Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

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golyplot
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Re: Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

Postby golyplot » Tue Jan 31, 2023 2:50 pm

lavengro wrote:I currently have close to 800 outstanding Wanikani reviews and an oppressive sense of dread.


Have you considered resetting a level or two?
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lavengro
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Re: Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

Postby lavengro » Tue Jan 31, 2023 3:09 pm

golyplot wrote:
lavengro wrote:I currently have close to 800 outstanding Wanikani reviews and an oppressive sense of dread.


Have you considered resetting a level or two?

I have reset levels in the past, but I think I will try to push through this time. "I am certain I can clear the backlog today" is something I say as an affirmation to myself each morning. And "How did the backlog get even bigger?" is something I ask myself in a bewildered way each night before going to bed.

But this time it is different: I am chasing some 6WC prize money starting tomorrow, and accordingly I am certain I can clear the backlog on February 1st.
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golyplot
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Re: Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

Postby golyplot » Tue Jan 31, 2023 10:57 pm

800 reviews in a day is quite ambitious! Even under optimistic assumptions (that the reviews are very easy for you), that's still two solid hours of reviewing. And you're not going to be able to do that continuously, you'll need lots of breaks. (Going by my own experience here)
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lavengro
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Re: Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

Postby lavengro » Tue Feb 07, 2023 5:32 am

Week 9 comment

Japanese has broken me. I hate it. I cannot stomach returning to it. It has forced me to curl up into a sobbing ball of shame and failure from which I am unlikely ever to emerge unscathed.

ETA: Ignore the above. Japanese language, I will conquer you.
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golyplot
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Re: Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

Postby golyplot » Sat Feb 11, 2023 3:02 pm

lavengro wrote:I currently have close to 800 outstanding Wanikani reviews and an oppressive sense of dread.



I currently have 821 reviews outstanding on Wanikani. Want to see who gets to zero first? I bet you'll win!

Background: I had over 5329 reviews in July 2021. I've been slowly whittling down the review pile for nearly two years now. It also shows the value of resetting. The 5319 came after I reset from level 60 to level 46. I was at a high of 6118 before I reset. Hang in there, and if you keep plugging away, you'll get through it eventually!

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lavengro
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Re: Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

Postby lavengro » Sat Feb 11, 2023 5:57 pm

golyplot wrote: Want to see who gets to zero first? I bet you'll win!

I would definitely take up the challenge and undoubtedly would benefit from doing so while unquestionably winding up in second place (I have been watching your study efforts, so that is an easy call to make). But after a therapeutic two weeks or so almost completely hiding from Japanese, I got liquored up one night and reset Wanikani all the way back to level 1 a couple of days ago. So I am at zero reviews currently and aiming to keep it at zero as much as possible on a go forward basis.


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lavengro
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Re: Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

Postby lavengro » Mon Feb 20, 2023 5:45 am

Back into the study swing of things. Seriously regretting having reset Wanikani all the way back to level 1, but on the other hand it is nice keeping accuracy rates for meaning and readings above 99%, and I am picking up some small details and alternate readings missed on my previous run through.

Watching Midnight Diner: Tokyo Stories (Japanese audio, English subtitles), which I am enjoying. I learned that this is actually a successor series to the first three seasons of Midnight Diner, taking on the additional name when Netflix could not initially get rights to the existing Midnight Diner episodes.



Heading out next week on a comprehensive visit to Japan. Virtually, rather than actually. Less expensive this way. Planning on remotely visiting all eight regions, and hoping to briefly virtually visit each of Japan’s 47 prefectures. Planning on working north to south, so I am desperately looking for last minute airfare for a pretend flight to the island/prefecture of Hokkaido.
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kelvin921019
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Re: Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

Postby kelvin921019 » Mon Feb 20, 2023 6:57 am

Good luck to your JLPT!

I am not particularly familiar with resources written in English. I used Genki 1+2 and Sou matome series for N4 prep and they are pretty comprenhensive for that level.
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golyplot
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Re: Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

Postby golyplot » Mon Feb 20, 2023 8:11 am

lavengro wrote:Seriously regretting having reset Wanikani all the way back to level 1, but on the other hand it is nice keeping accuracy rates for meaning and readings above 99%, and I am picking up some small details and alternate readings missed on my previous run through.


Protip: You can rapidly get your level back up if you understand the SRS timings. For all levels except 1 and 2, the timings are 4 hours, 8 hours, 23 hours, 47 hours. This means that if you do reviews at the right time, you can level up in about a week (levels 1 and 2 take half as long).

Example schedule:
Sunday 7am: level up, do radical lessons
Sunday 11am: review Apprentice 1 radicals
Sunday 7pm: review Apprentice 2 radicals
Monday 6pm: review Apprentice 3 radicals
Wednesday 6pm: review Apprentice 4 radicals, do kanji lessons
Wednesday 10pm: review Apprentice 1 kanji
Thursday 7am: review Apprentice 2 kanji
Friday 7am: review Apprentice 3 kanji
Sunday 7am: review Apprentice 4 kanji, level up, repeat

Obviously, you don't have to do things this way, and you probably shouldn't if you're feeling overwhelmed. But if you're regretting resetting and are feeling like things are too easy, then the good news is that it doesn't take long to level back up again if you want to.
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lavengro
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Re: Crawling to a brutal JLPT beating in December 2023

Postby lavengro » Mon Feb 20, 2023 4:49 pm

kelvin921019 wrote:Good luck to your JLPT!

I am not particularly familiar with resources written in English. I used Genki 1+2 and Sou matome series for N4 prep and they are pretty comprenhensive for that level.

Thanks Kelvin!

I had not heard of the Sou matome series before, will keep it in mind. My current plan is to plough through the first 23 levels of Wanikani including vocabulary items (projected to cover 98% of the anticipated kanji items on N4), Pimsleur (hoping to get through the first three of five levels), Genki 1 + 2 and about half of Mango Japanese (scheduled out a path for the first 324 of 651 units, to the end of unit 3 - of a total of 5 - by the end of October. Leaving November for working through practice tests and for comprehensive review.

Assuming I can through enough additional listening exercises on top, I am hopeful that this will be sufficient for N4 rather than just N5, but I guess I will have to make that call in August.
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