So for the past year or two I’ve focused hard on trying to learn Kanji and Vocab since I used to struggle with those in college. My methods being Anki and Wanikani (double duty for vocab) and while I’ve made significant progress I always seem to run into the issue of comprehension.
I’ll be able to read a sentence or two without issues but then come across one where I recognize nothing. No big deal, I’ll add any words that I don’t know to my deck and if I don’t know the kanji I’ll just wait until I learn it. Other times I can read a sentence, understand every word and grammar point but have no idea what it means.
I’ll then go to places like BunPro to brush up on grammar however notice myself memorizing the sentences and not the actual grammar. I can’t seem to apply them anywhere outside of simple contexts and did the same with math in school where I could use a formula in one example but be unable to in other instances.
So then I think, “am I studying the wrong way?” since it feels like I’m progressing in terms of metrics based off the studying tools I use but in the real world like I’m stuck in place. Technically I **am** progressing since Anki says I know around 3500 words and Wanikani around 2500 words (so I **should** know around 5000 given overlap of vocab) but I still struggle.
I know sometimes my mood determines my ability as well too. Since sometimes I can read something on Satori reader and get almost all of it, read the same thing the next day and struggle. So my abilities are a bit up and down.
My hope is that if I cram enough information in “someday” I might understand more since it’ll be a numbers game. Has anyone else gone through this phrase, since this feels like the “intermediate plateau” but extended. Since I don’t know if I’m studying in a way that hinders me and I could do something else to improve my comprehension.
3 comments
> feels like I’m progressing in terms of metrics
> like I’m stuck in place
This is very standard way to describe a “plateau” in studying. You are moving forward but from your perspective you aren’t. If you are looking far away when you drive, it’s like the background isn’t moving. But it is moving.
> Other times I can read a sentence, understand every word and grammar point but have no idea what it means.
I have this problem sometimes too!!! If you understand every word and grammar point, perhaps context tells you what it means? Also, you can post the sentence (and some context) online and someone will help you.
It can also be that you think you understand it, but there is an idiom at play. Or some cultural knowledge that you lack.
> so I should know around 5000 given overlap of vocab) but I still struggle.
Anki says I know over 7000 words and I struggle too. They say it starts to get better at over 15k, so you must just soldier on.
> I know sometimes my mood determines my ability as well too
Well we’re only human. If you were a robot, what use do you have to learn JP? To become a 留守番電話 perhaps.
But don’t let your mood get in the way too much, you gotta sit down and study, rain or shine. It’s something I struggle with as well, but studying hard can also help normalize your mood.
You seem introspective and productive, I can only think, you will go far if you keep it up.
I have a theory that this significantly depends on where are you from. This community is huge and we have people from around the whole world and the thing is that people in different countries talk slightly differently. For example, in USA people are less likely to use context dependency, while it’s absolutely the opposite in Japan and people are more likely to use context as much as possible. People from Italy and France are at the middle, even UK despite using English has significantly different approach with more context hinting. And it’s not only about context, there are many other different things, so overall people will need different amount of time to adapt to a completely new approach. In my case it was very simple, after learning for around 500 hours and 100 hours of content practice I could pick any book I want. Manga was simpler due to more laconic phrasing and visual aid, but even a novel with pure text was possible for me. I just needed a convenient way to translate unknown words like a tablet with tap-translation instead of actual physical book and physical dictionary.
It can be even things like relative clause. In some languages relative clause follows describing word, while in others it’s the opposite or both are acceptable. If you use one approach whole your life, then the reverse will throw you out and you will need to spend more time until you get comfortable with it and won’t need to spend any additional efforts on interpretation. This is very important, especially in more complex sentences. We can’t hold much in our short-time memory, it’s something like 5-9 blocks. If you need to spend 3-5 on a single relative clause, you can forget the beginning of the sentence even before you get to the middle. But with time you will get used to interpret the whole relative clause and following words as a single unit and you will be able to hold in your memory much longer sentences. I think this is why people can have problems despite knowing both vocabulary and grammar, and why some people adapt to it much faster than others, simply because the place where they live and language they use is much more similar to how Japanese works.
If you want a stronger grammar understanding framework, then I suggest cure dolly’s videos on yt. Other then that, this language is a tough nut to crack, so keep grinding and try different ways of learning. Most importantly, keep finding ways to have fun with it.