Here's and example of what I'm currently doing:

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Q: 旅の支度が できたなら 又 私に 会いに来るがよい 待っておるぞ Ｘよ


A: たびのしたくが できたなら また わしに あいにくるがよい まっておるぞ Ｘよ！

したく[支度](1)準備すること。用意すること。「食事の―をする」

しょくじ【食事】

じゅんび[準備]

ようい[用意](1)ある行為・行動をする前に、あらかじめ必要なものをとりそろえること...

あらかじめ (adv) beforehand; in advance; previously;

そろえる (v1) to put things in order; to arrange; to make uniform; to get something ready;

Trip('s) preperations (identifier) able to do (if), again me (target) meet come (identifier) good, waiting.

If you are prepared for your journey, you should come to meet me again, and I shall be waiting, X!

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Does that look ok?

For every word I don't know I sort of looking up an explanation in Japanese and then inputting it into the answer. The only problem here being for every explanation I get new words I don't know. And then explanations for those words.

This would be good except, as a beginner, I don't know that many words anyway and what was supposed to an answer to a simple sentence could wind up spanning the entire Japanese dictionary.

I don't know really. Is this what I'm meant to be doing? Any glaring mistakes?

I don't think there is a Way that must be followed absolutely by the followers of the Method. You should do what makes sense to you. You don't have to use a Japanese only dictionary if you're not ready for it, that would be counter-productive.

What's important is that you have enough information in the answer part so that you will understand the sentence even if you had completely forgotten it so that you don't have to look up everything in the dictionary again. If you can't follow the Japanese explanation that defeats the whole purpose and you might as well write nothing in the answer.

Looks great. I might get rid of the spaces in between words in your Q, just so you get used to it. Also, 私 should be read as わたし unless its an elderly person speaking.

Codexus Wrote:I don't think there is a Way that must be followed absolutely by the followers of the Method. You should do what makes sense to you. You don't have to use a Japanese only dictionary if you're not ready for it, that would be counter-productive.

What's important is that you have enough information in the answer part so that you will understand the sentence even if you had completely forgotten it so that you don't have to look up everything in the dictionary again. If you can't follow the Japanese explanation that defeats the whole purpose and you might as well write nothing in the answer.

Aha. Thank you. I'll just take a sentence and then fill the answer out until it gets to a stage where I can completely understand what the question's trying to say. And when it gets to that stage, I know the answer is sufficient.

uberstuber Wrote:Looks great. I might get rid of the spaces in between words in your Q, just so you get used to it. Also, 私 should be read as わたし unless its an elderly person speaking.

Oops! The funny thing is, I think that's meant to be written in "olde" Japanese (note 'yoi' instead of 'ii') as I actually got it from a Dragon Quest translation (a game with a medieval theme). I'll try and keep my use of it to a minimum unless I start sounding like the Japanese equivalent of Henry VIII.

Also, same with the spaces in between words, I just copy and pasted without thinking. I'll fix it right away though as you're right. Thanks!

Looks good.

I'm curious where you are getting your definitions from?

Also, do you think the English part is necessary? I never include a translation in my answers. My thinking behind this is that I think I would "cheat" and look at the translation, especially for difficult cards.

Because you said you were a beginner, try to focus your first 1000 or so sentences to be grammar examples. Only introduce 1 or at most 2 new words so you don't get bogged down.

An example would be:

Expression: 私はグラスにワインを入れました。

Meaning: I poured wine in the glass.

Reading: {わたし}はグラスにワインをいれました。

Vocabulary:入れる【いれる 】(v1,vt) to put in; to take in; to bring in; to let in; to admit; to introduce; to commit (to prison); to usher in; to insert; to set (jewels); to employ; to listen to; to tolerate; to comprehend; to include; to pay (interest); to cast (votes); (P)

I have a field for each section with Anki, but you can combine the bottom three for the answer side. To reinforce this grammar example, replace the bold vocab with other nouns/verbs. This also provides vocabulary in context as well. An excellent book I'm using for this is Understanding Basic Japanese Grammar which is just all sentences (recommended from the AJATT site) ISBN: 475740168X.

After your grammar roots, go crazy with game scripts or whatever else you would want. By then you should be able to make heads and tales of complex structures.

Don't try to do something that uses too many new things on one card. Six new words, I'd say is too much. When you have many points at which you could fail a card, SRS scheduling becomes less effective. Also I'm guessing preparing a card with so much info takes a long time. If you try to do 20 like that per day it will be exhausting.

I do my sentence reviews on Anki's web interface. This lets me use Rikaichan to quickly look up any words I forgot in the sentence, so it saves time on adding the words to my answer. I'll do this until I change to going monolingual.

Most of my cards have only a copy of the sentence in all kana (with spaces between the kana words to make it quicker to parse), plus a translation if I need one.

I agree with Vosimura about not putting too much in. In dabidos' example, [kana]ireru[/kana] does NOT mean the 800 things in the huge definition you'll never use. It means "poured in." Everything else just weighs you down; you can learn its other meanings/nuances in other sentences.

As for English, you don't have to use it at all. I hear it's a crutch. Switching to full Japanese means slower/more difficult earlier, but later you'll make much faster progress.

vosmiura Wrote:I do my sentence reviews on Anki's web interface. This lets me use Rikaichan to quickly look up any words I forgot in the sentence, so it saves time on adding the words to my answer. I'll do this until I change to going monolingual.

This is getting a little off-topic, but is there no way to modify rikaichan to use a monolingual dictionary? I remember reading somewhere about stripping out the definitions, so that you could use it just to look up readings without bringing up English all the time, but it would be nice if it were possible to go a little bit farther.

dabidos Wrote:Because you said you were a beginner, try to focus your first 1000 or so sentences to be grammar examples. Only introduce 1 or at most 2 new words so you don't get bogged down.

An example would be:

Expression: 私はグラスにワインを入れました。

Meaning: I poured wine in the glass.

Reading: {わたし}はグラスにワインをいれました。

Vocabulary:入れる【いれる 】(v1,vt) to put in; to take in; to bring in; to let in; to admit; to introduce; to commit (to prison); to usher in; to insert; to set (jewels); to employ; to listen to; to tolerate; to comprehend; to include; to pay (interest); to cast (votes); (P)

I have a field for each section with Anki, but you can combine the bottom three for the answer side. To reinforce this grammar example, replace the bold vocab with other nouns/verbs. This also provides vocabulary in context as well. An excellent book I'm using for this is Understanding Basic Japanese Grammar which is just all sentences (recommended from the AJATT site) ISBN: 475740168X.

After your grammar roots, go crazy with game scripts or whatever else you would want. By then you should be able to make heads and tales of complex structures.

I too am using UBJG, and find it beneficial for your first 1000 to 2000 sentences. After that, you may want to reinforce the rest of the Kanji not covered by using "Kanji in Context" as a sentence source. After that, you should have Kanji, Vocabulary and Grammar covered so that you can then utilize enjoyable sources for learning (TV scripts or Game scripts for example).

If it helps, I posted sentences from Chapter 1 of UBJG on Anki's forum. Take it with a grain of salt, as I converted many words to kanji that were not written as such in the book. There will also be some grammar mistakes and some sentences that are too long.

billyclyde Wrote:I hear it's a crutch.

Evil, just evil. You wouldn't let it lie.

Thanks guys.

I like the idea about the first 1000 or so sentences being grammar examples. UBJG sounds great but I can't seem to find it anywhere (eBay and Amazon UK don't have it), so I was wondering if there was a good alternative? Or perhaps could I just get these sentences from Tae Kim's guide?

You can usually find UBJG from Japanese booksellers. I got mine through Kinokuniya Bookweb... through their NYC store, I think? You can also get it from amazon.co.jp, but they waaaay overcharge on shipping.

Or you can get it from the Japan Shop. It ships from Florida, so it should be a little bit cheaper than getting it from Japan.

http://www.thejapanshop.com/product.php?productid=16188

Just google the name of the book, and you'll get about 4-5 places you can buy it from. (Is it me, or does it seem like google is easier to use to buy stuff than to actually research stuff?)

Yeah the shipping's putting me off a bit. I'll check my library and bookstores before seeing about buying it online.

Thanks.

While I wait is there an immediate online fix? I have decided to use Tae Kim's site but I'm also reading this: http://nihonbunka.uaa.alaska.edu/languag...word-order

I got it from AJAAT and it looks like a good supplement. Thoughts or any other suggestions?

Nukemarine Wrote:If it helps, I posted sentences from Chapter 1 of UBJG on Anki's forum.

You don't think you could post the link mate? I searched your username and the book title but nothing relevant came up.

Don't worry if you can't find it.

Also... are there really 1000+ grammar points I have to learn, or will I be doing multiple sentences for every rule I learn?

Been reading a bit of that Dirty Guide to Japanese and it seems beneficial. I might double it up with some sentences from Tae Kim.

Virtua,

I think the deck you are looking for is listed here:

http://ichi2.net/anki/wiki/ExtraDecks

suffah Wrote:Virtua,

I think the deck you are looking for is listed here:

http://ichi2.net/anki/wiki/ExtraDecks

Awesome! Thanks a lot!

Wow, there's over 350 cards here! Just what I'm looking for.

There's something I don't understand though. I'm assuming you are using an SRS that is not online because if you were, you could just use RIKAICHAN to save you lots of time. All you would have to do is scroll over the kanji to find the readings. So my question is why you don't use an online SRS so that you can reap the benefits of RIKAICHAN? Is there a reason?

You would have to use Firefox to use Rikaichan? And Rikaichan involves mouse movements which is annoying?

mr_hans_moleman Wrote:There's something I don't understand though. I'm assuming you are using an SRS that is not online because if you were, you could just use RIKAICHAN to save you lots of time. All you would have to do is scroll over the kanji to find the readings. So my question is why you don't use an online SRS so that you can reap the benefits of RIKAICHAN? Is there a reason?

because he's using anki it seems.

Also, entering stuff is a pain, but also useful for learning

johnzep Wrote:

mr_hans_moleman Wrote:There's something I don't understand though. I'm assuming you are using an SRS that is not online because if you were, you could just use RIKAICHAN to save you lots of time. All you would have to do is scroll over the kanji to find the readings. So my question is why you don't use an online SRS so that you can reap the benefits of RIKAICHAN? Is there a reason?

because he's using anki it seems.

Also, entering stuff is a pain, but also useful for learning

I use Anki's online interface.

I agree that entry is good for learning. In fact I think it's primarily for learning, because most of the time I don't read the answer part. Certainly not all of it.

When I saw some examples where people have gone monolingual and they've got a chain of 10+ Japanese sentences on the answer side, I have to wonder if that's the right approach. The point is to put stuff you need to learn on the question side, so that you can be questioned on it and get it mastered. Stuff on the answer side will only get a small amount of reading by comparison, so it seems to be a real imballance to me to put 10 times more effort in the answer side than the question side.

Putting loads of detail and examples on the Answer side is ok if you want a place to keep your notes, but if you want to learn, then those examples belong on their own cards, on the Question side IMO.

Yeah, right now I tend to get my sentences from dictionaries, and if I have a word in a sentence I don't know, instead of explaining it too much, I get another sentence for that word. Sometimes two or three if it has multiple meanings. Feels like I get a better scope of things.

Vosmiura, I see what you mean, but I think that in order to maximize your understanding (and learning) of all of the question's details, having definitions on the answer side is necessary. If one doesn't do that, there's the risk of forgetting what the meaning of the sentence was, after a long time. Then you'd have to look it up again anyway, and waste even more time.
Moreover, finding and analyzing the definitions is a good reading+decyphering exercise, and I don't think it's wasted time. It all sums up on the long run.

Sure I'd put the decyphering notes in the SRS, but I think if its a lot of information it may need to be broken up into multipe cards. If you use a +1 approach its pretty unlikely you'll forget everything and get stuck.

I agree that too much on the answer side is counter productive. You need to understand the sentence, if you don't get one word, then you can look that word up. I just put the sentence written in kana on the answer side. For example:

Q
そこ左奥ね。

A
そこひだりおくね。

So how do I know what it means? Well hopefully I am only inputting sentences a little above my current knowledge. I take it to mean 'on the left, inside'. I think it's a description of where the toilet is. I took this sentence from 'Neko Ramen' a manga about a cat that owns a ramen shop, and also has a pet cat. It's a simple example and it was just to show the use of 'oku', which I hadn't seen before. Obviously I already understand most of the elements or I wouldn't have added the sentence. So I don't need to look anything up, even the meaning is somewhat implied by the kanji and heisig story. I have a dictionary on my desktop and it takes about three seconds to get all the info I need on a word.