I am preparing for EJU, currently learning the basics( hiragana & katakana). I want to achieve at least JLPT N2 in 1.5 years. So I want to know how should I prepare. Should I join a Japanese language school? for me, there is no Japanese language school in my area, So I was looking for a Japanese language school online, do you guys know any online Japanese language school? also, for those who passed N2 or N1, I would like to know how did you guys studied.
8 comments
Ajatt and anki probably. Lots and lots of immersion while watching like 2 or 3 cure dolly grammar videos a day without taking notes or anything in the beginning.
N2 is possible way faster, so don’t sweat it. Just learn everyday.
Plenty of guides exist, but your motivation is important. No matter what – find a way to stay focused. Progress is measured best in hours put in, but N2 and N1 are fairly difficult goals for 1.5 years. Self-study for the determined is going to always beat a language school – but you need to put the hours in like you were in school.
My path was RTK -> Core 2k -> Read manga/VNs for a while -> then switched to SRS grind again because I retain it better.
Key note: SRS grinding is efficient, but not enjoyable for most people. Most of the time you will SRS grind for a set period of time and it will be part of your study. For me it is the vast majority of my study time… not advisable or maintainable unless you are dead set on achieving something quickly at insane risk of burnout.
Immersion was not enjoyable for me until I hit a very high comprehension rate – it was just a different form of study. I nearly dropped Japanese at one point over it. This is after reading over 50 manga but making minimal progress it seemed in retaining the language. I had about 4k vocab known by my estimate and who knows how many ones I forgot from my few months of just ‘immersing’. The rate at which I felt I was learning was glacial. After following a particular Youtube video I decided to SRS grind vocab lists and I’ve been happy because I am beyond that terrible intermediate phase. Put so much time in for seemingly so little progress… it is a real killer.
Now with over 10k vocab immersion my comprehension is over 90% and context and the RTK make it easy to read most things. I still need to look up lots of new words, but I know a majority of them from context.
If you do the core 6k Anki deck, at 20-30 cards a day, you’ll know all the N2 kanji and half of N1 in about half a year. You’ll also know 6000 vocab words.
Combine that with lots of reading of native material and of course lots of listening. Then two months before the exam, do some practice tests of past papers while continuing your reading and listening routine.
There are a fuck ton of guides online. I recommend reading an immersion based guide such as https://learnjapanese.moe/. Read the articles on there (it shouldn’t take that long) and immerse yourself in the language. I’d advise following their 30 day guide for beginners to develop a foundation, and from there, either follow their suggestions such as reading VNs or just keep immersing with whatever you like want. Install the necessary stuff like anki for vocab and read a grammar guide such as Tae Kim. For Kanji, either use rtk or just learn to read words rather than learning individual kanji. Ideally, you should try doing immersion with either native content, comprehensible input, or material meant for learners from day 1, even if you understand nothing. Just keep grinding until you do.
An ideal timeline (if you follow their 30 day routine) should look like this
Immersion from day 1/Anki with core 2k/Read through tae Kim → Sentence Mining/immersion (After the 30 day guide, I recommend reading visual novels)/anki (for vocab and sentence mining). Continue this until you have a high comprehension, then study for the jlpt n2 exam using the shinkanzen series, sou matome series, and lots of immersion.
Motivation is key here…and by that I mean you have to basically study as if this was anther job (8 hours+)….or at least thats what worked for me. I used to do kanji for about 4 hours daily (only 5 new kanji a day, the rest was review through srs), anki for about 1.5 hours (250-500 cards reviewed), grammar for 30 mins, (although I started really learning grammar after I became more comfortable in the language, about a year into it…I tried it as a complete beginner and it was not clicking with me….when I started learning grammar again, i was already on my 3rd light novel…meaning I had read a ton before starting to study grammar), reading for 2 hours
Ive been studying for 2.5 years and comfortable N2, at least in reading. In 1.5 years, personally did Heisig’s RTK practicing stroke order + Core 2k on anki + Genki for the first couple months. After finishing Genki i took a small break finishing my anki decks since that cards were building up and practicing easy reading. Then I used Tobira, and practicing reading before was helpful, the book can be a but if a jump. After that I just grinded through Native material I wanted to read, without especially working on anki or anything else. Overall this was great for me, since finishing Tobira I read 25 books last year. In general, there are a lot of methods, and I encourage you to try a couple out and see what sticks. In the end the method sticking is really whats most important. It doesn’t matter how good a study program you make if you don’t want to do it.
I reached around N2 in 1,5 years. My path was Genki -> AIATIJ -> ~40% of Tobira -> Quartet -> New Authentic Japanese -> Kagaku no Toi.
I didn’t jump straight to Quartet because I didn’t know it existed hehe. Whatever path you follow, it’s important to study at least one hour everyday and always tackle more challenging content. I also didn’t consume much japanese content outside of these textbooks, but I think after Quartet you could already do so. Don’t overdo Anki, it may burn you out, but don’t neglect it either, it’s important. Good luck!