How Do You Guys Use BunPro? Am I Doing This Wrong?

Bunpro
#1

Hey fellas. I’ve been using WaniKani longer than BunPro, and I’m wondering if there’s inefficiency in my study process.
Currently, I study might BunPro lessons by copying down whatever grammar lesson it generates for me. I have a notebook that I’m filling up with lessons. But this does take a lot of time to even do one lesson, and I’ve lowered me daily BunPro grammar goal to one lesson a day. I’ve been significantly more consistent while doing this, as one lesson a day (20 minutes or so) is actually feasible considering my work and school schedule, as well as my BunPro reviews, WaniKani Reviews and WaniKani lessons. I would like to throw my textbook learning back into the mix, but I’ve been slacking on that, and I could always do some more listening.

My lack of patience will show through this next part.
I would like to reach N5 like all of you would. N3 is the biggest goal right now, as that’s the time that I’ve set where I’ll start trying to talk to native speakers in Japanese (fortunately my Aunt is one), and I think things will go quicker from there. But according to BunPro, I’m still 489 grammar lessons away from finishing out N3. At the rate I’m going, that’ll be another year. I know patience is a virtue, but is there anything I could be doing instead? Is using the notebook too time consuming? How do I optimize my process?

Thank you, guys. Love you guys. Love BunPro. 'ate the Anti-Christ. Simple as.

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#2

Hi there! I personally think writing down the lessons is a good idea since physically writing things is good for keeping things in your memory, but it might be a lot to write down the ~whole~ lesson. Maybe try summarizing important points, and then copy down a few of the sample sentences? That should lessen the total time it takes you to complete a lesson while optimizing what you’re retaining. I’m also a big fan of the self-study sentences function, so if you can write at least one per lesson I think that will also be more beneficial than writing out the whole lesson.

I also think Bunpro’s reading samples and the accompanying audios are a great way to solidify the grammar in your head while practicing your listening! If you’re wanting to layer in textbook materials for getting at this, then that works too, but you’ll also end up with the same time commitment issues where you’ll be physically writing more for the textbook’s exercises (which is great for learning, but since you’re self-proclaimed as lacking in patience then you might not like that). If there’s any way you can do more than one Bunpro grammar lesson in a day then that’ll also speed you up, but I think that it’s a good idea to balance the quantity of what you’re learning with how well you think you’re retaining.

Best of luck!

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#3

  1. ‘without grammar you can’t speak well, without vocab you can’t speak at all’

  2. therefore, you absolutely don’t need N3 grammar to talk to your aunt… but you might need 2000 words

  3. use a textbook and the corresponding deck. Each bunpro grammar point lists the page number so syncing isn’t hard.

  4. I put the CD that came with genki in my car and listened to it while commuting. I’ve seen good reviews for the podcast “Nihongo con Teppei”. I like “Let’s learn Japanese from small talk”- once you finish N5

  5. I recommend you get your writing practice with the textbook

  6. don’t be afraid to pick and choose what vocabulary you want. Wanikani, bunpro, textbook teaching you a word you don’t care about? 専攻, 丸 or 玄関, mark as mastered.
    learn some other word you like more, like 頑張る [I’ll try]or 助ける [saveme]add to reviews in bunpro

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#4

Almost everybody likes to study in a different way, so what works best for other people might not work well for you. I personally only read the lesson page once, make sure I understand what the grammar means, and then leave any actual studying and memorizing to the reviews.

If you enjoy writing or think it helps for you then go for it, but it is not absolutely required for everyone. If you spend less time doing lessons, but therefore have more time doing reviews or reading your efficiency might go up.
Or it might not, it depends on the person.

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#5

As a fellow sufferer of limited patience, nothing is a better teacher of it than learning Japanese. So, trust me when I say, work on that. It’s not a sprint.

As for optimizing your process, how much Japanese are you exposed to outside of Bunpro and WaniKani? Reading practice and listening practice is essential. Hearing/seeing what you’re learning in a “real world” context is what’s going to make it stick.

NHK has a wonderful resource for beginner learners, NHK News Web Easy.

As for listening practice, YouTube is FULL of great Japanese listening content. Some of my favorites (I’ll mark these as Beginner or Intermediate, or both if it’s somewhere in between); Speak Japanese Naturally (B-I), Namishodo にほんごレッスン (B), あかね的日本語教室 (I), けんさんおかえり / Japanese Conversations (B), Emiri’s Tokyo Life(B), Bite Size Japanese (I), Japanese with Shun (B-I). Try not to get discouraged if you can’t understand what they’re saying. Again, patience is a must. Japanese doesn’t English good. So one of the skills you have to learn until fluency is sort of reconstructing what you’re hearing into something that will make sense to a native English brain.

I also really enjoy watching Japanese local news on YouTube. It’s a little more advanced, but not only is it good practice, as an American where everything is doom and gloom, it’s really comforting to watch news where the top story is a 10 minute segment on the adjustment in train schedules.

You could also try using an app like HelloTalk. It’s built a bit like a dating app, and it seems like the majority use it for that, but (with a little patience - sorry) it really helped me with conversational Japanese. I also made some good friends along the way.

But again… It’s not a sprint. It’s not a sprint. It’s not a sprint. You’ll save yourself so much stress and frustration once you realize that. Hope this helped, and 頑張って❣

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#6

A form of perspective I like is I used to teach French at my local university - I would teach 101 and then 102 over the course of the full year.

Students would pass those two courses and be at high beginner at best - after a full year of taking university level courses! Admittedly, they probably weren’t studying for much more than the class required from them, but still, compare that to your 20 minutes a day studying grammar getting you potentially to N3 level understanding - that’s practically fast!

The pace that allows you to be consistent is the right pace :slight_smile:

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#7

I just want to echo the quote that @Noxsora used about grammar and vocabulary: grammar is good, but vocabulary is best! There is no need to rush with grammar. Although I personally love studying, grammar is often best caught (I live in Japan, and many Japanese cannot explain basic grammar because they grew up with it naturally through immersion).

If what you are doing works for you, keep that pace! Pick up some graded readers and watch level-appropriate videos (I suggest Comprehensible Input Japanese), and you will begin to intuitively pick up the grammar.

I took a long break from Bunpro due to being busy with kids and life, and when I came back to the program, I found that I had learned almost all of N5 and N4 grammar just by existing (albeit in Japan). But if you do a good job with input, the grammar study will be multiplicatively more effective and enjoyable.

3 Likes
#8

Thank you all for replying to this thread. I have learned that consistency is important, and that, otherwise, I can do whatever I want. This is tough lesson. I wish it was more straight forward. But thank you all for taking the time to try and help me. I appreciate it.

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#9

I wanna point out real quick to,

A LOT of those grammar points are also like, part vocab or just really weird pieces of grammar you could skip and pick up later. Realistically, you could get away with maybe half or a little more than full amount and still talk with the vocab. Im realistically Middle/Lower N4 and I can converse with a lot of people and right now feel as if my vocabulary is lacking. Once I finished up the book im going through, Im gonna focus heavily on Vocab for a few months. Probably double my current vocab per day.

Also

Honestly start a little before then too. Each skill is its own. Writing, Listen, Speaking and Reading. Even if its simple “I like x” or “Yesterdays weather was bad” Itll still help those little things click into place and get you used to speaking and having to think quicker. Writing helps, but it also allows you the time think through what youre saying which doesnt translate to the instant speed of talking.

Anyway, Keep going famalam

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#10

I have no idea what you are using a notebook for. Basically, if you want to learn to speak to Japanese people, try going to events where you have the opportunity. Any small practice is good. You could also try using a language exchange app. Another thing I would recommend is using SatoriReader. That way, you can see the grammar in action in native Japanese contexts. If you do not see the grammar being used in your daily life or in native content that you are reading, then it will be difficult for the grammar points to stick. Connect the abstract rules to their actual value and use in real life.

#11

I want to jump in to say that, for some people, writing grammar points down helps them solidify them in their mind. Jumping straight into speaking can be a good method, but it doesnt work for everyone. I do agree grammar needs to be reinforced with some level of immersion though, but at the very start that doesn’t necessarily mean native content, though it can.
Anyway, I personally don’t think its a bad idea to keep notes about grammar points. I often forget and have to look them back up anyway, so having them all in one place would be helpful.

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#12

I took notes when I first started as well, when I did not even know about Bunpro. On Bunpro, all of the grammar points are already here, and you can add your own notes on the site, no paper needed. I pretty much have never referred to the notes that I took, so it seems useless to me. That is just my experience, perhaps. Actually seeing grammar points in action, or even using them yourself in life, seems like a much more powerful way to fix the grammar points in your mind. So, I would say that it is true that writing them down might help you learn, but at what cost? It seems like it takes a lot of time. However, if you are uncomfortable with using the notetaking feature on Bunpro, then I can understand why you would write them down.

#13

Studies show writing things down by hand is better for memory and learning than just typing or reading
Why Writing by Hand Is Better for Memory and Learning | Scientific American.
That’s just one reason though!
Anyway, it depends on the person, I mostly just wanted to point that out. What might seem useless to you might be beneficial for others.
If it were me personally, to make the best of both worlds I would take abbreviated notes of the grammar points, focusing on the most foundational ones. That would save time but also help with memory. That’s just me though.

6 Likes
#14

Jumping on the “you don’t need to be N3 to start talking” bandwagon. I’m end-of-N4 / getting started with N3 and I’ve been talking with friends and exchanging messages for quite a while. Back in N5, when I basically had zero grammar, I already managed a conversation full of hand signs and enthusiastic waving with a visiting friend of my teacher who only speaks Japanese.

Communication doesn’t need to be perfect to happen and it’s a really effective way to solidify what you’re learning. I find that speaking tends to be way below your other skills since it takes longer to output what you can already understand, but it’s easier to go with writing since you can take the time to research what you want to say and use that one vocab/grammar point you just learnt. Maybe try to send messages to your aunt as well ? Just mixing some Japanese with whatever your common language is in day-to-day life is already a great first step. My conversations with japanese friends tend to be a healthy mix of Japanese, English, and some French since that’s what they’re learning themselves. As long as we manage to somehow convey what we want to say it’s alright.

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#15

Personally, the notebook thing seems a little time consuming, so it’s not something I would do. I like to just brute force things, just taking them head on and hoping for the best :sweat_smile: When I don’t understand grammar, I like to use ChatGPT to explain it to me and give me practice sentencing and have me practice making sentences using the grammar pattern. You can always look for efficiency, but don’t get caught up in a cycle of trying to constantly find the best way to do something; if you spend too long doing that, you’ll waste tons of possible learning time (trust me, I wasted like 3 months of my Japanese learning journey doing that). If you can, I would also prioritize vocab over grammar, because there’s a lot more words you won’t know.

#16

(…what is a graded reader, and where can I get one? Is it like a book for kids learning how to read?)

#17

They’re books for non-native speakers to learn how to read! They start out with very basic vocab and grammar and the idea is that you read one where you can understand most of what it says and work your way up the levels. You can find a bunch if you search https://amazon.co.jp.

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#18

Do you have any you would recommend? @Shneeki , do you have any you would recommend?

#19

You can find many free ones here https://tadoku.org/japanese/en/free-books-en

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#20

I have used two in the past (but now I attempt to read simpler native texts). I really enjoyed Amazon.com: Japanese Short Stories for Beginners: 20 Captivating Short Stories to Learn Japanese & Grow Your Vocabulary the Fun Way! (Easy Japanese Stories): 9781951949228: Lingo Mastery: Books because it was actually interesting (which is one of the painful problems of graded readers).

I also used レベル別日本語多読ライブラリー にほんごよむよむ文庫 レベル1 vol.1 | NPO法人 日本語多読研究会, NPO法人 日本語多読研究会 |本 | 通販 | Amazon. These were good and also came with a CD. I don’t have a link for the American Amazon, but I am sure it can be found.

You will find that many people are strongly opinionated on how they learn and how others should learn. Just do what you enjoy and can continue to do. You will need to make intentional steps towards difficult and “less fun” content, but love the process.

The undisputed (and scientifically backed) best way to learn a language is as much comprehensible input as possible. That means reading and listening to as much of your target language as possible, but keeping it at a level where you mostly understand what is happening. If it is too hard, you won’t learn. If it is too easy, you won’t grow.

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