get used to), another great resource is the Japanese from Zero (JFZ) YouTube channel. The owner of JFZ, George Trombley, is very good at guiding you step by step through all of the basic concepts. He also has textbooks for each course, but they are not mandatory. Here’s the playlist to get started:

Anyway, the point is that you need a proper way to learn Japanese. Bunpro is better used as a supplement to reinforce what you’ve learned, but I wouldn’t recommend it as your main resource for learning Japanese because the explanations don’t go into enough detail for you to properly grasp the concept of each grammar point. Something like a textbook, etc. will enable you to study them in depth, and then you can use Bunpro to drill what you’ve learned. This is really where Bunpro shines.

HTH!

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#17

I third the Cure Dolly recommendation. I avoided those videos for a long time because I found them off-putting, but when I finally gave them a chance they were tremendously helpful. Mordraug, Nunko, and Kellen also worked very hard to transcribe all of the videos and make them into an online textbook.
From your description, I also wonder whether you might be falling into a trap of trying to speak English in Japanese. It’s crucial to remember that Japanese is its own language with its own rules and structures to learn, and not a cereal box decoder ring version of English. がんばって！You can do it :slight_smile:

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