Level 100!

After almost 4 years on Bunpro I’ve finally made it to the elusive level 100! I’ve still got a long way to go but it’s very nice to look back on my journey and see how much I’ve progressed. And finally, I’ll almost be done with all the grammar on Bunpro (although I hear more is planned to be added). Right now I’m studying as much vocabulary and grammar as I can before I take the N1 exam in a month, so this really does feel like the final push.

I feel like the past 12 months especially have been very productive as I was barely an N4 level and now I definitely feel that I’m an upper intermediate level. I can easily read books and play games in Japanese (although my listening is still a little iffy) and my study methods have definitely become a lot more streamlined and efficient. I know that taking the N1 just a year after barely passing the N4 is a really foolish decision, and I actually was originally planning on taking the N2 as I felt confident I’d pass that since I’m learning N2 content at university, but something inside me convinced me to take the N1 instead. In fact, through effective anki usage, I’ve been able to learn more than 2,500 N1 vocabulary in just 6 months!

But whilst I’ve learnt countless vocabulary and grammar over these past 12 months, I wouldn’t say I’ve “mastered” the great majority of them, I do have a strong grasp on them but I feel it’ll take quite a bit more immersion to really know the information inside and out. And despite learning some several thousand (I actually don’t know the exact amount although I estimate it to be somewhere between 5000~6500) vocabulary in the last year it feels like it’s never ending. Well, I guess it kind of is. I’ve known English my whole life and I still learn new words pretty often (like ‘demagogy’, thanks to that N1 vocab book) so I’ll definitely be learning more Japanese words as life goes on, but I’m really just talking about actively learning words. As in, making flashcards and consistently reviewing them. I think I could probably stop actively reviewing vocab now, since it’s actually quite rare I come across a Japanese word I don’t know when I’m on social media or playing a game (apart from specialist words or slang, damn you slang!) but since I’m close to finishing the vocab decks on Bunpro I don’t see a point in stopping here.

Grammar definitely feels a lot easier now. It’s difficult to describe it, but they just make more sense now, I guess because my grasp on the fundamentals of Japanese grammar became much better recently, seeing advanced grammar points ironically does not feel as difficult or overwhelming as it did when I was learning N5 and N4 grammar. N2 and N1 grammar just seems a lot more nuanced and specific which in a way makes them a lot easier to wrap my head around. It’ll be a great day when I study the final grammar point on Bunpro (Bunpro devs please don’t release the new grammar this summer, I’d like a break).

Speaking of the summer, as soon as the N1 exam is over I won’t be learning anything new on Bunpro or Anki, just slowly whittling down my reviews as I prepare for my year abroad in Japan in September. It’ll feel very weird to actually give my brain a break but it’s served me well so I’ll give it the rest it’s been pestering me for these past few months.

This post became a lot longer than I anticipated, but in conclusion Bunpro is a great study tool, I’m almost done with all of the JLPT Vocab and grammar, I’ve finally hit level 100, and, once again, please don’t release the new grammar this summer. Joking (not joking).

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What other learning sources have you been using this year to jump from N4 to N1/N2? It seems an impressive learning curve!

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おめでとうございます!

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Congrats! Very impressive jump!
How would you describe the learning curve starting from N5? I got that you went from N4 to nearly N1 in a year, how did you schedule look like in terms of studying different materials?

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The main one has been anki, making loads of vocabulary flashcards based off of textbooks I’ve been assigned by my university (mainly Tobira) gave my vocab a great boost. I then started making flashcards based off of Japanese manga I was reading. I’d read about 30 pages per day before I’d become fatigued and would use a dictionary to look up words I didn’t know so I could create their flashcards. It was a very tedious process at first, since I’d be stopping to search up words all the time, but over time it becomes easier since there are less words to search for. Whilst using anki for vocab, I also started to use Bunpro for vocab (up until this point I’d only ever used it for grammar) so that I could fill in gaps I had in N4 and N3.

As for speaking, I sort of had that base covered with university as my classes were taught entirely in Japanese and we were expected to speak in Japanese as well.

Listening was probably one of the more difficult aspects to master and to be honest I still struggle a little with it, but I mainly just watched a lot of anime on Netflix firstly with subtitles and then slowly weening myself off of them. To give you an idea of the shows I was watching, they were mainly slice of life shows like Ao no Hako and The Quintessential Quintuplets. But now I’ve started to try to into more advanced and fast paced shows, as I now watch demon slayer and also a Japanese reality show called ‘Terrace House’. I do use Japanese subtitles for Terrace House however so that I can accurately shadow what they are saying.

I’d definitely say that whilst I’m happy with my progress there’s some improvements to be made, like the flashcards I made would’ve served me better if I added a sentence with each one that showed it being used in context.

Hope this helps!

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ありがとうございます!

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Compared to learning N5 Japanese, it at times feels much slower, as in it feels that you hit multiple plateaus and feel progress screech to a grinding halt for a little while before it picks back up again. You should definitely try to immerse yourself in the language from as early on as possible and get yourself out of the English mindset and into the Japanese language mindset.
N4 feels quite similar to N5 in that you’re learning a lot of new concepts that are still relatively simple and crucial into making natural Japanese speech, so you shouldn’t see much different there. When it gets to N3, this is when you’re really transitioning into more nuanced Japanese and the grammar feels less like learning crucial sentence structure and more like making your sentences work in a wider variety of circumstances and topics. This is also the time when you start reading and watching more native Japanese material rather than materials specifically made for students of the language (it’s still very difficult and fatiguing at this point, but crucial to do it).
Bunpro is an amazing study tool for grammar and vocab but it doesn’t hurt to look elsewhere for more out there vocab, worst case scenario is that it actually is on Bunpro and you have to learn it twice (which I actually don’t mind doing).
The learning curve from N5 to N1 will feel a lot more natural if you begin to add more varied methods of study and immersion as your Japanese gets better, constantly challenging yourself rather than just staying stuck on one study resource.

Hope this helps!

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お疲れ様です。

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おめでとう!やがて僕の番だといいな!

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Amazing, wish you all the best for the year abroad as well. Its pretty cool that you can start at an N1 level rather than spending the majority of the time learning the basics.

Impressive, very nice.

I hope I’ll get there, too