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Anybody here use memrise? - Printable Version

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Anybody here use memrise? - SevenSyndicate - 2014-12-24

I have been using memrise for some time now and I love it! It is awesome for learning new vocab. But I literally don't have a single friend in real life that is learning a language, so I don't have anybody to compete with on memrise. So I am making this post to see if anyone wanted to add me on there. If you do just go to my profile here. See you on the leaderboards!

Anybody here use memrise? - john555 - 2014-12-24

SevenSyndicate Wrote:I have been using memrise for some time now and I love it! It is awesome for learning new vocab. But I literally don't have a single friend in real life that is learning a language, so I don't have anybody to compete with on memrise. So I am making this post to see if anyone wanted to add me on there. If you do just go to my profile here. See you on the leaderboards!
What's memrise?

Anybody here use memrise? - MelonBerry - 2014-12-24

A simple google search will give you this
Quote:Memrise is an online learning tool with courses created by its community. Its courses are mainly used to teach languages, but are also used for other academic and nonacademic subjects.
I used to use it but I stopped. Anki is more convenient.

@Seven ; Also, why not learn for the sake of learning? Why does it have to be a competition? I'm genuinely curious. Is it supposed to be some form of motivation? What do you do when you don't actually ever win, ect?

Anybody here use memrise? - SevenSyndicate - 2014-12-24

Actually melon I am not that competitive myself. But I do find it does give you some motivation to see that your friends are higher up in the leader boards than you. Just like how seeing your friends be at a higher level in a video game makes you want to play more. And yes you may not win anything but just the act of keeping up with your friends can give you motivation.

Of course being too competitive can discourage you. So you need to find a good balance. As for myself I like to keep up with what others are doing, and try to compete. But I don't let myself get discouraged by any means if someone is learning much faster than I am. Everyone learns at their own pace. So in short a small bit of competition can be great for motivation as long as you don't take it to far.

But I certainly don't use memrise for the competitive aspect of it alone, I like it for it's convenience and the community. It's also a huge time saver, I don't have to spend time making decks like I do in Anki.

Also I do, and will always learn for the sake of learning. Whether there is competition or not. I made a commitment to myself to study Japanese to a fluent level, and that will not change. I enjoy learning Japanese more than any other hobby in my life right now and I have been doing it for a year. So just because I am using a "competitive" site, doesn't mean that is my main means of motivation.

Also just like you melon I tried memrise a long time ago and quit using it, I though it was stupid. But about two months or so ago I gave it another shot and fell in love with it. But one of the key things is to really look into the courses on there and make sure you are only taking quality ones. But I am not trying to proselytize memrise, if you don't enjoy then by all means don't use it. Using something you don't like can be detrimental to your studies. But I do like to go back every so often and try methods that I gave up on to see if I still hate them, and occasionally I change my mind, like I did with memrise.

Also I will mention one more thing in this dastardly long reply. I actually use both Anki and Memrise. I use Anki for sentences, Kanji, grammar points, and other assorted things. And I use memrise for vocabulary only. I came to this system simply by experimentation.

Anyway thanks for the reply Melon and 頑張って！

Anybody here use memrise? - Aspiring - 2014-12-24

A little bit of structure and goal-setting never hurt. As mentioned, Memrise is already set up for you, so in that sense it's pretty convenient. The site is methodical and organized, and the language section is set up pretty well. The competitive aspect makes the site seem game-like, and thus systematic or hierarchical, maybe. Granted, this feature may interfere with actual learning. I imagine the interface would keep users curious and excited to learn and doesn't require much fiddling. Anki requires a little more setting up to get it the way you want it, but I think it's worth the time and effort. Both learning programs have their merits, and whichever is aesthetically pleasing to you works best. I love anki because of ja-dark and koohii, in the sense that through this community I've been able to customize anki to fit my own needs. I can adapt my routine with any resources shared by the community (particularly through overture's morphman and cb4960's jglossator and subs2srs), along with information/advice passed on by koohii members.

Anybody here use memrise? - rikishi - 2014-12-24

I started using it a few months ago, mainly during down time (ahem) at work. Stopped after a while, but that was mainly due to flagging interest in improving my 日本語 and not because of the site. Recently started back up again, as I have started again using Anki, and I like the simplicity of it, whereas Anki is way to fiddly and frustrating for me. OTOH, Anki allows me to learn via sentences rather than the pure vocab approach of memrise.

My main problem, not exclusive to memrise, is the lack of high intermediate/low advanced resources, but there are a few I have found, and I like that not only do I have to recognize words (receptive skills), but I also have to input the words as well during a learning session. As for the competitive aspect, I hardly pay attention to it, so it's not a prime motivator for me.

Anybody here use memrise? - chillimuffin - 2014-12-25

Quote:Anki allows me to learn via sentences rather than the pure vocab approach of memrise.
This.

Anybody here use memrise? - SevenSyndicate - 2014-12-25

So I don't mind that this thread started a debate about memrise, and I had a feeling it might. But literally the only thing I asked was to see if anyone used it, and if so if they wanted to add me. These responses have really missed the whole point. As I said I don't mind that it turned out this way. It's just funny that I mention memrise and everyone suddenly has to take a side. Also chilli I said in my above post I use anki for sentences and memrise for vocab. It's not like you have to use one srs system, in fact I currently use three, and have been managing it well for a while. I use anki for sentences and other stuff, memrise for vocab, and wanikani for extra vocab and kanji readings.

Also chilli I just checked out your website, very good stuff man, keep it up!

Anybody here use memrise? - overture2112 - 2014-12-26

Aspiring Wrote:...The competitive aspect makes the site seem game-like...I've been able to customize anki to fit my own needs...subs2srs...
I recently checked out memrise myself and have similar feelings. The gamification is neat, it seems really easy to jump into using pre-made material (though not easy / impossible to customize or batch modify it?), and mixing up the quizzing methods seems pretty handy. However, cb4960's subs2srs is too amazing and I have a hard time believing anything else could be even remotely as effective as comprehensible *and* interesting sentences for learning vocab.

I'm slowly being won over by social reinforcement and gamification mechanisms and would love to see more of these. The HabitRPG Anki plugin is pretty cool (especially with friends) and I'd be interested to see a similar plugin to integrate with Memrise to some extent (eg. export known morphemes list and all the leaderboard score stuff).

Anybody here use memrise? - chillimuffin - 2014-12-26

Sorry for that SevenSyndicate. I do agree with you that you shouldn't limit yourself to one system if it doesn't meet all your needs. I use both Anki and Memrise myself (Anki for sentences, Memrise for extra vocab). Feel free to add me on Memrise by the way, my username there is mojedrugieja.

I'm curious, how is Wanikani better than Anki and Memrise (in what ways is it more useful / what more can it do than the two)?

I'm glad you like my tumblr Smile

Anybody here use memrise? - SevenSyndicate - 2014-12-26

No need to apologize muffin person ; )! As for WaniKani it is mainly focused on learning kanji, particularly reading kanji. The way it works is that there are 50 levels, and each level has 3 sets of sub-levels so to speak. So you start out on level 1. You learn the level 1 radicals, then they show up in srs reps until they have reached the guru level which then moves you to the level 1 kanji. Then you learn the level 1 kanji with on yomi pronunciations until they are guru'd. And finally you learn the level 1 vocab which consists of different words that use the kanji you previously learned. After all that you move on to the next level and repeat the process. And everything you learn is put into an srs system which is fairly similar to memrise. I find that is the best way to learn kanji readings I have ever tried. Also everything you learn gets solidified in your memory very quickly because you are making so many connections with the material you learn. I want to say one more thing as well, wanikani will not help you much with writing the kanji, that is what RTK is for. But it will drastically improve you're reading ability if you stick with it. So i'd say if your interested, request a beta invite and see for yourself, the first 2 levels are free. Also I would say to read this too, https://www.wanikani.com/guide

Anybody here use memrise? - chillimuffin - 2014-12-27

Thanks SevenSyndicate, that cleared up a lot Smile WaniKani does look good. Personally, I won't be using it as I already know the jouyou kanji but some people I know might be interested.