I'm not sure what the interest level in this book is, or if anyone around here has it, but I'm currently going through it for 2級 kanji prep. This book focuses on the 2級　kanji and every compound needed for the test.

I really like the material, but typing out everything by myself takes a lot of time, so I wanted to ask if anyone is interested in helping?

Not enough love for this book ;(.

Here's the link to a sample for anyone interested: http://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/reader/488319...eader-page

I've done 25 chapters so far. Excellent material. My goal was to do one chapter every day, but I skipped some days mainly because of the time it takes to enter each chapter. Learning & reviewing time is much shorter than the data entry.

I'm also doing this book. I have up to chapter 15 done. I'm doing about 2 chapters a day. I can put up a google spreadsheet for it, and add to it as I go through my studies. However, I am skipping duplicate sentences.

Here's the link to my spreadsheet. You can request access the same way people request access to the KO2001 book, I need a picture of your book. Just click the link, sign into google, hit request access, and I'll email you back to request the picture of your book.

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=r...AYsQ&hl=en

I'll probably keep write access to myself until I get the entire thing completed, and then I'll toss it out to the community to proofread, etc. If you want to donate lessons to me, just upload the spreadsheet to google docs in the same format I have mine in. I'll download it, add it to my deck, and then reexport to google.

The format is:

[Kanji #] [Sentence]

This does create duplicate numbers, but there's no clear numbering for sentences that persists between the lessons. If you're intent on studying the entire book, there's no reason to care very much about the order the sentences are in within each kanji group. All the sentences are grouped by the kanji number listed in the book. The kanji numbers are printed below every kanji in each lesson.

I keep a spreadsheet that has [Chapter #] [Sentence #] [Kanji] [Sentence]. I can add the kanji # if you need it.

Just added chapter 26 to mine.

Initially I was thinking that 例文で学ぶ... would be a cut down version of KIC and I started doing it just because I'd like to take the 2級 exam this year, but just now I started looking at KIC for the KIC mining project, and realized KIC is the one that looks more cut down !

- 例文で学ぶ... is supposed to cover only 1023 kanji but has 107 chapters that average about 35 example sentences each.

- KIK workbook 1 is supposed to cover 1200 kanji but has 94 chapters that average about 15 example sentences each.

つまり the former averages 3.5 example sentences per kanji and the latter averages 1.2.

However, 例文で学ぶ... examples do start to repeat, for example up to now (chapter 36) I've pruned about 25% of the examples for repeating or being small variations on earlier examples. Probably I'll be pruning more and more as I go.

I think I'll still do a pass over KIC workbook 1 after 例文で... in case it covers some different vocab.

That's good to know. In 550 sentences in KIC, I've come across maybe 4 or 5 repeat sentences which are phrased slightly different, but have the same basic meaning. If I hadn't already invested so much time into KIC, I'd be seriously considering 例文で学ぶ as well.

2級 is coming up in about two weeks, though, so I don't think I can switch over right now.

Aw shit. vos, I just realized I have this book on my bookshelf. Tried using it a couple of years ago before I tackled RTK. I really loved the sentences, but I was in over my head at that time. That was also before I found out about SRS. At that time, I actually really liked the repetition of the sentences because I would come across something later and realize "holy crap, I can READ that!" -- sort of like an analog SRS.

Where are you right now? After I recover from my post-JLPT shock in a couple of weeks, I'll add what I can to this project.

I'm on Chapter 37.

I hate to do this, but I've stopped studying this book. I had some extra money, and so I got Kanji in Context. From what I've studied so far, Kanji In Context has better sentences. 例文で学ぶ is alright, but I was beginning to become worried that it wouldn't lead into book 2 of KIC properly. There's no higher level book in the 例文で学ぶ series, and so I didn't want to get stuck or have to go back to the beginning of a different book after studying another book.

So I've cut my losses, and begun KIC.

erlog Wrote:I hate to do this, but I've stopped studying this book. I had some extra money, and so I got Kanji in Context. From what I've studied so far, Kanji In Context has better sentences. 例文で学ぶ is alright, but I was beginning to become worried that it wouldn't lead into book 2 of KIC properly. There's no higher level book in the 例文で学ぶ series, and so I didn't want to get stuck or have to go back to the beginning of a different book after studying another book.

So I've cut my losses, and begun KIC.

Yeah I recently started on KIC Workbook volume 1; I'm at a sub JLPT3 level, I do notice some of the grammar in it is a little complex, but I'm still grasping the basic jist of the sentence but I'm recalling the readings fairly easily. I'm going through it hell slow (1 page per day). I really like it so far, although it is the only one I've tried, a book is a book, and I'm sure if I work through it there will be more gains than losses.

@erlog
Even though I am only working on KIC at the moment, I would say don't completely give up on 例文で学ぶ -- it has its place. KIC might help your continue further, but 例文で学ぶ still makes for excellent practice. 例文で学ぶ sentences would be nice as an additional drill on top of KIC (perhaps starting 300-400 kanji into KIC), since KIC sentences do seem to have a few "themes" to them (commonly politics, economics, and cause-effect) which can get tiresome.

No sweat erlog.

I enterend a few chapters of KIC for the other project, and I could tell some of the sentences seem a bit more complex. If you're going for JLPT1 then it's good practice.

I'm going for JLPT2 so 例文で... still seems good for me as it seems more thorough for those kanji.

vosmiura Wrote:No sweat erlog.

I enterend a few chapters of KIC for the other project, and I could tell some of the sentences seem a bit more complex. If you're going for JLPT1 then it's good practice.

I'm going for JLPT2 so 例文で... still seems good for me as it seems more thorough for those kanji.

Yeah, I actually used 例文で.. as part of a class studying for JLPT2. For what it's worth, I passed.

I wanted to mention a change I made to my study method that seems to be giving good results.

I was unhappy about the number of times I was failing young cards until I learned them. For 2 weeks I've been trying this simple change:

1) When I have a list of sentences to add to Anki, I mark all the words I don't know or don't remember, and write them in a little memo in the format: [Kanji, Reading, English]. I have 14 on each page of this little memo.

2) Then, I do simple drilling on groups of 7 at a time, for 1-2 minutes until I can read them all, Kanji -> Reading and after English -> Reading. The goal is not to memorize the simple English -> Reading, but just to check that the reading is in my head.

3) I don't drill 1 1 1 1, 2 2 2 2, 3 3 3 3... instead I do 1...7, 1...7, 7...1, 7...1, random order, etc. so that there's a little spacing between the words. This is very important.

4) Start to review the new sentences in Anki the following day.

My results are that I remember young cards much better now. My review pass rate noticeably improved. As a result I have quite a bit less reviews per day. Also, I think I'm getting better/faster at memorizing the lists, so it seems there's some brain training effect going on.

I've figured out the problem I have with this book. It's mostly that it's targeted at JLPT二級. I studied all this stuff last year, and I passed. This means there's little new material for me in the book, and thus the book is boring.

The book also does kind of a disservice to readers because of the simplistic grammar it tends to use. You might find that you're able to read the words fine when they come up in native sources, but the grammar is going to give you a headache. So the book is not truly putting the words in proper grammar context. They're high-level words in low-level sentences, and this ends up making the sentences feel too pat, too boring. It also ends up not preparing you very well for grammar you'll see on the JLPT at that level.

There's also the issue that I mentioned before that this series is currently a dead end. There is no 一級 option available. So to study for 一級 you're going to have to start back at the beginning of KIC. There's no easy transition from 例文で学ぶ to KIC. There's JLPT1 words in KIC from the very first lesson, and so if you got Book 2 of KIC thinking it would mesh well with 例文で学ぶ then you're in for a rude awakening.

Almost all of these issues would be solved if they just released an 一級 version of the book. I like what it's trying to do. It makes some sense that you would want to isolate vocabulary from grammar so that students are only confused by one thing at a time, but this also makes the sentences very mundane. There's no magic in them like there is in KIC sentences.

I like the fact that when I read a sentence from KIC, I'm able to know the meaning without following the grammar specifically. That maps to how I feel when I read native Japanese text. I also like the fact that I have to occasionally look up the grammar for a sentence. It means less work later when it comes to studying for the grammar.

Maybe I'm being too harsh, and am expecting too much from any one book. I think that if you have the time to do it, doing both 例文で学ぶ and KIC will really be worth it to take you from one level to another. I'd have a hard time recommending KIC to someone that only just passed 三級 because the grammar would throw them for a loop. So 例文で学ぶ does have its place on the path to Japanese fluency, but it's just that it's not for me at this point with my level.

The upside is that 例文で学ぶ is extremely cheap compared to the KIC set. So there does seem to be this trend developing slowly of higher level books coming down in price. A few years ago you'd be hard pressed to find ANY options outside of KIC. With stuff like 例文で学ぶ and KO2001 filling the void the path is becoming a lot smoother for learners.

Quote:I like the fact that when I read a sentence from KIC, I'm able to know the meaning without following the grammar specifically. That maps to how I feel when I read native Japanese text.

I'm not sure what you mean by that. Could you give an example?

Quote:I also like the fact that I have to occasionally look up the grammar for a sentence. It means less work later when it comes to studying for the grammar.

I'm of the thought that at the learning stage, N+1 material is best. Vocab is so numerous and takes such a long time anyway, it shouldn't be more torturous than it needs to I think.

Like you say, for someone who just finished 三級, KIC would drive them loopy. I also found the same issue with grammar books; KM grammar is a great book, but if you try to use it after just finishing 三級 the vocab will drive you crazy. It's quite hard to 'bootstrap' the intermediate level. KO helped me a lot with it.

Quote:The book also does kind of a disservice to readers because of the simplistic grammar it tends to use. You might find that you're able to read the words fine when they come up in native sources, but the grammar is going to give you a headache. So the book is not truly putting the words in proper grammar context.

I think grammar would still be a headache with KIC too. I've been going through some chapters in the middle of KIC workbook 1, and I honestly don't think the caliber of the sentences is that different, at least not for a lot of them. It seems very similar.

Like for like sentence; one can tell it's written by the same guy:
KIC: 最近は床の間のある家は少なくなった。
例文: 昔の日本の家にはたいてい床の間があリました。

I said before that KIK has fewer example sentences. Let's compare some chapters. If you have the books take a look and see if you agree.

KIC Chapter 35: 12 kanji, 18 complete example sentences plus 28 more compounds with limited or no context. The first thing that stands out is the lack of "proper grammar context" for so many compounds.

例文で学ぶ Chapter 35: 11 kanji, 36 complete example sentences plus a few example compounds with no context. This seems to have more meat to me.

Compare the caliber of the sentences. To me, KIC doesn't seem that different. Most of the sentences are short and simple.

The following are the sentences from this Chapter 35 of KIC:

「人民の人民による人民のための政治」（アブラハム・リンカーン）
国民の意識が変わらない限り、政治は変わらない。
子供の時に母に歌ってもらった子守歌を今でも覚えている。
この辺りは昔は畑だったが、今は住宅地になっている。そして宅地は年々広がっている。
駅の周りはオフィス街で、住宅は少ない。
会社の方に電話して、いない時は、自宅の方に電話してください。
寒い地方では冬になると、水が凍って水道管が破裂（はれつ）することがある。
風邪で気管をやられてしまった。
管理職になると、組合をやめなければならない。
霞ヶ関周辺（かすみがせきしゅうへん）は官庁街になっています。
最近家庭菜園がはやっていて、小さな庭でトマトやきゅうりを育てている家が多い。
休み時間になると、生徒たちは廊下や校庭で遊んだ。
ボストン美術館の日本庭園は有名だ。
椅子に座らないで、床の上に座ってお酒を飲んだ。
最近は床の間のある家は少なくなった。
最近は男の人でも床屋に行かないで美容院に行く。
日本の文庫本は小さくて軽くてとても便利だ。
先週の日曜日は銀座に行って、画廊を見て回った。

Spot the grammar above 3級? I think I highlighted the only one, "~による”.

Maybe it's just this chapter, but I picked it completely at random. I don't know if it would be very helpful to prepare that well for 2級 grammar or above.

vosmiura Wrote:KIC Chapter 35: 12 kanji, 18 complete example sentences plus 28 more compounds with limited or no context. The first thing that stands out is the lack of "proper grammar context" for so many compounds.

Look more closely at those compounds. They're usually complex nouns like 電子力発電所 that become self explanatory, or they're idiomatic expressions that are given as much context as they need to be given. Many of those compounds are actually very short sentences. Because of this, you can't simply compare the numbers of full sentences in each book. The books are not structured the same, and so it's off base to compare them like that.

I think you're right in saying that in a lot of places they can be very close, but here is the difference that I see. The 例文で学ぶ sentences seem to be created in a way that specifically avoids higher level grammar. KIC doesn't have high level grammar in every single sentence, but it seems to be there where it is appropriate.

So the peppering of higher level grammar into the sentences, to me, makes the book quite a bit more interesting. It's not as much fun for me if I know for sure I'm absolutely going to understand every single sentence in 例文で学ぶ. That's not what I look for in a book I want to learn from. I want there to be sentences I don't understand.

There's also a significant difference in the content of the sentences. I'm only up to chapter 6 of KIC, but it's already referenced 3 or 4 different things like Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, Carmen, etc. The sentences don't feel like they're a part of some empty vacuum like a lot of the ones from 例文で学ぶ do.

I know I'm not articulating this properly, but the sentences in KIC just feel a bit more natural, more mature. It's hard to pinpoint exactly why, but they do. Maybe it's just that the ones in KIC less often end in です or だ. By the rules of beginner Japanese it is ungrammatical to do this, but by the rules of realistic spoken/written Japanese it's just fine.

So you have sentences like: うちの主人と隣のご主人はとても仲がいい。

That feels a lot more natural than if it ended in です or だ. The constant strict adherence to lower level grammar in 例文で学ぶ homogenizes a lot of sentences that should be flavorful and interesting.

There's really not much to argue about here. We both kind of agree that 例文で学ぶ is a good part of intermediate level study, and that KIC is good for upper-intermediate students.

Vos, where are you right now? I'd like to begin helping you with this.