I want to learn a comprehensive list of grammar so that when I’m watching Japanese shows I only have to worry about not knowing the words used. I found a decent community tutor on italki but she lacks structure as she’s not a professional. My friend suggested to go through the bunpro grammar with her. I want to be able to use the grammar when I speak as well as just understanding it when I watch things. So do you think it’s a good idea to practice using each grammar point with the tutor as I go through bunpro?
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If you don’t mind me asking, whereabouts in your Japanese learning journey are you? A fresh beginner or would you say you have a lot of the basics already up to a good/decent understanding? I think that answer might influence what myself/others would potentially recommend.
Welcome to Bunpro/the forums though~ 
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I finished genki 1 and the first chapter of Genki 2 and I know around 1000 or so words. Not really learning individual kanji but I know the ones from Genki 1. Also I am try to learn words in their kanji form although I often forget the readings. On bunpro I know all the N5 grammar points and a few of the N4 ones.
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I find a lot of teachers preferring genki textbook to any other at least on italki. I’ve yet to see one that knows much about bunpro. Maybe just bring up the grammar points to the teacher and ask them to help explain it? I’m not sure what exactly you’d want out of specifically teaching based off the bunpro grammar points rather than the same grammar point from Genki.
I guess my question would be, why the Bunpro path specifically when it comes to your question?
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Oh genki only goes up to N4. The bunpro path goes all the way to n1 which i assume is all the grammar points ill need. And i’d just want to practice them with a teacher so i can recall them more easily when i want to use them.
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ah- so post genki 2?
In that case, isolate the ones that you have trouble with. I’m not personally in N3 or really halfway through N4 myself, but I heard N3 is synonym hell. Try finding grammar points that sound repetitive and ask about those would be my advice in that regard. You probably would not need to recite every grammar point to the teacher.
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My advice would be, first find another teacher (one who knows Japanese grammar, and knows English, well). The reason why is because at first, given that grammar is easier in the beginning, it’ll be fine. But once you get into the more nuanced grammar points, he/she will not be able to properly explain the differences to you. As someone mentioned earlier, N3 is where you start learning similar ways of basically saying the same thing, but with slight nuances. You need someone who can explain them properly. And if they know English well, they’ll be able to translate sentences correctly. Sometimes having things explained in Japanese is not enough for you to grasp what the Japanese is doing, unless that person knows English and they can relate the differences in an easy to understand manner (even if they do so all in Japanese, since they know what would trip up an English speaker).
After you get past Genki II, try Quartet I & II. BunPro has pathways for them, which should get you up to N2 level (not really, given that BunPro has more grammar points than the Quartet books. Then again, it’s the same thing with the Genki books). Once you reach N1, you should be able to pick whichever book you like since a lot of grammar points after N3 use a lot of the same grammar structures you’ve learned previously, but more nuanced. Obviously there are completely new grammar structures in each level but, at around N3, they’re not all going to be completely new like it was in the beginning. You’ll see a lot of familiar structures. Hopefully this makes sense.
Anyway, that’s my recommendation given that that’s pretty much what I’ve been doing up to now. If you liked the Genki books, you’ll like Quartet as well. I believe they were made as a follow up to the Genki books, so they are similar in many aspects.
HTH!
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If your goal is watching shows with ease, this won’t be the case. I can only speak for manga/anime/video games, so if your goal is live action stuff then maybe it’ll be different, but bunpro only teaches jlpt grammar. There are a lot of grammar patterns you won’t find on the jlpt and thus won’t find in bunpro, including but not limited to contractions, dialects, archaic grammar, and language that is simply too “anime” to be included in such curriculum (たまるものか comes to mind).
Bunpro will teach you a lot of useful stuff and most of what you need to know, but I’m just giving you a heads up that not everything there is to know is on here (yet, I hope!)
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The BunPro team mentioned adding a JLPT level 0, where I’m sure they’ll add stuff like slangs, and other grammar points that are not found in the JLPT curriculum. It’s slated to be released some time this year, but who knows. It was just a tentative timeline. Looking forward to it though.
That said, with all of the grammar points you learn in BunPro it would not be too hard to connect the dots and figure out what these contracted/old school grammar points you encounter in those mediums probably mean. At least for the most part.
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BTW, a really fun way to learn Japanese grammar, with great explanations and several examples for each grammar point, that can serve to supplement BunPro, is the ゲ-ム言語 YouTube channel.
Not only does he teaches the JLPT grammar points by level, but he’ll also talk about other non-JLPT grammar points that are also common and are related to the one’s being taught. An example of what I mean is in the video below. I LOVE his channel:
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I also just want to add that the idea of “grammar” gets more and more diffuse the higher your level is. It becomes far more about patterns or the nuanced use of “normal” words and at that point it becomes basically impossible to have a “comprehensive” checklist as it is hard to say what is a straightforward extropalotion of a more fundemental grammatical idea or what is just vocabulary etc. Bunpro is already one of the most comprehensive resources for Japanese grammar, going off of the number of grammar points, but even the more encyclopaedic attempts at listing every grammar point that you might imagine a learner might want a specific reference for still miss things. At that point it becomes more about thinking for yourself (and using very specific google searches).
Here is an example from English grammar: What is the difference between “may” and “might”? Is “might” the past tense form of “may” (many L2s learn this in their textbooks)? Is “might” the informal version of “may” (again, textbooks)? Are there occasions where they are not interchangable (“May I help you?/Might I help you?”)? Is there is a difference in certainty? When using them to refuse an invitation, which one sounds firmer? etc etc etc. Of all these nuances, which ones should be in a lesson about how to use may/might? This is especially hard to answer since it isn’t an advanced grammar point but the nuance is something that you can’t really grasp without a more advanced understanding of the language and culture as a whole.
Essentially, the idea of being able to study a “comprehensive” list of grammar is slightly misguided, in my personal opinion, as it is a pretty nebulous idea. Although going the completionist route on Bunpro will certainly not be a detriment.
The nuances you mention I believe are learnt through a lot of exposure to the language. Trying to learn all the nuances of a grammar point or word may only add to confusion at first. As long as I can understand the general meaning and a few specific cases then I think it’s fine for a foundation. I actually tried what I was asking and it went okay. The teacher also explained the difference between two grammar points which have the same english translation but different nuances.
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Maybe I’m just slower than the average Japanese learner but this is absolutely not the case for me. In any case that level 0 update can’t come soon enough
It depends on how you’re going about learning Japanese, and what level you’re currently at. If you’re at N4 or lower, than the reason why it doesn’t work is because you’re still learning the basics. N3 is where I think you really start learning the language, IMO.
Personally, I like learning the literal translation of the words and the Kanji in each grammar point. That’s something I really appreciate about BunPro, that they always include the Kanji (even if it’s not used). Not only do I gain a deeper understanding of what the Japanese is doing, even though it ends up sounding weird AF in English, but it helps me memorize the grammar better.
After you memorize enough patterns, it just a matter of putting the pieces together. That said, sometimes this method doesn’t work and you just need to memorize the grammar points, period.
Yeah, nuances are learnt through exposure, totally agree. Maybe I misunderstood your original post, hence my response, but it sounded like you wanted to have a complete grasp of grammar just from studying with a tutor/Bunpro so that you only have to worry about vocab later on. I guess you don’t have any misconceptions here but, honestly, I have heard beginners say things like “I will just get really good at kanji/vocab/grammar and then I don’t have to worry about it anymore” a fair number of times and it is really not how it works, in my opinion. This viewpoint seems especially common for kanji for some reason. I think I projected that onto your original post and misunderstood what you meant as such so sorry about that.
And glad the lessons are working out as you wanted them to. Doing what works for you and what you enjoy is the most important part.