Learning Japanese From Zero

[crush]

止める is a bit of a pain. From this thread on Reddit:

Here's a simple explanation.

やめる = quit

If the word "quit" would make sense in English, use やめる. If the word quit would sound wrong or unnatural in English, use とめる.

* You can quit watching TV, so やめる
* You can quit smoking, so やめる
* You cannot quit your car in an intersection, so とめる
* You cannot quit your TV, so とめる

Note that the first and last examples are different. "Quit watching TV" is fine. "Quit the TV" is not fine. In the second sentence, using とめる has the meaning of "turn off".

At least that's how i understand it. When you're talking about quitting your job, though, there's yet another character with the same yameru pronunciation: 辞める. Japanese writing seems so haphazard (especially compared to Mandarin/Cantonese)...

[golyplot]

I read another article on Watanoc tonight. I hate how Japanese resources aimed at beginners often write everything in hiragana. I wish they would just use kanji with furigana instead. When I saw かきごおり, I knew it "sounded" familiar, but I probably wouldn't have made the connection to the かき氷 I learned on WK ages ago, if I hadn't already known the topic of the article. Likewise, にんき sounded familiar to me, but I couldn't remember it without looking it up. Still, the fact that I could at least tell from the sound that it was probably a word I had previously studied on WK is a promising sign of progress.

[golyplot]

Last Friday, I finished watching Beastars and decided to start/continue watching Carmen Sandiego in Japanese without subtitles. I still can hardly understand any of it, but I figured it was time to throw myself in the deep end and try to grind my listening skills. Hopefully I'll be able to understand more pretty quickly. I've currently watched the first four episodes.


Also tonight, I decided to try something different with WK. Previously, I'd been doing a level a week, leveling up every Friday morning with the half-levels Monday afternoon. The theoretical minimum time is 6 days and 20 hours per level, but that would require getting up in the middle of the night sometimes, which is why I stuck with the weekly schedule instead.

However, it occurred to me that it might be more convenient later if I shifted my schedule a day or two forward so the half-levels happen on the weekend, and that now is the best time to do it, while the lockdown is in place and I'm working from home and before the levels get much harder. So for the next 6-12 weeks, I'm going to be trying to do 6d20h levels to shift my level up schedule forward four hours every week in order to eventually get it a day or two earlier than it is now. This of course means that I'll have to sometimes get up in the middle of the night. Specifically, I'll have to wake up at 2am Tuesday, 1am Wednesday, and midnight and 4:40 Friday this week. I don't know how it will work out or if I'll actually decide to keep it up, but I figured I'd at least try it and see how it goes.

[golyplot]

When doing anki last night, I was struck by how weird the intervals seemed. Maybe I'm biased by Wanikani, but why does it go 1min -> 10min -> 1 day? It also seems to be inefficient at teaching new words. I ended up with a rotation of new words I had no clue on that kept popping up every minute as I burnt through all the easy ones I already knew. It took quite a few rotations before I even started remembering one of the new words through sheer repetition. For all the Anki experts out there, have you noticed this? How is it supposed to go?

I read my third article on Watanoc. I'm still frustrated by how often I fail to understand the meaning of a sentence despite knowing all the words in it. I've done a lot of grammar study, but it barely seems to help.

I also listened to an episode of Nihongo con Teppei. It seems useful for listening practice, but I hated how he ends nearly every sentence with "ne". I wish his voice and speaking style weren't so annoying.

I also did the usual Wanikani and Bunpro and watched ep5 of Carmen Sandiego, but that goes without saying.

[jeff_lindqvist]

When doing anki last night, I was struck by how weird the intervals seemed. Maybe I'm biased by Wanikani, but why does it go 1min -> 10min -> 1 day? It also seems to be inefficient at teaching new words. I ended up with a rotation of new words I had no clue on that kept popping up every minute as I burnt through all the easy ones I already knew. It took quite a few rotations before I even started remembering one of the new words through sheer repetition. For all the Anki experts out there, have you noticed this? How is it supposed to go?

I counter:
How many cards do you have in the deck?
How many new cards are shown per day?
Do you want unseen cards to appear sooner than 10 min, or later than 10 min?
Is the interval 10 min for previously unseen cards that you grade "Hard" (or "1")?

The way you feel about Anki may depend on many factors.

Some people front-load the deck with thousands of cards and don't realize that anything "new" is probably going to be hard to learn, and will appear again and again.

Some people don't realize that what they graded as easy a number of times will eventually be pushed years into the future, and unless they've maintained the language with other methods/resources, these words may feel like "new" when they appear again.

These are things to consider before you change the settings. (I've been using Anki since the spring 2008, and have never changed the intervals.)

See also:

Huge anki decks
Goldlist vs Anki

[golyplot]

How many cards do you have in the deck?
How many new cards are shown per day?
Do you want unseen cards to appear sooner than 10 min, or later than 10 min?
Is the interval 10 min for previously unseen cards that you grade "Hard" (or "1")?

The deck comes with 2007 cards. As for how many new cards are shown, new cards are shown after all pending reviews are done, so it depends on how much time I spend on Anki that day and how long it takes to get through the review backlog if any.

[crush]

You should also look up the Pass/Fail addon.

Though i don't believe that will work on Anki web, only with the desktop program.

As jeff_lindqvist said, what you get out of Anki depends on how you use it. A lot of people start fast and burn out fast as the reviews quickly begin piling up. I'd start with 5-10 sentences a day for at least a month as by then you'll have an approximate idea of how many reviews you can expect with a fuller load (new cards, young cards, and mature cards).

Another thing to consider is whether you want to spend so much time on cards that are hard to remember. There are differing opinions on "leeches" (cards that you continually get incorrect), some people want to learn everything 100% right from the start whereas others choose to pick the low-lying fruit and leave the stuff that you just can't remember for later. In my current Japanese decks i give myself two opportunities to get a card right (once i've pressed the 1d/good button), if i miss a card a third time i suspend it.

As for the intervals, it's possible that the cards are just too difficult for you. For my cards, i try to stick to one new thing per card (grammar or vocab) and generally the 1 minute -> 10 minute -> next day interval works. Some cards i'll mark as 1 minute again and go through that 1-10-next day interval again. Some cards stick, some cards i forget the next day, the stuff that won't stick i just let go and trust i'll come across it again later when it'll hopefully be easier for me to remember.

[golyplot]

Another thing to consider is whether you want to spend so much time on cards that are hard to remember. There are differing opinions on "leeches" (cards that you continually get incorrect), some people want to learn everything 100% right from the start whereas others choose to pick the low-lying fruit and leave the stuff that you just can't remember for later. In my current Japanese decks i give myself two opportunities to get a card right (once i've pressed the 1d/good button), if i miss a card a third time i suspend it.

I'm not talking about leeches, I'm talking about learning new cards for the first time.

[golyplot]

Just only press Good.

I half follow that already (partly due to having read the Low-key Anki page). I only press "easy" if it's a word I've already studied before or I can recognize it pretty much instantly. I have yet to use the "hard" button at all.

[crush]

Look up as in read about what it is. Dont have to install it to do it. Just only press Good.

Ah yeah, that works on any platform

Just only press Good.

I half follow that already (partly due to having read the Low-key Anki page). I only press "easy" if it's a word I've already studied before or I can recognize it pretty much instantly. I have yet to use the "hard" button at all.

I think that's the way to go.

I'm not talking about leeches, I'm talking about learning new cards for the first time.

It's normal to have it take some time for new cards to sink in, but assuming there's only one or two new items per card and you can understand the sentence, i rarely have trouble remembering a card that day at least. Sometimes i'll miss a card the next two/three times i see it in which case it becomes a leech and i ignore it so i can spend more time learning new words which are easier to remember. But if you're remembering all the new cards successfully (and not missing them on successive days) then it seems that the Anki schedule is mostly working for you, no?

Just to clarify, that 1-10->1 day schedule isn't a three step process for all words, some cards will go 1-1-10-1-10->1 day while others may just be 10->1 day. Japanese cards can be tougher as there's more information to remember (not just the meaning but the reading as well). You can change those intervals, but i just use the defaults + pass/fail and it works well for me.