Getting the most out of sentences?

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Getting the most out of sentences? - nohika - 2012-02-17

So when I originally started the core2k deck I used what I thought made sense - the vocab word out front, next to the sentence, and I judged myself on whether or not I could understand and read the vocab word. The sentence was for context in case I was confused.

A week or two ago I decided to try full sentences for vocab, using the core10k deck. I'm starting to get frustrated with it now, since I can't actively remember pretty much anything. I'm starting to memorize the sentences and remember words based on the context. With the first method, I could actively "see" the word everywhere. Now I'm lucky if I remember it in the sentence. Most of the time I don't.

I have probably a 500-600 word passive vocabulary and grammar is probably around N4 level (I've not studied in a while and have forgotten lots). I made it through half of core2k and accidentally deleted the deck. That was probably 6 months to a year ago.

Am I fine to keep studying vocab in isolation? If not, tips on how to make sentences less...forgettable? I've thought about using vocabulary lists from native media I have but I wasn't sure if I had a good enough vocabulary base for it yet. Was thinking of completely core2k and then proceeding onto vocab from manga, light novels and pulling short example sentences from like the jp yahoo dictionary or ALC.

I'm so confused. Help/advice?

Getting the most out of sentences? - vix86 - 2012-02-17

I'm confused why what you are saying. You said at first you started with the Vocab out front next to a sentence and then you say "studying in isolation."

How are your cards set up?
Front / back
A) 屋根 / やねーroof
B) 屋根にカラスが止まっています. / There is a crow on the roof.

If your problem is really that when you get out in real life and start talking, and can't recall the word. I don't know what to tell you on that. I have this problem myself, but given enough time I have found that words have either A) Sank in, in such a way that the word I need just "comes to me" or B) I only hit half the word I need, assuming I don't completely forget it. I refuse to do a E->J production deck because they have so many problems.

I'm a pretty strong believer that words in isolation are not a good thing now in the long term. If you merely want to 'prime' words, it might be fine; but if you are looking to cement words then you probably want to stick to sentences. I had tried to make my own sentence deck once before in the past and had the same kind of critique about "memorizing the sentence." The thing about the Core2k/6k though, that I like, is that maybe in the beginning you can pull that off but because the deck uses a new sentence for almost each word you eventually can't memorize every sentence. You might vaguely remember the sentence AFTER you start reading the sentence and get a handle on the meaning; but this is basically what context reading is about.

Biggest hurdle is getting enough words down and getting the "Japanese part of your brain" working. You'll pick up words faster and the process gets better.
If you are struggling with recalling the meaning of words though (for kanji words) and haven't finished the RTK, you might consider that. It really helps to form key word mnemonics for words to help recall what the meaning of something is, via the RTK keywords.

EDIT: Oh and for the Core decks, make sure you are using the excel sheet in nukemarine's beginner guide which lists the words in as close to a N+1 manner as possible. This will mean you should always be reading sentences you can read almost everything about.

Getting the most out of sentences? - Asriel - 2012-02-17

I've found that keeping the sentence on the front teaches me the sentence and not the word. My cards are like this:

Front / Back
屋根 / やね - Roof　屋根にカラスが止まっています。[translation of other words if necessary]

That way I can recognize the word on its own, but I still have the context in the case that I need it. Often times I have a vague feeling of what the word means, but then the sentence blows my idea away, and I mark it wrong.

Getting the most out of sentences? - vix86 - 2012-02-17

Have you ever tried formatting like my example? This is how my cards appear exactly

Front / Back
屋根にカラスが止まっています。 / *sent trans* roof やね *sent gloss*

My sentence is formatted with ＭＳＰ明朝 at 58pt font. I've gotten use to focusing pretty much on the word when its like this and don't really pay much attention to the sentence, though peripheral vision kicks in sometimes. (I underline too because AnkiDroid doesn't show bold for me)

I really am just not sold on single word vocab decks anymore. One reason is that words like 間 can be あいだ／ま, 後　あと／のち, and I'm sure there are a handful more like this. Then some words can be homonyms (same pronunciation, different meaning based on context). All of these sort of rely on context to figure out the reading. Then there is the issue of Intransitive/Transitive verbs. If you are good at repetition and memorizing "ok, this is intrans this is trans" then go ahead, but I've been trying to tackle the problem through pragmatics (exposure to seeing the verb next to a が・を respectably).

I have <1300 words to go in Core6k and have been doing my deck like this from the start of core2k. I can't imagine trying to do this many cards as single words. If it works for you though by all means keep going.

Getting the most out of sentences? - usis35 - 2012-02-17

I think we have 2 kinds of words.
1. words that not require context because they have only one meaning, like 猫【ねこ】.Usually they are nouns. Here you don't need sentences.
2. word that require context. Usually verbs, some adjectives,etc. Here you need sentences.

Getting the most out of sentences? - Tori-kun - 2012-02-17

usis35 Wrote:I think we have 2 kinds of words.
1. words that not require context because they have only one meaning, like 猫【ねこ】.Usually they are nouns. Here you don't need sentences.

I disagree. Especially nouns require context, I find! F.e. 陰謀ⅹ共謀. Both mean "conspiracy", but their contexts are somewhat different.

Getting the most out of sentences? - usis35 - 2012-02-17

Tori-kun Wrote:
usis35 Wrote:I think we have 2 kinds of words.
1. words that not require context because they have only one meaning, like 猫【ねこ】.Usually they are nouns. Here you don't need sentences.
I disagree. Especially nouns require context, I find! F.e. 陰謀ⅹ共謀. Both mean "conspiracy", but their contexts are somewhat different.

I didn't mean that all nouns are group 1, what I said is that most of group 1 are nouns.

Getting the most out of sentences? - vix86 - 2012-02-17

usis35 Wrote:I think we have 2 kinds of words.
1. words that not require context because they have only one meaning, like 猫【ねこ】.Usually they are nouns. Here you don't need sentences.
2. word that require context. Usually verbs, some adjectives,etc. Here you need sentences.

I think there are far more words that require context than words that don't. Just think about the number of words in English which have tons of slightly different meanings but are kind of lumped into a semantic bubble. You may not even realize all these uses for a word till you see it in context and go "oh ya..."
I mean just consider my first sentence (ignoring pronoun, articles, predicates):

Quote:I think there are far more words that require context than words that don't.

'Think' for instance has 10 entries as a transitive verb alone. 'far' 5 as adverb. word 11. require 3. context 2.
Japanese is the same way.

Learning as single words also deprives you of using context to...well...see the context of use. You may know that 重要・重大・大切・大事 all mean 'important' but some are more formal, some are situational. Some words might also only occur in "negative" situations and therefore carry a negative tone to their use simply due to pragmatics. Again, simple word learning won't necessarily tell you this. Exposure/Lots of sentences will.

Getting the most out of sentences? - howtwosavealif3 - 2012-02-17

keep it simple and fun: do song lyrics
i learned my first 1000 or 2000 words from songs and you get learn alot of grammar patterns that are frequently used like aitai lol

Getting the most out of sentences? - kainzero - 2012-02-17

to OP:

i think you're using sentences that have too many things you don't know. you can fix it with two ways.

-grind it out slowly.
-choose sentences that don't have as many new things.

i did the first technique and it was hell in the beginning since there would be like 3 or 4 new words and a new grammar point. i'd clear 30 sentences in 30 minutes. but in the end i learned it, so it did work for me. since i can't go back in time and do the second method i can't really speak for it. =)

my vocabulary deck has... evolved, so to speak.

it started with full sentences and full english translations, then i mixed in single word cards for some of the narrower vocabulary, then instead of english translations for the entire sentence i just define the parts of the sentences i don't know, and then finally i started adding in cloze delete cards. all in the same deck.

Getting the most out of sentences? - vix86 - 2012-02-17

Are the cloze cards for grammar?

Getting the most out of sentences? - usis35 - 2012-02-17

vix86 Wrote:
usis35 Wrote:I think we have 2 kinds of words.
1. words that not require context because they have only one meaning, like 猫【ねこ】.Usually they are nouns. Here you don't need sentences.
2. word that require context. Usually verbs, some adjectives,etc. Here you need sentences.
I think there are far more words that require context than words that don't. Just think about the number of words in English which have tons of slightly different meanings but are kind of lumped into a semantic bubble. You may not even realize all these uses for a word till you see it in context and go "oh ya..."
I mean just consider my first sentence (ignoring pronoun, articles, predicates):

Quote:I think there are far more words that require context than words that don't.
'Think' for instance has 10 entries as a transitive verb alone. 'far' 5 as adverb. word 11. require 3. context 2.
Japanese is the same way.

Learning as single words also deprives you of using context to...well...see the context of use. You may know that 重要・重大・大切・大事 all mean 'important' but some are more formal, some are situational. Some words might also only occur in "negative" situations and therefore carry a negative tone to their use simply due to pragmatics. Again, simple word learning won't necessarily tell you this. Exposure/Lots of sentences will.

I understand your point, of course, strictly speaking, almost all the words require context.
But we are talking about ANKI. If we input most of the words within sentences, we will reach a point where it will take a lot of time to review.
So, we can do a tradeoff, leave the sentences for the more difficult words, and input mostly words alone (or in pairs, or series, to disambiguate), and LEAVE THE NUANCES to learn with exposure to real material.
Also I am reaching a level where I have long sentences from 2 or 3 years ago, and I only need to review one word in that sentence. Then, I bold or put that word in red, so I can review it faster.

Getting the most out of sentences? - nohika - 2012-02-17

Thanks for all the comments, guys.

My cards are generally structured as: vocab word (in kanji) -- Sentence on the front, and then the sentence w/the reading on the back along with the English translation.

That was how I did it at first. I don't remember exactly why. I made it through about half of core2k that way. I started sentences and maybe the fact I haven't "tested" my level since then, but I didn't feel like I was retaining anything...

I was looking for a decent deck for core6k, so I'll look at Nukemarine's spreadsheet then. It's just frustrating and maybe I need to give it longer to see if it works or not. I haven't had much free time to "test" anything on native material so maybe I'll switch to that deck, keep using sentences, and give it a month. I have a bad habit of memorizing "patterns" and so it prevents me from learning everything, I think. And there are some words that I know what are but couldn't tell you what in the heck they mean except for in the context of the sentence I learned it in.

I haven't finished RTK, no, but I am doing it concurrently. I'm about 330 kanji in and I do 10 or so new a day. I get too frustrated doing it by itself, so.

I do study grammar in sentences (using the DOBJG right now) and am fine with those. I dunno why vocab sentences are so different. Maybe they are too difficult.

Getting the most out of sentences? - kainzero - 2012-02-17

vix86 Wrote:Are the cloze cards for grammar?

Both grammar and vocabulary. They're really just the practice test questions from JLPT books, except they're not multiple choice and they simply test if I can produce the structure or answer the question.

They helped a lot for me because they emulate that process when you're searching for a word and you want to say it but you just can't remember what it is. It is a little detrimental as I find myself using strange grammar at times, but that in itself becomes an experience to remember how to express ideas properly. (Recently I used ～や否や in Lang-8 which was corrected to ～てから because of the rarity of the first phrase.)

I don't use cloze delete exclusively though, I use a combination of everything.

Getting the most out of sentences? - vix86 - 2012-02-17

usis35 Wrote:Also I am reaching a level where I have long sentences from 2 or 3 years ago, and I only need to review one word in that sentence. Then, I bold or put that word in red, so I can review it faster.

That's exactly what I suggested to Asriel up above. You keep the sentence but format it so you focus on the one thing you wanted the sentence for, be it grammar point or vocab. I blow through my reviews in core6k this way. I don't need the sentence unless I forget meaning and then I read context and the meaning usually comes to me.

Long sentences will always be an issue though, too much information when maybe you don't need all of it for the point. You could still add the long sentence for context but stuff it in a field you don't actually show. That way if you need a reminder of full context you got it. This really only applies to stuff you add to your deck though since usually you will know the material you add.

kainzero Wrote:It is a little detrimental as I find myself using strange grammar at times, but that in itself becomes an experience to remember how to express ideas properly.

I'm starting to have this problem with vocabulary. I'm picking up a lot of words people don't usually say yet I use them in spoken language cause they are easier to remember sometimes. I have no idea whats a spoken word and whats an essay word and there isn't really any way to check this stuff out. Native speakers learn this stuff by ear.

Getting the most out of sentences? - kainzero - 2012-02-17

vix86 Wrote:I'm starting to have this problem with vocabulary. I'm picking up a lot of words people don't usually say yet I use them in spoken language cause they are easier to remember sometimes. I have no idea whats a spoken word and whats an essay word and there isn't really any way to check this stuff out. Native speakers learn this stuff by ear.

you do too, since you usually match the speech style of your friends in any language.

there's a lot of words that i'm used to just because people said it to me and i unconsciously try to emulate them.
(my speech is peppered with a lot of osaka ben because i watch a lot of owarai stuff. haha)

Getting the most out of sentences? - ta12121 - 2012-02-18

kainzero Wrote:to OP:

i think you're using sentences that have too many things you don't know. you can fix it with two ways.

-grind it out slowly.
-choose sentences that don't have as many new things.

i did the first technique and it was hell in the beginning since there would be like 3 or 4 new words and a new grammar point. i'd clear 30 sentences in 30 minutes. but in the end i learned it, so it did work for me. since i can't go back in time and do the second method i can't really speak for it. =)

my vocabulary deck has... evolved, so to speak.

it started with full sentences and full english translations, then i mixed in single word cards for some of the narrower vocabulary, then instead of english translations for the entire sentence i just define the parts of the sentences i don't know, and then finally i started adding in cloze delete cards. all in the same deck.

Pretty much how I use my decks too. Sentences should be short/small, even if you do reach advance levels, going back to the basics of how you add cards will still help. For vocabulary I still use an english translation just for the purpose of making my reps done at a certain pace. For sentences I use monolingual look ups because I don't add too much cards there.

Getting the most out of sentences? - nohika - 2012-02-18

Welp, starting back up on the core10k deck and trying to read more native material and play games and stuff. Hoping that'll help.

I can't go very fast, sadly, since I really don't have that much free time. :/ Half hour, hour a day, max.