The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best is now.
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My main bits of advice for myself after learning for 8 years are:
- Find ways to measure/benchmark progress. Daily studies can feel like a slog especially as it can feel Iike you’re getting stuck on the same 3 kanji over and over. Stats, metrics, and even reading/listening to something you found hard before can be very rewarding.
- Learn kanji in the context of words.
- Learn words in the context of sentences.
- Bunpro is amazing because it gives words in the context of sentences, and I’m too lazy to sentence mine.
- Anki is easier than it looks (the Android app is good.)
- Every mistake you make in a flashcard is a mistake not made in real life. Be strict and diligent.
- Language learning is like spray painting. Each flashcard is a small speck of paint. It’s fine to have gaps or not understand a word or idea perfectly because you can come back to it later.
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Did self-study via Minato (free online learning course) that would sometimes put me to sleep. Should’ve started with WaniKani and BunPro SRS instead. Eventually found my way to those 2. (Have had to slow down WK a lot to catch up on grammar.) Wish I had started on Comprehensible Input Japanese at the same time as those 2 or soon after to improve my listening and recall of vocabulary. Also trying to watch more Japanese movies/tv shows that I enjoy watching but the main issue is time.
Completed Genki 2 and passed N4 last year. Working through Quartet 1 right now with my online sensei and still feel like I haven’t mastered all those conjugations in Genki 2. Also somehow feeling discouraged with BunPro reviews lately. @jhoeksma “now I’m going to read and listen and enjoy myself for at least a year before I even think about N3.” is resonating with me. Will be checking out the Folktales book from my library soon. Thanks!
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I would have told myself to not use Duolingo and focused on the fundamentals.
I totally skipped out on learning the characters and the basics and I truly regret that now that I’ve had to backpedal to better understand the language.
I thought it’d be like learning Spanish and reality hit me like a brick wall.
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You should make a sentence out of every new vocab you’ve just learned. Not just when you encounter it while reading or listening ; Immediately after you’ve just learned it. Same thing applies to grammar points. When you learn a new grammar point, don’t just read the example sentences, make a sentence out of it from scratch, and find out what you can do and not do with it. They get drilled into your brain so fast this way.
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I would have told myself to take a more holistic approach to learning. I think I focused too hard on individual parts of Japanese in order rather than learning Japanese. I spent a while pretty much just doing vocab flash cards, then switched my focus to kanji for a long time, and finally to grammar. But I didn’t really do all three at the same time. Once I started studying all of them together, I noticed much faster improvement.
Oh, and to check how much time I actually spend immersing. I thought I was doing at least 45 minutes of reading a day, but when I timed how long it act took me to read a page it was closer to 2 minutes a day.
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This would probably be for Language Learning as a whole and highly encouraged but If you’re learning a language, try learning another on top of that if you can (don’t overwhelm yourself). I just started learning Korean and what I’m doing is using, reading, etc. Japanese to connect and help me learn Korean. Then I do English to Korean (thank you Sejong the Great for just having to know Hangul for writing. )
This has helped me solidify my Japanese on top of learning Korean plus you can nuances and similarities across languages. I’m taking it slow but I’m really starting to notice how I’m pick up things faster (besides Hangul vs Kanjis plus Hira and Kata, learning from my mistakes from Japanese, Korean being very similar in terms of words from Japanese, Grammar, Polite Language, etc. ) . Good for the brain and starting to notice how much I’m remembering and recalling from Japanese while learning Korean but still, don’t overwhelm yourself, get good rest, and follow the advice and critiques from others.
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