After a long time I wanted to retry creating sentence cards and my problem with them already resurfaced.
I see the words in the sentence that I already know, I remember what sentence it is and I remember the keyword just by that.
I don’t have to see the keyword the card is supposed to teach me and I don’t learn the kanji that the keyword contains. I simply remember the sentence and learn/remember the word. I already learned like 2000 card, the nihongo shark deck that way and after finishing it I realized that I barely know any of these keywords, just the sentence. You could just blank the keyword out and I could tell you the word but if you would show me the word/kanji I would be lost and I think we can all agree that this is not good.
I feel like learning with sentences and context would be beneficial but only with random sentences containing the keyword.
8 comments
Bold the keywords, it will make it easier to learn
Have it so it shows the word you’re trying to learn and then the sentence under it, first you’ll see the word and if you don’t remember it then read the sentence.
You could could also consider the card “failed” if you can’t remember the word itself
Alternatively you could start reading more content withoutふりがな so that you kinda force your brain to learn the kanji
I modified my card front template to hide the sentence. I can unhide it by clicking a link. So I try to figure out the word without the sentence.
If I can get it right without peeking at the sentence, then I pass the card.
If I need to show the sentence for help, then I check how long until the next review. If it’s measured in days, then I still pass the card. If it’s measured in months, then I fail the card.
And obviously, if I can’t get it, even with the sentence, then I fail the card.
On the back of the card, I listen to the sentence (or read, if no audio is available).
I had this same problem with sentence cards, so I switched to word cards.
If you want to continue with sentence cards, one option is jpdb.io, which requires registration but is free. It’s possible to change the settings to display random sentences on the front of cards, among other things.
Hm. I also recently switched to sentence cards and I feel like it helps me develop an association with the context it’s used in and the keyword where normal word cards don’t help me do that. Well it can if you have a sentence on the back but I’m too lazy to read it. I benefit the most from sentence cards is when I genuinely forget the bolded word (that’s what I skip to immediately during review) and try to recall the meaning of the word based on the surrounding context. I do end up treating most of my sentence cards as word cards in the end anyway. But this way with context I have more retention. I’m not sure if it’s considered “cheating” because I’m recalling the keyword based on the context :shrug:
> I simply remember the sentence and learn/remember the word.
I’m gonna post the same answer I gave to someone who had the same question/doubt:
I feel like this is a common misunderstanding that people often have. Don’t worry about that, your goal should be to maximize exposure and minimize the time spent doing anki. If you can remember the word more easily with a sentence, then you should use that. If you notice you stumble upon the same word in immersion and cannot read it despite being familiar with it in anki, then nobody stops you from mining it again in that new sentence and adding it back to your reviews as a new card. Sometimes multiple contexts with the same words and different nuances help, sometimes some sentences help better unlock that “ah-ha” moment where you instantly acquire the word via exposure and having more sentences mined like that can help. It’s really up to you
Stop worrying, spend more time reading Japanese instead of micromanaging anki cards.
I would have just the word on the front and 3 example sentences on the back. The goal is to recognise the word and then recall the sentences.
This is the thing I DIDN’T like about Anki and the Core 2000 deck, and the thing I like the best about Duolingo.
For Core 2000 I had much the same problem as you, but thankfully the cards had both the keyword alone, and the sentence.
The problem was I may know the keyword, but I don’t know anything else in the sentence, rendering the sentence completely useless.
Duolingo on the other hand builds up everything gradually. It teaches you a handful of words alone, and then places them in short sentences and builds up from there.
I guess anymore I DO learn from sentences, cuz I get all my new words from media… but I look up everything I don’t know and effectively understand the full sentences.
Or if I make my own cards, then the new word is the only one I don’t know.