POLL - Grammar explanation complexity

Bunpro
#1

Hi Everyone! :desert_island:

Recently, and a bit further in the past as well, there have been discussions on the forums about whether the way that the Bunpro grammar explanations are displayed is the best/easiest to parse. This mainly refers to the inclusion of Japanese grammar expressions such as 助詞, 接続詞, etc, with the English equivalent coming after it in brackets like (Particle), (Conjunction).

As we would like to gather as much honest feedback about this as possible, we will not go into detail about the reasons we included it in the first place, as your uninfluenced opinions are the most important to us.

Using this particular poll as an opportunity to gather more data, please feel free to answer any of the other polls that we have included regarding the writeups. We will take all of this data and use it to the best of our ability to make changes where needed, or leave things the way they are if there appears to be no issues.

1 - Should explanations include Japanese technical terms?
  • Yes
  • No
  • I would like to be able to toggle between both languages

0 voters

2 - Should there be more example sentences?
  • Yes
  • No

0 voters

3 - Should there be more examples of incorrect grammar usage?
  • Yes
  • No

0 voters

4 - Should the explanations be longer or shorter?
  • Longer
  • Shorter
  • I like the current length

0 voters

5 - Should there be more comparisons between similar grammar points?
  • Yes
  • No

0 voters

Finally, please feel free to add comments about why you chose certain things in regard to any of the poll topics here. The only thing that we ask all users is to focus on your own ‘ideal’ version of Bunpro in your comments, and not to try to convince other users why one particular style is/isn’t better.

Each learner has their own needs, and learns in their own way. Let this be an opportunity for everyone to describe what the optimal Bunpro is for them, so that we can get as accurate a depiction as possible of the diversity of our community.

Thank you in advance to anyone that decides to take part! As always your opinions really matter to us and we look forward to creating an even better product going into the future! :partying_face:

(p.s we plan to keep this poll going for quite a while, so don’t be afraid to leave your comments/votes even if you see it at a later date!)

30 Likes
N1 Grammar Explanations + More! (05-20-23)
#2

Thanks for running this poll. With the 5th point- trying to figure out the nuances of different grammar points has probably been where I’ve had the most difficulty using Bunpro. A few google searches normally helps but it would be great if it was also tied into the Bunpro platform in some way.

Another thing that I personally would love to see is maybe an option to sort grammar points by level of formality. I personally don’t do much reading and whilst I appreciate that I will now be able to recognise more formal and literary grammar should I come across it when reading, I would like to be able to focus more heavily on grammar points that are common in conversation as that is most important to me at the present.

These are honestly the only 2 slight gripes I have with Bunpro (well I would also love a cheaper option to upgrade to lifetime after 4 years of using the platform, but that’s not really relevant to this thread). It’s been a great resource for my Japanese learning!

26 Likes
#3

I definitely agree that the nuances between different but extremely similar grammar points had been really difficult for me.

13 Likes
#4

I voted in favour of technical terms. I looked at some of the lower level books I have and they all use them too. Even N5 practice books use them, one doesn’t even have translations for all of them. Some N4 ones don’t even have furigana for them anymore (and these are still books that have English translations for their exercises etc.). So in a way bunpro’s explanations are already easier than a lot of beginner level material and not learning these terms seems like it’s just going to make everything more difficult later (but not much later). Obviously a way to turn them off doesn’t hurt but I actually think that option is less important than having the technical terms available in the first place.

I answered the other polls too but I don’t think I care much either way for most of them. The only exception is the “more comparisons” one. Sometimes I think it would be nice if I could look up a grammar point on bunpro and get a chart with similar grammar points and the differences in nuance etc.

10 Likes
#5

I don’t really mind about the grammar japanese terms … My brain usually do “Oh ! I see a stack of kanjis, let’s ignore them for now”, but I’m planning to learn them in the future.
As for the comparisons between similar grammar points, I want that :smiley: ! Sometimes i mix similar grammar points, but luckily I’m not using ONLY bunpro, and the Minna no Nihongo does a good job at putting all the similar points during the same lesson, with shit tons of exercices “should we use X or X ?”. Same for kanjis, i prefer to learn all the similar kanjis at the same time because if i don’t i mix them (土士, 鳥烏 …) and do writing exercices (I’m a weirdo)

3 Likes
#6

Hey! Not exactly related to this, but on the subject of “ideal” versions of Bunpro, I think having a tool to practice translating English sentences to Japanese would be amazing!

Something where a simple sentence is given in English using grammar and vocab that you have already learned, and you have to type it in Japanese, and then the answer is revealed, and you can choose if you got it right or not!

Because there are so many synonyms and possible variations in translating a full sentence, it would probably be better to choose how well you did Anki-style to determine how soon you see that sentence again in the SRS based on how close you think you were to the answer! I can only imagine how painful it would be if there was only one correct answer and you type out a full sentence and find out it was “wrong” because you typed “ざんねん” or “さびしい” instead of “かなしい”

My speaking ability is far below my reading ability because I don’t have a way to practice translating full English sentences into Japanese in my head, and I think a tool like this would greatly improve my abilities! That’s all! Thank you! :pray:

7 Likes
#7

@dschrute97, I don’t know if you saw my post, but as long as you have a realistic understanding of its limits, you can do English-Japanese translation practice in ChatGPT. See my last post in the thread: https://community.bunpro.jp/t/chatgpt/60012/32

Obviously, something integrated into Bunpro with curated sentences would be great though.

2 Likes
#8

I do think disambiguation between superficially similar grammar points is useful and needed.
However, I think ideally this disambiguation would be spread over time: learn the basics of the grammar point first, then practice it a lot, then later on compare and contrast it with its nearest grammatical neighbours to really nail it down and get it correct and more focused.
I realise this might have quite big implications, e.g. increasing the number of “grammar points” to be covered by including points which specifically contrast between previously learned grammar points.

For example, there are quite a few ways to say “if” in Japanese.
Worst case scenario for me is to pile them all together into one single grammar point and start saying things like “way A” is for when you want to say XYZ, but if you are saying a more explicit condition, use “way B”, but if it’s more hypothetical than “way A” or “way B”, use “way C”, but then if it’s just a condition, use “way D” which when contrasted with “way A”, “way B” and “way C” is … you get the idea.

I would really like to see: “way A” means “if”. OK. Practice. Notice how these are all expressing a condition which …
sometime much later, after lots of practice
“Way B” also means “if”. OK. Practice. Notice how these are all hypothetical instances which, unlike “way A” are …
sometime much later, after lots of practice
So far we have met two ways to say “if”: “way A” and “way B”. They both do mean “if”, but you might have noticed that they are used in totally different situations. Blah blah blah. Examples. OK. Practice, e.g. multiple choice (blah blah blah blah ______ blah blah - is the answer “way A” or “way B”?)
sometime much later, after lots of practice
“Way C” also means “if”. OK. Practice. Notice how these are all hypothetical instances which …
then further disambiguation etc.

2 Likes
#9

I would rather have deeper/longer grammatical explanation rather than yet more examples of correct/incorrect use. I don’t find learning by induction very effective (being exposed to countless examples until the underlying rule becomes evident), and I much prefer a deductive approach: understand the rule and then being able to produce by myself or understanding any sentence using it.

I very much enjoy the Japanese grammatical terms, even when still unfamiliar. It’s a good prompt to have a look at them at some point, and they are useful to develop a deeper understanding of the language.

3 Likes
#10

I voted for the option to have more comparisons between similar grammar points and agree with it in theory however there are perhaps a few caveats to add, in my opinion. Firstly, how to group “similar” grammar points is pretty hard (part of speech? visually similar? semantically similar? Etc). Secondly, most stuff can be solved in a 5 second Google search so be wary not to spend too much time working on something that is just “nice to have”. Thirdly, if it can’t be solved by a 5 second Google search then it probably is an edge case or quite complicated and, although those cases are probably the most fruitful to have further comparisons with, those cases aren’t common by definition. Fourthly, it is seemingly impossible to predict what some people will find to be similar or not (E.g., the other day there was a post on the LearnJapanese subreddit asking why you can’t just switch を and が in sentences - I thought this was a very good example of the fact that it is really hard to see what might be confusing to someone, especially if being confused by the difference between これ、それ、あれ seems like a distant memory from some bizarre time when kanji all looked the same). Fifthly, comparisons can become massively long (look at some of the posts from Maggie sensei or the Japanesewithanime website - they’re normally quite excellent comparisons but they can get pretty long). In essence, don’t waste too much time on this feature if other parts of the content side need improvement first.

Other than that (and my ideas that I mentioned in the other post and that I believe you read, Asher), I would actually like a sentence or two summary for each grammar point but written in Japanese. Perhaps only for N3 and onwards or something. I am thinking of the style in Shin Kanzen Master grammar books where they give a very simple summary definition at the top of each explanation and then also the nuance sentence they have at the bottom of each explanation. For whatever reason I find it easier to remember these nuance points when they’re written in Japanese (I guess since I don’t have to pause my “Japanese brain” to visit my “English brain” and come back to my “Japanese brain” with some English). Similarly, if these Japanese summary lines could be used as nuance prompts during reviews then I would be so so happy. The update to those prompts was excellent and made Bunpro much more usable but, since they sometimes rely on either English nuance or kind of “translation abuse” by being over literal with translations to give a fairly big hint, I would love to see Japanese hints that don’t have to worry about translation confusion.

Thank you for the poll and I’m looking forward to the N1 explanations later this year!

5 Likes
#11

So, to me the comparison between similar grammar points is very important. Especially on the higher levels there are so much possibilities to express a certain construct like for example (even, even though, although) which translates different in Japanese depending on the nuance.

I take classes with a Japanese teacher as well and I ask regulary what is the difference between “grammar A” and “grammar B” or “word A” and “word B”

To me it helps me learn more efficient if I really underatand the nuances between certain grammar points

For the grammar explanation itself I think that the length is totally ok right now but as other user described as well I just skip the explanation which includes the Japanese terms since currently it does not help me learning but probably it will in future. So, a toogle would be great

4 Likes
#12

Maybe it’s an unpopular opinion, but I think the grammar explanations focus too much on giving a rigid and exhaustive equivalence in English words “This translates as a, b, c, or d and e if the sentence is negative”, when in most cases all those direct translations follow the same principle and could be explained just with that. For example, in verb + てもいい:

Verb + てもいい is a construction in Japanese used to express that something is ‘okay’, or ‘alright’. It can also be used as a question to ask if you ‘can’, or ‘may’ do something.

In this case makes much more sense to simply explain that てもいい is used to express permission or approval, and the let the sentence examples speak for themselves. Sure, in English てもいい can be expressed with a bunch of different words, but the core of the grammar point is that all of them fall into the unbrella of “asking for or expressing permission or approval”.

I’m no expert but I think that causes more confusion than help. If I need to say something like “Can I do this thing?” and I focus on learning direct translations of the grammar point I could confuse てもいい with ことが出来る, or the potential form ～られる, after all, all of them can be translated as “can”, but only one of them is the correct one. However if I learn てもいい as the way to ask for permission and recognize “Can I do this thing?” as such, the choice of words is clear

14 Likes
#13

For me the most significant point of this poll is the comparison between similar grammar points. That’s by far my biggest source of doubts while learning new grammar. “Wait couldn’t I say that using X instead? Wouldn’t it be correct? Or would it have a different nuance?”

Also I don’t think it would be a good idea to make explanations longer than they are but sometimes I wish some points were broken down in several entries, if only for SRS purposes.

For instance I would have liked for the positive and negative versions of すぎる to have separate entries due to the somewhat unexpected negative form.

9 Likes
#14

Adding to this, it makes sense to me that users should be able to customize their learning experience wherever possible. (If it’s not a hassle for the devs to implement, of course.)
(I also think that BunPro is one of the best at this type of customization.)

Definitely interested in comparisons between similar grammar points (similar words too!), and not just listing them at the bottom. Tofugu has many fantastic articles doing exactly this, but there aren’t very many of them.

Some examples:

They also sometimes have articles about different words and when to use one or the other. My favorite so far was 開ける・開く.

8 Likes
#15

I hope I won’t derail the conversation by bringing up a relatively tangential point but I wonder if one possible general improvement to bunpro wouldn’t simply be to better leverage the community and crowd-source some content.

Many people in this thread (including myself) point out that it’s hard sometimes to compare and contrast similar or overlapping grammar points. However, as I’m sure we’re all aware, the combinatorial we’re talking about here is absolutely enormous! Some grammar points have similarities with half a dozen others, and having every single of these entries exhaustively address all the others seems like a daunting task…

I wonder if having some sort of very limited “Frequently Asked Question” section in every grammar entry or something of the sort wouldn’t be a good way to improve on this. It would all be cherry-picked and curated by bunpro’s moderators and authors obviously.

This way the common sources of confusion will be addressed simply as users encounter them, and the answer could be “pinned” to the grammar point for everybody else to peruse.

You can sort of do that right now by leveraging these forums, but it’s a bit of a hassle and because it’s not integrated directly with the main site you don’t see any potential previous discussions around a grammar point that could have occurred. Maybe some of the doubts I’ve had while reading bunpro’s entries have already been discussed here somewhere, but I wouldn’t know it!

5 Likes
#16

I seem to have chosen the least popular option each time haha. I’ll drop my comment anyway.

I picked every option that would remove information unrelated to correct usage. I think if you do opt for a “simple” version toggle of the explanations, I’d say really cut the fat out.

I think very simple explanations and sentences can get the basic gist across so one can get right into review/use. The comparisons and incorrect usage are a bit odd to me. I like the links to synonyms but I skip the minutiae of why.

2 Likes
#17

The issue was sort of mentioned above, but to emphasize: would it be possible to a have “special” cram options to permit written, formal, casual, and also spoken Japanese grammar to be crammed separately (each in its own bunch)? In this way, the learner would be able to better understand what grammar goes with what grammar. I could put on my “now reading” hat or my “talking to my buddies at karaoke” hat, or “talking to my doctor hat”, or “some 野郎 cut me off” hat as I do my cram…

2 Likes
#18

This is something I also struggle with. Some of the grammar points pack a large amount of information into one entry, which is then spread very thin in the SRS exersizes. This is especially true for grammar points related to conjugation, which usually have several cases, and a list of exceptions to those cases.

This also seems very useful and this feature already exists for the reading practice exercises, which all link to their own forum thread. This could maybe also be done for grammar points.

For the Japanese technical terms, I find some of them very useful, and others completely useless. Statements like: this is a 助詞/動詞/形容詞 etc, are very useful to me, because I know what it means and can relate it to what I already know about Japanese and other languages. Words like 接続詞 however might as well be made up, as I have no idea what it is supposed to convey. I think that in order for these terms to be useful, a short explanation of what they mean with some examples would be required. This could be done by giving them their own page which could be linked to like how this works for regular grammar points. Maybe the decks feature could be used to allow people to choose whether they are interested in learning this information or not in some way?

3 Likes
#19

I like the idea of the ‘other resources’ being crowded sourced/ curated / voted on for most useful/not useful.

I think BP does a wonderful job of explaining grammar, however I don’t think it’s possible for one resource to be able to explain it in a single way that makes sense to all people.

Therefore in order to keep the BP explanations relatively concise, and to relieve them of the pressure of having to consistently curate and add excellent new videos, articles, etc that come up - it would be good if we could add to the resources page and then have a feedback mechanism so that the best ones bubble up to the top.

6 Likes
#20

Conjugations are indeed a good example of something where bunpro could better leverage the SRS. I think 来る and する could probably benefit from having dedicated SRS entries for all conjugations where they have exceptional forms (which is most of them).

But at the same time I think that having separate grammar entries for these would be a bit overkill, I think ideally we’d want one entry for, say “the short past” but it would come with a bunch of SRS entries for the various forms and exceptions:

  • godan short past for る/う/つ verbs
  • godan short past for く/ぐ verbs
  • godan short past for ぬ/ぶ/む verbs
  • godan short past for す verbs
  • ichidan short past
  • する short past
  • 来る short past
  • 行く short past

Grammatically all of these points are the same, but I think they each deserve to be drilled separately (at least, that’s what I’d do if I were making my own Anki deck for instance).

Of course that would create an explosion of new SRS entries, but I think that this particular example is sort of a worst case scenario and it’s also a very important point of Japanese grammar that every beginner will want to learn very early on (alongside the similar て form of course), so I don’t think it’s overkill.

After all there only are about a 1000 total entries right now on bunpro, adding a few hundred more wouldn’t dramatically increase the review load overall IMO.

3 Likes