Hello! This’ll probably be a mix of a few different thoughts so please bear with me.
I’ve been studying Japanese for the past few years, though progress has been slow. It took me quite a while to figure out which resources worked best for me, and there was definitely a break or three in there (either due to burnout or life simply getting busy). All this is to say that I’m unfortunately still sitting at probably a bit below N5 level after all this time.
I’m currently studying the official Bunpro N5 vocab and grammar decks and am about 40% of the way through. I only just discovered the reading practice feature earlier today which I was elated about (particularly as Satori Reader is still a bit above my paygrade). While I was able to read the early N5 lessons no problem, I realised that my listening skills were abysmal. Even with the simplest of sentences (e.g. これは私の本です。これも私の本です。), it felt like my brain was being ambushed by a group of flying monkeys and I just couldn’t compute what was being said. By the time I’d mentally translated the first sentence back into English, the audio was already half way through the next sentence.
Even during my ‘break’ periods, passive listening practice was the one thing I did consistently the past few years. So I guess I’m just a bit bummed out that it may not have been as helpful as I thought it was. It makes sense in retrospect, because I was never actually engaging with the material (merely keeping an ear out for words I recognised or occasionally searching up words I heard multiple times). But it’s admittedly left me feeling a little deflated, and also a bit worried I’ve developed some bad habits. In particular, the compulsion I feel to translate what I’m reading/hearing back into English before my brain will actually recognise it for what it is. I assume that reading will improve this, but every time I check back on Satori’s easiest stories they still feel too advanced.
I guess I’m just feeling a bit lost, and would very much appreciate some advice from anyone who’s made it out of the N5 quicksand. Did anyone else feel like this when they first started out? Were there any resources or habits you found useful? At what point did Japanese begin feeling more natural (and less mentally draining) to engage with?
I feel like if I could just get past this phase and begin reading then my comprehension will naturally grow (as will my confidence), but doing so always feels just out of reach. Do I just take the plunge and accept that I’ll only be able to make out 30-40% of what’s written?
It only gets easier by doing. Japanese didn’t start feeling less draining until around 1000-2000 hours in not going to lie, but I found things that I thought were fun and worked my way through it and gradually increased the difficulty to not get complacent with only things I can understand (hence why it took a while for it to feel comfortable).
Finish the N5 grammar deck and set up Yomitan and OCR so you can easily look up unknown words. Or if you’ve read visual novels an easy one will give both listening and reading practice. The difficulty curve is extremely steep though, but when you’ve finished your first novel you are probably already around N3 level and the sky is the limit if you keep doing it.
I haven’t tried Satori, but keep reading some of the stories even if they feel hard. They won’t get easier by waiting.
Heyo, Japanese is hard so don’t beat yourself up over it. Until you progress up to N2-N1 you’ll basically be unable to smoothly read/listen to Japanese content and enjoy it, unless it’s simplified content.
My main advice would be keep learning vocab. Without proper vocab, making sense of sentences is basically impossible. No matter how good your grammar is, without vocab you won’t be able to parse the sentences. Even doing 20 minutes a day of SRS will massively help your vocab. The reading practice will be very helpful too.
Second listening is just a case of practice. Do it slow, then do it fast. Repeat listening to the same content until you can parse it. Again, knowing where vocab starts and ends makes parsing it a lot easier.
Often it’s easy to feel you aren’t making progress. Having measurable progress (e.g. vocab you are learning) is very helpful. Try making note of sentences you weren’t able to read, and the come back a few months later and see how much easier you can read them.
considering that you are only 40% into the N5 material, I’d say you are expecting a bit too much from yourself. it’s perfectly normal to struggle with reading and listening if you have never done it properly before. it takes practice. a lot of practice.
keep working on vocab and grammar for now. and make sure you always do it with audio enabled. listen actively while trying to read along. repeat the audio if you didn’t quite catch it, until you do.
if you go into the reading practice, do it slowly. reread a section once you are done. replay the audio a couple times. you are not at the point where you can just “read and enjoy a story”. you are at the most painful part where you have to subject yourself to toddler-level conversations over and over again. it’s frustrating, and it’s boring, and there is no way around it. you need to accept that, and then you just keep working on it, no matter what.
I’m also a complete beginner (just “finished” the N5 content in Bunpro and Kaishi 1.5k in Anki), and my current state reminds me a lot of my first few years of English classes back in middle school. I hated English classes. 25 years later, I’m fluent in English. that’s my personal motivator: the knowledge and personal experience that it will get better if you just stick to it.
I tried beginner books, but without enough vocab knowledge it is just painful.
When it comes to reading and listening, it’s unfortunately the same as always: practise, practise, practise.
My breakthrough in listening comprehension came through Comprehensible Input https://cijapanese.com or:
Maybe first try without the transcript, when read the transcript and get sure to understand the content and then repeat listening until you understand everything.
When it comes to reading, I found the free Level 1 and, more recently, Level 2 books from Tadoku Greaded Readers very helpful.
I also think the Genki Japanese Readers Boxes are great for beginners, but not worth the price. Of course, if you want to, you can find ways and means to get them for free
I am at 60% of the N5 deck and started satori reader 4 months ago, though I have been using Duolingo for a year and a half before so I know a bit of vocab and grammar.
It will sadly be that way for a little but don’t give up! Keep working through the N5 vocab deack and it will become easier. You wil slowly recognise words and kanji and your comprehension will only improve.
Did you tried the spring story?
The first time I read the first I understood roughly 10% lol, there were birds then more birds and uh… no idea.
What helped me was reading it once with audio after I read the line but without look ups!
Then rereading right after while clicking on each new words and reading the explanations then trying to translate it myself before reading the sentence translation. This takes me 7 to 8 minutes per chapter then around 15 minutes to reread with translation and explatioon.
I also add every new word (except preposition,rare complex words and linking word such as " therefore, in such case, right after, meanwhile, etc, etc") to their card system and I review them daily (I have roughly 650 cards right now).
Then a few days or a week later, I will reread that chapter and try to do as few look ups as possible. I was amazed at how much vocab I could remember and how far my understanding came.
From 10% it reach 40 to 50% and what is great is that they try to reuse the vocab so you will slowly understand more and more.
I use to do 2 chapters a week and now I have ramped it up to 4.
I have finished Spring, Summer and at chapter 21 of kiki mimi radio.
With the help of bunpro and the built it card system my overall understanding on easy story is at around 30 to 40 % I sometime even reach 70% which is awesome but generaly those easy chapters are followed by complex ones where I feel like I am starting all over again haha.
The most important is to not give up, consistency is key.
When you add a new grammar point (or maybe even vocab) make sure to have “hide Japanese and English” turned on in settings so you it hidden on you sentences while you are viewing the point:
And try to listen and deduce what they are saying, this will help you with the listening without you leaving Bunpro.
Also, while doing reviews, if you see a short sentences, try to repete it with the same speed and intonation as the voice in the recording, it will help with listening even more, (choose sentences that are challenging to pronounce, but not the sentences where it challenging to pronounce even a half of the sentences)
Just some improvements you can add to your current workflow
Thank you for the advice! And also for a clearer perspective on just how much study it’ll take to get to where I want to be. I’m more than happy to slog through all sorts of lookups to get through books or visual novels, but (as stupid as it sounds) I didn’t think I was ‘allowed’ to or that it was frowned upon. All this time I’d been following advice I’d received when I first started that reading should be 90% known content, 10% new content. While that makes sense in theory, it’s honestly a relief to know that you (and others here) were just fine (and benefited from) just diving into it.
Thank you so much for your advice, plus the realty check I think I’m just a bit hard on myself as I know I could be so much further along if I’d just applied myself a bit more the past few years. I think if this were 3 months into my learning journey I wouldn’t feel the same way. I’ll continue to focus on learning vocab, particularly as it goes a long way towards comprehension as you said.
Thank you for the listening advice as well; I’ve been listening to input at full speed, I think expecting that I should be able to understand at this point without actually taking the time to get used to it. I’ve been so used to passive full speed listening and letting most of the noise wash over me that I didn’t realise I had no practice with content I should be able to understand.
Thank you so much for the reassurance, it honestly helps a lot. As I said above I think I’ve just been putting a lot of pressure on myself to improve as it feels a bit embarrassing to still be at this level after 2 years. But I’m more than happy to go through the toddler phase knowing that there is a way out of it eventually lol. Ironically, I’ve actually been watching a Japanese YouTube channel for children the past few days (シナぷしゅ) which has been a lot of fun despite it being meant for literal toddlers. It helps remind me that once upon a time that was me with English as well, we just don’t remember the early years much.
Thank you so much for the suggested resources! The Natural Japanese website looks especially intriguing, I’ll definitely give it a closer look. I’ll check out the graded readers as well! As for the Genki resources, I’ll keep an eye out on the high seas for them
Thank you so much for the reassurance, it really helps a lot. Also ngl this had me absolutely cackling because SAME!! When I checked it out a few nights ago I was all like “Uhh bird … blue and green bird … some more about birds …” Honestly that makes me feel a lot better, knowing others have had the exact same experience lol.
Thank you so much for the advice, I’ll definitely give this a try. Sooner rather than later I imagine, as it’s clear many people here just dove straight into reading without waiting too much.
That is such a good idea!! I never would’ve known you could do that, thank you so much. I’ll definitely give it a try. Up until now I’ve just been covering the translation and reading/translating myself but listening to it would be even better. I’ve already been repeating sentences as I go through new vocab which has been helping, so I’ll definitely keep that up. Thank you!!
Reading started to get a lot easier around mid N4 grammar, level 20 wanikani, and around 1000 core words. Also, just pulling in the most important/frequent things that reoccur in things like games and apps that I ran into. Actual comprehension was low, but it ranged on every sentence between 10-90%, but I was getting the gist of what I was reading, enough to that most of the time I could just move forward and not really worry about the stuff I didn’t get. Around the end of N4 grammar I played Pokopia and only bothered to lookup text boxes that seemed too important to not understand fully and words that came up or needed to know a lot. I didn’t understand everything, but it was enough to where I wasn’t lost, it was a lot of practice, and it was a lot of fun. So, if you can handle reading without full comprehension, you can start to find stuff to actively enjoy in Japanese sometime in N4. If you’re super lucky in what you like, you might enjoy graded readers sooner. Obviously, it’s going to be certain titles that open up at each stage, but things are continuously opening up as you push forward.
I passed the N5 last December and I’m going to try the N4 this December and the Listening practice still feels like a bunch of flying monkeys in my brain.
I still feel the urge to translate word for word in real time. Usually I can understand something after several listens, but I panic when I know I only have one chance to hear it.
The thing that works best for me is just drilling Listening practices over and over again until I can pick out each word.
Mochi Sensei’s youtube channel is really good for this. She plays short passages 3 times through, adding English subtitles on the second playthrough. Her content is broken up by N-level.
What I’ve found is that N5 (and N4) likes reusing similar scenarios and sets of phrases, so it’s worth just doing them over and over again, like the Bunpro exercises for grammar, until set phrases become like second nature.
I still find Satori Reader too tough. I want to find something I can read that’s pitched at my level, rather than needing to constantly look stuff up. Bunpro’s reading passages are good for this. (Better than their grammar SRS sentences which often contain vocabulary of a higher level and can be frustrating to try to translate!)
Pick anything that interests you, find the English Wikipedia page, check if it has a Japanese version, read until the first sentence you can’t understand (probably the first one for many of us). Now feed that sentence into an LLM while asking for a breakdown for language learning purposes (grammar + vocab + furigana). Now you know one JP sentence that’s actually relevant and about something that interests you, which no textbook or platform can ever match. Once you have hundreds, only then will common patterns (grammar) start to feel relevant/interesting, which will automatically help with the grammar studying on Bunpro. Now N5 will feel like nothing and you have a technique that helps you find your blindspots and create a foundation of sentences you know every word and grammar point for. Doesn’t have to be Wikipedia of course, the Japanese internet is bottomless.
Do what you want but I would be against using LLM.
You need to pay to actually have any good results so instead of giving 15 $ to OpenAi or other, give them to Satori reader (less than 8$ monthly) or other hand made paid ressource that will not lead you in a wrong direction.
I am anti Ai so take my comment with a grain of salt too.
On costs most providers give a few daily prompts with their “Pro” models so it’s usually fine. I think this is a pretty fine use-case of AI, particularly if you have grammar fundamentals from a textbook/Bunpro.
But please, let’s not make this into another AI/LLM thread
Okay. First, you’re N5. Everything you do in Japanese - speaking, reading, listening, etc - sucks. And that’s fine. It’s natural. So don’t stress.
Your question about how and when to take the plunge into reading is a very personal one. It comes down to your tolerance for ambiguity.
Some people have very high tolerance, and can happily read a manga with 10% comprehension, as one of the other commenters said. My tolerance is quite low - I hate constantly having to stop and struggle with new words when I’m reading.
So, even though I sat the N3 with high scores in reading and grammar, I don’t actually do much reading outside of Bunpro at the moment. I figure that while I still have curated vocab lists, why not just grind the pre-existing material? Unless I feel I need more reading practice for the exams, I’ll probably hold off on serious extra-curricular reading until after I finish N1. But other people might absolutely hate doing that.
So there’s no right and wrong here, only what you find enjoyable, and by extension, sustainable. Because this is a looooooong haul. A marathon, not a sprint. So you really gotta love the journey, whatever that means to you.
that’s the level from several years ago, the current free state of the art models give better answers than even most natives (not because they’re smarter, but the natives have such bad English)
Similar to @adorable I started with re-watching my favorite anime with no comprehension.
It gets easier in the things that you engage with regularly. That sounds like a “Oh yeah everyone knows that without saying it” but people still expect otherwise.
For me my home in understanding right now is anime and anime with japanese subtitles which I comprehend with close to 100%. My weakest is speaking/conversation which I’m left trying to form sentences and being lost for words ETC. Guess which I put majority of time into
Alright, I apologize for my comment and will eat my hat
Heard so many time from AI users that you need to pay or you will have bad/ wrong answers that I thought it was mandatory.
@Urazi The reason I think AI is pretty benign for this use case is that conservatively AI hallucinates 5-10% of the time. This is problematic for critical decision makers (e.g. law, engineering, medicine) where everything needs to be correct nearly 100% of the time.
However, language learning will smooth out mistakes in learning and understanding over repetition, especially if you keep developing your understanding and not believing one approach. Humans also make mistakes in learning, only for them to be corrected with further learning. There’s been many phrases and readings I’ve understood incorrectly until I eventually revisit them.
Also the famous hallucinations (e.g. glue on pizza) come from search engine AI which is designed to be cheap and as fast as possible (and in turn is prone to being inaccurate.)
AI is quite decent for having things explained to you, since what you are learning is something others have also learned so there’s a lot of it in the dataset, but you can tailor the explanation to your needs/ask follow-up questions.
Thanks for the explanation!
That explains why search engine LLM are so ludicrously wrong at times.
Will still not use it haha but OP has more info if they to try out.
I think I’m just a bit hard on myself as I know I could be so much further along if I’d just applied myself a bit more the past few years. I think if this were 3 months into my learning journey I wouldn’t feel the same way. I’ll continue to focus on learning vocab, particularly as it goes a long way towards comprehension as you said.
