Just kind of curious what everyone has the most trouble with. Or, more specifically, what are some grammar points you mix up fairly regularly.
My brain would not remember につれて and ついでに correctly for the longest time. It’s only pretty recently that I’m not making mistakes on them anymore.
Currently I’m continually mixing up にともなう and ともなると. I think they’ve ghosted and unghosted several times.
What grammar points are you currently fighting?
I’m a lower level, but for some reason ～すぎ is giving me a lot of issues, and never just for the sugi or even the I>sa part, but because of the endings and how it interacts with the word.
I cannot tell you the number of times I mix up として・にして it’s ridiculous.
Twins omg, I remember cramming those two right before the N3 test almost in tears because I could just not get them to stick.
I have a hard time with わりに、かえって、ぎゃくに、 and sometimes したがって and もっとも when it’s translated to “therefore”
I’m sure there’s many, but these are the most current ones.
OH! and the description of (long form+ば＋ていく) for the なければならない devils. I can do them just fine enough in daily life, but writing out all the variations makes me go crazy
I felt that. Those aren’t even that difficult conceptually but whenever they come up in reviews they mess with me
For me for some reason, I always screw up whether it is つ or づ in the grammar point に気が付.
Also being somewhat fresh in N3 I still confuse points like それで, それに, and それでも.
Nothing specific, but I’m at N2 currently and everything seems like another way to say the same thing. Up to yesterday I had the lowest level of hints enabled and there was no way of guessing the correct grammar point most of the time. So I just switched to the highest level again and see how it goes.
As for something more specific, として and にして still give me trouble. There is an excellent explanation of them by Asher here として vs にしては in this review - #4 by Asher (I bookmarked it). It helps, but I still haven’t practiced them long enough for it to stick.
The real life uses that hammered として into my skull:
友達として…
外国人としては…
Annoying grammar points for me are ones I forget exist because I don’t see them enough. Then when I get the answer wrong (normally after cycling through a few similar bits of grammar) I realise that of course I knew the answer but I just hadn’t seen or thought about it for a month or something. Mostly true for more formal written grammar as I barely touch the news etc in Japanese. Best to take it as a sign that using Bunpro is worth it.
I’d tell you exactly which points these are but by definition I can’t remember them 笑
My problem is that I always confuse points with similar meanings when I’m doing reviews and pick the wrong one.
For a while it was all the honorific ones, because they’re so similar, like お〜ます形する・お〜ます形致します・お〜ます形なさる・お〜ます形になる. Then it was the appearance ones: と見える・に見える・と見られる・みたい (and then add any of t そう or よう).
These days it’s にしてもと・いうのは・からいうと・ことなの・ということ or として・に対して・における・に関して・に基づいて and それで・それに・それでも・ところで・ところが. So basically everything I’m working on right now.
What helped A LOT was making a document to help me differentiate the prompts that come up in reviews. Deciding not to push myself to take the JLPT by a certain date helped a lot too. Since I’m going to be learning languages for the rest of my life because I enjoy it why should it matter how long any of it takes.
(Also sometimes I can’t tell which tense they’re looking for, or if the negative form should be used. For those I have to use the hint—I don’t think there’s any other way to know. Like for 〜てかまわない the speaker can be saying it’s ok if you do wear and they can also be saying it’s okay if you do not wear—着てもかまわない or 着なくてもかまわない.)
I’m working through N1 right now and it kind of feels like there’s even more of that. On top of the similar N2 points now there’s similar N1 points. The hints though for these, at least, are a bit more direct. There’s a lot of “this is old-fashioned” and “this is often in literature” kinds of grammar.
