Hello LearnJapanese!
I’ve been studying Japanese for a while now. I started with about 1-2 hours a day, but eventually got to about 5 hours a day late last year. I have recently increased that to 8 hours (it’s actually not quite, it’s 50 hours a week. I don’t have enough time two days of the week to go up to 8. So it’s more like 2×5 hour days and 5×8 hour days)
It’s all a work in progress on what to focus on, but it would be great to know from those more experienced or knowledgeable in language learning as to what I could perhaps do in those 8 hours.
For a reference, I have completed Heisig’s RTK, Tae Kim’s, Tango N5, Tango N4, 75% of Tango N3, Japanese for busy people 1+2, Genki 1 and Japanese from Zero.
I have read some manga (I have read Yotsubato volumes 1-13 5 times. I feel like I got more out of it each time).
Currently my schedule looks like:
Anki ~1 hour
Reading ~ 2- 3 hours
Listening ~ 3.5 – 4.5 hours
Grammar ~ 30 minutes
I would say I can’t change the reading time that much. I can’t listen at work, only read. And as for listening, an hour of that is done to and from work!
Before I had basically read Tae Kim’s and done the basic grammar stuff, then didn’t bother anymore. Recently I have focused more on grammar. I went from about 10 minutes per week to 30 minutes a day.
For reading I have recently been doing some graded reading. At work I can’t really listen to Japanese, and I always tended to prioritise that over reading.
For listening, I have some stuff on an MP3 player on repeat. Podcasts and some shows. I also watch YouTube stuff in Japanese.
I still find a lot of stuff very difficult to comprehend. When long sentences come along, I feel pretty lost. Even short ones I often misunderstand (hence my increase in grammatical studies!) When listening, I can still only really pick out a few key words.
Obviously one can’t expect immediate improvements, but does this look fine, am I missing something, or should I be focusing on something else?
Thank you.
19 comments
I’d say try just using the language as normal but when you come across a word that you don’t know, put it in anki.
> For a reference, I have completed Heisig’s RTK, Tae Kim’s, Tango N5, Tango N4, 75% of Tango N3, Japanese for busy people 1+2, Genki 1 and Japanese from Zero.
Why did you do more than one intro textbook? Do tobira or quartet and beef up your vocabulary
> When long sentences come along, I feel pretty lost.
Post your long sentences to the daily thread and ask for strategies to tackle them. It’s hard I know long sentences are hard.
I think you went a little too hardcore on the basics. As for your current schedule I think you are dividing your time well.
If you want to understand complex sentences, my suggestion would be to get away from graded reading and also from reading the same content over and over again…
If you step out of graded reading and read just regular stuff meant for natives it will definitely be hard at first, but if you keep at it you will improve faster and along with studying grammar be able to understand complex sentences in no time.
I do suggest you (and this is a topic with divided opinions) add grammar points with example sentences to anki…and study 5 of those cards daily…to sort of review grammar points..and keep that all the way up until about 2 months after you finish going through n1 grammar
As for reading the same content over and over again because it is the same content the returns you get each time decrease as opposed to just reading new manga or light novel chapters daily…also be sure to diversify your reading every now and then to be able to get exposed to new vocab. Don’t just read new chapters of manga you are already used to, pick out new series altogether…authors have different ways of expressing things…
Every new word that is not clear from context add to anki and review in that hour you have allocated to anki…but I do suggest in that hour of anki you do daily to space it out…don’t do it all in one sitting…it helps retention rate…and maybe do 10 card in a single review…it is ok to have a backlog…you will get to it when you can…final note about anki..try not to do prebuilt decks unless necessary, this is because when you find a word in context, even if you did not add the sentence itself to anki, you tend to still remember it better than if you were given a random word from some random prebuilt deck.
Hope this helps. And good luck 😀
Lol I struggle to put in 15 minutes a day and then we got OP. How do you get to this level of discipline??
I think you’re doing pretty well. You should definitely try to read more difficult / new native materials though. If you dread reading because looking up words take too much time, I recommend reading digitally. Tools like Yomichan or the Kindle’s popup dictionary let you look up unknown words effortlessly so you can focus more on the context and grammar. And yes, believe me, you’ll eventually learn the words you look up a lot. And don’t be afraid of not being able to understand longer sentences; if it’s too hard for you, just put it into a machine translation tool like DeepL or ChatGPT and see what you get. The translated sentence might not always be accurate, but it’ll, at the very least, help you parse the sentence and recognize grammar points, which is a major pain point for newer learners.
Also, have you heard of [visual novels](https://youtu.be/stSRTDWO6fI?t=570)? They’re a great way to learn Japanese because there’s a lot of text, and the characters speak clearly and you can replay audio easily, making it a great way to practice both reading and listening skills at the same time. Having said that, many visual novels are heavily influenced by otaku culture and usually contain themes that are stereotypically associated with this, such as romance, fan service, and fantastical elements. Just a heads up.
I don’t have any help to offer but a question for you myself:
How long did it take you from going 1-2 hours daily to 5 hours to 8 hours daily?
How did you originally learn your first 1000+ words?
I think in the beginning it’s def possible spending 8 hours just crunching Vocab, Kanji and grammer but it is somewhat boring so I think if you start reading and listening and understanding it is way easier to spend longer learning, right?
I’ve been learning Japanese for around 5 months actively and after that I went to Japan for 3 months (where I am right now) and just learn from daily conversations with native people (which helped me a lot) and not a lot of vocab/Kanji but a little bit of grammar so I’m better able to form sentences on my own.
I am definitely hyped to continue actively learning after returning from Japan but I really don’t know if I am able to concentrate for 5+ hours.
I wish I had 8 hours spare a day lol
It’s cool that you have so much time to study, but you’ll burn out.
I am jealous of your discipline but I think 8 hours per day is an overkill. I have no problem with studying (when I have to) and I studied for about as much when I had state exams and I felt everything is leaking through my ears after few days.
keep studying grammar and some anki.
But mostly, just read more.
You don’t have any output. Maybe find someone to talk to ?
consume pornographic media in japanese.
nukige = reading
doujin/eromanga = reading
listening = hentai or ecchi anime, and if it’s your type of thing then theres lots of asmr pornographic stuff on dlsite.
you combine something you have no control over (your libido) with education. it’s like as if you were shooting heroin each time you started learning.
if you’re a eunuch/no libido/dont masturbate then you can safely disregard since this way of getting yourself to consume media is contingent on horniness.
You have already gone over all the grammar lessons you need to understand every day Japanese. Just do your anki and immerse. Wanna make it a bit more fun? Get yourself on HelloTalk and start chatting with natives.
How could you even accomplish this much studying without being a literal NEET?
Really at this point just focus on what you want to use the language for. You’ve covered all the basics and even went back to ensure you covered any gaps which is commendable.
You’re at the point where you’ve surpassed what 95% of the users in the sub have accomplished, I’d leave this place for somewhere like HelloTalk where you can chat with natives and ask questions there.
As far as recommendations on how to spend your time… this is what I recommend and what I do (but again, focus on whatever at this point):
Start reading a proper novel, and really grapple with it (maybe a page a day). Spend half of your listening time immersing with YouTubers to expose yourself to natural-spoken Japanese and the other half listening to the chapter you’re currently reading (on repeat using the audiobook).
That is a broad review of beginner grammar. Which resource did you like best?
Do you sense a deep understanding of beginner grammar? If so, I would move on to ONE intermediate series. If not, pick one resource and really commit to crushing the grammar basics.
Anki.
Mmh, from what I see, in your daily schedule there is 0 minute spent on practicing. I think you should introduce writing to some penpals, maybe just one hour a day, or communicating in japanese somehow (in a videogame, or talk Japanese to ChatGPT). I think this is a key part of learning real world conversations.
I personally do not like Anki. I use Takoboto (android) dictionary for almost everything. It has pre-populated N1 – N5 study vocabulary and Kanji lists, you can copy and paste mind words with ease and make your own study list/flash cards.
Ankis method of flash card recency doesn’t work for me, neither does randomization. I find that being able to scroll back and fourth through flash cards at will has helped kanji and vocab stick with me more.
Another oddity is and potential downfall about flash cards is studying words and kanji out of context. I’ve had many moments where I comfortably learned and knew complex words but when I saw those said words lined up in a long sentence, they wouldn’t register in brain quickly. Where as, if I read a news article in furigana and then remove the furigana and practice reading it out loud, the newly obtained kanji and vocab stick and I’m able to recognize them better later.
Lately I’ve been playing Final Fantasy V pixel remaster on Nintendo Switch. It has a good amount of N1 – N4 kanji so I use Google lense to screen shot sentences and then I copy and paste them into a note pad and recite them later. This has worked wonders for me in terms of acquiring new kanji, vocabulary, and even getting used to grammar points and examples I don’t commonly see.
Here is an example….
ここは海賊のアジト･･･ ってことは、さっきの船は海賊船か?
(This place is a Pirate Hideout? That Ship from before is a pirate ship?).
In the above example sentence, I was able to acquire the kanji for boat and pirate quickly, learn a few new vocabulary and learn how to use “ship” in 2 different readings ふね and せん。
This makes reading a lot less of a drag for me. Hope you could find some use out of this and best of luck on your study journeys! Whatever you do, never give up. Keep going. It gets better, you get better. 最後まで頑張れ！