WaniKani + Bunpro +?

Japanese
#1

(Full disclosure: I’m also posting this on the WaniKani forums)

At the beginning of this year I decided to get back into Japanese in full force. I started with Duolingo, then I found WaniKani, then I found Bunpro. I soon realized Duolingo wasn’t nearly as useful as I had thought and so I’m now concentrating on WK and BP, which I’m finding very effective (so far).

The problem is I’m missing a tool like Duolingo, wherein I’m asked to either write or translate full sentences. The ideal app would take my WK and BP levels and give me sentences that I should be able to either understand or write at the given point, both kanji and grammar-wise. I doubt anything like that actually exists, but I’d really like a way to use the knowledge I’m getting from WK and BP together somehow.

Does anyone use a third tool/app that allows for something like this?

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#2

I’m using all three of the tools you mentioned and I think they work well together. Duolingo gets a bad rap because it’s very casual and “show don’t tell” but I think it’s pretty useful as long as you are realistic about what it does. It’s like a secondary workbook to include as just part of your studies.

Right now I’m actively trying to defy Duo by answering everything in casual form. It will still accept these answers, and it’s allowing me to practice more complex verb conjugation than just putting ます or ました at the end of everything.

Make sure you have keyboard mode on so you aren’t using the answer bubbles, check the comment threads on any questions you don’t understand, and try to understand sentences in their entirety before answering, rather than going through them word by word without bothering to get the whole picture before moving on.

Once I get more comfortable with the grammar, I plan to move on to something like HiNative where you write sentences and native speakers can correct them. But I plan to keep Duo as part of my studies because the instant feedback is unbeatable for drilling the basics.

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#3

For sentence practice, I wish I could recommend an SRS, but I don’t know of any either. What I use, though, that you might find useful is japanese.io. The site’s centerpiece is a Japanese text parser that does a lot of the legwork and frees my mind to focus on the overall sentence structure.

My favorite way to use it is with this Language Learning with Netflix plug-in. I’ll find a show in Japanese, export the subtitles to an HTML file, copy-paste them into japanese.io, and just work my way through, marking words I don’t know and want to learn. It’s a little tedious to set up but it’s worth it!

I could see that. It’s a good place to get the fundamentals down and get comfortable with seeing words in context a lot. After the first few lessons, though, I’ve found that Duolingo is deceptively Eurocentric. Its concept of a sentence or a part of speech is fundamentally tied to Germanic and Romance languages. Context is so important in Japanese that it feels to me like Duolingo’s one-right-answer model is inefficient. But if you know what you’re getting and you’re cognizant of that, as you said, that’s surmountable.

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#4

Those are exactly my main two problems with Duolingo. I’m up to Unit 4 right now and if I didn’t know about casual forms from my earlier studies then I still wouldn’t know about them, much less be able to practice them.

But the answer bubbles are the worst and it would improve the app for me tremendously if I was required to type everything in, but it’s not an option I see anywhere in the app? I’m using the iOS app, is “keyboard mode” something you have in the web version or in Android?

EDIT: There is, in fact, a “keyboard mode” in the web version! I had no idea, this makes it so much better, thank you. I still see the usual Duolingo problems, like it will sometimes accept only かばん but not 鞄 because that’s the expected answer, but there’s still much more flexibility like you said and now I really have to think about how to write everything out.

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#5

Thanks, that will come in handy. I definitely want to start watching things with Japanese subtitles, but I think it’s still a little early for me, I want to at least get through N5 grammar first.

#6

Nothing like this is going to exist solely because WK’s vocabulary isn’t structured to help you with reading right away or really at all until you get a large chunk of levels done. This is why majority of WK users tell others to use something else for vocab while you’re learning - core2k decks, freq decks, etc. Couple this with reading NHK easy, subs from animelon, etc. and you should have a good structure going forward.

There’s a train a thought among some people that eventually you shouldn’t be thinking in terms of J-E or E-J and instead just try to keep your brain in J mode only. if that makes any sense. Obviously a lot tougher when you’re starting out but the two languages are so different and there’s so many different nuances/sayings that doing direct translations all day may or may not be detrimental. Everyone learns different though so whatever works for you should be the way to go~

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#7

That’s fair. But believe it or not, you could get something out of starting immersion practice today! It’s not at all too early for you to start listening to NHK or watching Japanese stuff on Netflix with Japanese subtitles (or none at all; I regularly do both).

You won’t understand a thing at first (and you really have to command your brain to accept the confusion), but just listening to the sounds and the pitches goes a long way. Sooner than you think, you’ll find yourself feeling stronger in your Japanese than others who’ve been at it for the same amount of time.

Immersion practice can certainly wait until you feel more confident. I totally understand why you’d want to wait. And I promise I mean this as encouragement and not judgment! But you’re readier than you think. You’ll surprise yourself if you give it a shot!

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#8

The thing about keyboard mode is it’s only available in the higher levels of each lesson. So for instance, when you start a new lesson/skill, you won’t be able to do it until you get to, I think, level 3 in it.

But yeah, Duo isn’t good for learning new concepts. I just use it as a way to drill/practice what I’ve already learned elsewhere.

#9

Actually, if you go to the normal website instead of the mobile website/app, there are actually “tips” buttons that link to great explanations of grammar points and kanji.

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#10

I’ve tried using it for that, but I got tired of having to send in so many corrections. I’ve looked into the Russian one too but after my partner (native speaker) pointed out mistakes or awkwardness in it, I’ve dropped that too. Perhaps if I was learning Spanish or German, it wouldn’t be as much of an issue. Since those trees seem the most refined. :woman_shrugging:

–

@ OP

This isn’t an SRS app, but it might be worth looking into–HelloTalk. It’s like Twitter but for language learning. You post in the language you want to learn and get corrections from native speakers. The idea is to return the favor and correct them in your native language.

It has a bit of a reputation of people trying to date on there, though I’ve not encountered that in the times I’ve used it. I’m mentioning it just so you’re aware it might happen. They allow various privacy settings and such to help mitigate it.

You don’t need to be any specific level to start. There are lots of beginners on there typing their first sentences.

(Speaking of, I really want to use this app more, haha. It’s hard to incorporate it into my schedule. I’m not big on apps, and there’s no web version, unfortunately.)

#11

I’ve been doing exactly the same thing ass you WK+BP+ diolingo. (only have 5 bubbles max not golded so progress is slow)
But I also been using renshuu.org for additional grammar and sentence study.
It’s all multiple choise or word juggle but the exposure helps. SRS is also part of it but I’m not so religious in keeping up a streak.

#12

I really believe Duolingo gets less useful the further the target language gets from Europe. My Arab friends laugh at Arabic Duolingo. I have a Russian colleague who reacted similarly to some of the Russian stuff. She kept pointing out nuances that would make X sentence not apply to Y and suchlike.

If I could, I’d teach Japanese in the form of one huge, conversation-heavy story, like a soap opera! I’ve heard that Genki has some aspects of that but I’ve never tried it.

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#13

I absolutely believe that. I have a friend learning Korean and even at the beginner level she can tell Duo isn’t great. This is why I never recommend it unless someone wants to learn a European language.

It’s a shame really, I wish they invested more into these other languages. It’s not as if these other trees aren’t popular? I do recall seeing some of the volunteers who work on the Japanese tree mentioning that Duo doesn’t help them with anything, and what the volunteers can do is super limited. Really unfortunate. :confused:

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#14

It is my impression that it’s not so much what language family the course belongs to, but how long they have been working at it.
I started Spanish and Italian on Duolingo in 2013, and those courses have transformed MASSIVELY over the years, and always for the better. I used to contribute by doing the English to Dutch (my native language) course and reporting all the awkwardness that was in that course back then. That course too has improved massively. I do realise that this gives me a bit of an emotional bond with Duo that might make me biased.

I started studying Japanese on duolingo in februari of 2020, and then the pandemic hit and my jobs became non-existent. So I had at it with Duo and finished the Japanese tree in 337 days. And when I say finished I mean full gold. It taught me a LOT about Japanese. I could easily pass N5 by the end of it, and with the stars aligning and the wind blowing the right way I might have made it through N4.

But yeah, it probably wasn’t the most efficient use of my time. However if you are the type who is let’s say stimulated by gamification (addictive personality and procrastinator) it is a way to stay motivated.

By the way the Japanese “tree” got largely remodelled in March of ‘20, and a new version (5.0) is now being released again, so people (albeit volunteers) are working quite hard on the Duolingo Japanese course. But it will take a while (seven years?) before it reaches the level that the oldest courses on Duo are at.

Just the two cents of someone who remembers the olden days of Duo, when every course was far worse than the Japanese one is now. But someone made a GAME! To learn a LANGUAGE!

-edited for spelling-

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#15

It sounds like, to borrow a phrase from your area, “Je moet Japanners onder de knie hebben!”

I think, like Rosetta Stone, there are limitations in the format that keep it suboptimal for Japanese, like incorporating context. It sounds like there’s been a lot of work to overcome that, though, which is good. I suppose I wish there was something like Duolingo but with more of a focus on what to say when. But I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know what that would look like!

But most importantly, it sounds like you learned a lot. Anything that makes that happen is good!

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#16

For sure, I get that, and I’m glad you were able to get a lot out of it. I’m sure also many appreciate your contributions.

If the site works for people, that’s awesome. My main concerns are just the marketing around learning any language, when many trees can be littered with various mistakes that absolute beginners (the target audience) can’t recognize. (I know they have comments/forums, but that can still lead, and has lead from what I’ve seen, to a lot of confusion for beginners.)

That’s why I’m glad my partner pointed out those issues with Russian. As fun as Duo might be, I have more of a preference to learn elsewhere, even if it can be more boring, just to have more confidence that I’m learning correctly from the get-go. Save me from having to relearn from mistakes later.

Edit: Not sure if this came off as passive aggressive or anything, I didn’t intend that. To clarify: you can definitely learn from Duo, for sure, but just for me personally, I don’t like that feeling hanging over me of “is this right? is this natural?” and having to constantly nag my partner about it. I think Duo can be decent with other resources. I just don’t have the patience for it xD

I think I was in the early beta in that, and while there was a lot of new content, I still saw a lot of the same issues that were there since…what was it, 2018? when they first opened up the tree. Hopefully they’ll keep at it though. :slight_smile:

In any case, congrats on your progress.

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#17

Personally, I think that Lingodeer is a nice replacement for Duolingo in its niche. It’s paid but totally worth the price.

For me it’s like this:
Wanikani for kanji and vocab.
Lingodeer for sentences and grammar(N5/N4).
Bunpro for grammar practice.
Yomichan to read sites.
Japanese.io to read pdfs(with premium, but it works wonders for me).

I’ve tried Japanesepod101 and a bunch of other services and they were pretty useless IMHO.

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#18

I turned translations off in BunPro, and that helped me a lot with reading and understanding.
Try it: Settings → General → Review English - > Hint
You see a sentence, translate it and then compare it to the suggested translation ( hit space )

Writing is a completely different animal though.

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#19

Your requests reminded me a website that may suit your needs: http://duendecat.com/

It displays sentences containing kanji from chosen Wanikani levels. You can configure it to display Japanese or English first, so you can practice either. The only thing that does not match your requirements is the one with the BunPro content.

I haven’t used it a lot because I discovered it years ago when my level was too low, and completely forgot it since.

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#20

Thanks, everyone. Duendecat looks the closest to what I was looking for, a way to check what I think I know against “real-life” sentences. I’ll definitely start using it once I’m a little further along with Kanji. Yomichan will probably come into play later on as well, as I try to read things on my own.

This is very useful information. I was wondering how far an app like Duolingo can take you (mistakes and inconsistencies aside). I was definitely hoping it’d be much farther when I started using it, as I’ve studied most of N5 a while back. I’ve put it down since, will focus on WK and BP for now, though I do want to take a look at Renshuu to shake things up.

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