Oh yeah, that's right. I forgot about the grammar. Thanks for answering.

And thanks for the book recommendation too, ariariari.

ariariari Wrote:Make that chapters 2 *and* 3

Chapter 4 is the last one in the first chapter ("single kanji that make whole words"). Then there's a monster 4 page review section. Seems like finishing off chapter 1 completely might be a nice goal for the month.

I'm already suffering a bit from kanji fatigue right now though, so we'll see how it goes.

So, just finished off chapter 4 and the review section. It wound up being much easier than I expected, but I had to add a bunch of new vocab to my deck.

There's something like 25 more chapters of that book. I think that I'll now set a goal of trying to do 1 chapter a week. I take 1 lesson a week on JOI, so I already learn 1-2 grammar points a week. I guess that this would make my 2nd weekly Japanese goal. Oh, wait. I also recently set a goal of reading 1 NHK Easy News article out loud with a native speaker. I guess make that my 3rd weekly Japanese goal.

Here are my anki stats for May so far:

mature vocab cards: 3,756 (today) - 3,710 (end of april) = +46
mature grammar cards: 326 (today) - 315 (end of april) = +11
mature kanji cards: 453 (today) - 446 (end of april) = +7

Halfway thru the month:

mature grammar cards: 329 (today) - 315 (end of april) = +14
mature kanji cards: 468 (today) - 446 (end of april) = +22
mature vocab cards: 3,770 (today) - 3,710 (end of april) = +60

The biggest change recently was a decision to decrease the amount of new vocab I add to anki. Now that I'm regularly reading NHK Easy News I am constantly encountering new vocab. I think that my reviews would pile up too quickly if I added every new word I encounter.

In fact, I did that math on how much vocab I need to add. My N3 vocab book says there's about 1,200 new words better N4 and N3. That comes out to about 6-7 new cards a day, which I think that I have been overshooting. I'm going to try and make my N3 kanji book my primary source of new cards, because I feel like I learn a lot more from using that book than just picking up random words.

ariariari Wrote:mature vocab cards: 3,770 (today) - 3,710 (end of april) = +60

My N3 vocab book says there's about 1,200 new words better N4 and N3. That comes out to about 6-7 new cards a day, which I think that I have been overshooting.

How many total words does your book say you need for N3? The Tanos cumulative N3 list is 3054 words long but I notice you already have several hundred more words than that. 6-7 new cards for the next 6 months will put you at close to 5k. Presumably your deck contains quite a few words that aren't on the N3 list..?

Also, I notice the tanos list seems to be several years old (2010). Is anyone aware of how well it covers the more recent tests?

Thanks!

yogert909 Wrote:

ariariari Wrote:mature vocab cards: 3,770 (today) - 3,710 (end of april) = +60

My N3 vocab book says there's about 1,200 new words better N4 and N3. That comes out to about 6-7 new cards a day, which I think that I have been overshooting.

How many total words does your book say you need for N3? The Tanos cumulative N3 list is 3054 words long but I notice you already have several hundred more words than that. 6-7 new cards for the next 6 months will put you at close to 5k. Presumably your deck contains quite a few words that aren't on the N3 list..?

Also, I notice the tanos list seems to be several years old (2010). Is anyone aware of how well it covers the more recent tests?

Thanks!

I'll check later to see if it lists a guideline for number of words. But note that in anki 1,200 words = 1,200 notes = 2,400 cards. That is, a card is only one side of a flashcard. So my 3,770 mature cards might represent as few as 1,885 unique words. (But it might also represent more unique words, depending on how often I bring both sides of a note to mature).

Also note that there are some things in my deck that make it hard to compare to a unique word list. For example, I added in 一匹、二匹、三匹 etc. I definitely feel that I benefit by using anki to regularly quiz myself on how the counters change. But I also don't feel that those 20 cards mean quite the same thing as 10 truly unique words.

For reference, here's the reporting screen I use in Anki when I report my numbers.

Ah I see. I didn't consider that you were doing your cards both directions. I do mine recognition only but I have the same problem with my core sentences inflating my vocab numbers. In case you are interested in getting more precise numbers, you can use the browser. For instance, this will show you only your mature vocab cards:
card:'recognition' -isuspended prop:ivl>21

just replace 'recognition' with whatever your vocab card model is named.

yogert909 Wrote:Ah I see. I didn't consider that you were doing your cards both directions. I do mine recognition only but I have the same problem with my core sentences inflating my vocab numbers. In case you are interested in getting more precise numbers, you can use the browser. For instance, this will show you only your mature vocab cards:
card:'recognition' -isuspended prop:ivl>21

just replace 'recognition' with whatever your vocab card model is named.

Oh, that's interesting. I haven't heard of people doing recognition-only flashcards. How is it going for you? What made you decide to stop doing recall?

I like it because I don't get frustrated as much as when I did the reverse. I think it has something to do with the fact that I have a lot more depth of understanding of my L1. I think of L2 as black and white and L1 is high-definition color so I have a lot more experience to draw on to think of a specific L1 word than the other way around. I'm guessing once my cards get well mature, it would be trivial to go through a production deck with pretty good accuracy.

But more to the point of the thread, I'm under the impression the JLPT is mostly recognition and grammar. Is this true? I haven't taken JLPT before. If it is, it makes sense to spend more time on recognition if your main goal is passing.

yogert909 Wrote:But more to the point of the thread, I'm under the impression the JLPT is mostly recognition and grammar. Is this true? I haven't taken JLPT before. If it is, it makes sense to spend more time on recognition if your main goal is passing.

I'd add reading to that list. If you can't read at a certain speed, you're simply going to run out of time. This is more of an N2-N1 concern, though.

Agreed. I was categorizing reading as vocab recognition with some understanding of grammar patterns. My point is that to the best of my knowledge, you don't have to do L1 -> L2.

It's interstesting. I just did some math between the 3k words you referenced from tanos, my current number of words (this time counting mature plus "young + learn") and the rate I said I plan to now add new cards (6-7 a day). My math says that I need to add 7.8 a day to hit his number.

So it looks like I'm more or less on track for that part of the exam. I did very well on the N4 vocab part last year (it was my only "A"), so I don't feel the need to try and somehow aim for JLPT vocab perfection this time arround. If I throw in the words I'm picking up from class and reading that I'm not adding into Anki, it looks like I might even get to all of them.

I'm pretty excited to be focusing on reading comprehension now. It's new and has been extremely rewarding so far. I'm also pretty psyched to have a plan in place that results in me spending less time with anki every day Last year it was definitely too much.

yogert909 Wrote:

ariariari Wrote:mature vocab cards: 3,770 (today) - 3,710 (end of april) = +60

My N3 vocab book says there's about 1,200 new words better N4 and N3. That comes out to about 6-7 new cards a day, which I think that I have been overshooting.

How many total words does your book say you need for N3? The Tanos cumulative N3 list is 3054 words long but I notice you already have several hundred more words than that. 6-7 new cards for the next 6 months will put you at close to 5k. Presumably your deck contains quite a few words that aren't on the N3 list..?

Also, I notice the tanos list seems to be several years old (2010). Is anyone aware of how well it covers the more recent tests?

Thanks!

I don't know about N3, but I used the tanos lists as my main vocabulary resource to pass N1 & N2, and they worked really well. I think there were only like 2-3 words I didn't know on the N2 test, and I felt well prepared for N1. Some of that was just adding unknown words I came across to Anki, but a lot of it was thanks to those decks.

So I went to NHK News Easy for the first time in three weeks, and I'm surprised to see there are furigana all other the place. Turns out my firefox didn't support ruby (hence furigana) until the new version 38 (which is, idk, a week old?).

Anyway, the point of this post is a huge part of the benefit reaped from NHK News Easy is lost because of the furigana imo, which is why I'd like to share this "hide furigana" Stylish found on reddit. Furigana only clutter space when things like rikaichan exist.

https://userstyles.org/styles/86595/nhk-...e-furigana

I also add the original page because there is another work-around for those without Stylish:
http://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/co...na_on_nhk/

[RawToast]

EratiK Wrote:

CK_Byuu Wrote:Huh, didn't know that. What makes it easier than N3? Furigana aside.

The grammar is N4. The vocabulary might be N3, but it's always the same words that come up (like dates, prefecture names; stuff about volcanos, earthquakes, airplanes...) so even the "hard" ones are easy to learn (総理大臣、宇宙航空研究開発機構、文部科学省...). Except for a word here and there, I felt even the grammar kanzen master N3 book had more vocabulary variety than NHK news easy.

I agree. Most of the grammar I know (recognition wise) from NHK Easy has turned out to be ~N4 level. A lot of reading NHK Easy will make the N4 reading sections a breeze -- well that's how it was for me. There's a site (I can't remember it, I found it on reddit) that maintains a database of vocabulary used in NHK Easy. I think it turned out to be ~4000 words used over a period of a few months.

I am sad to see furigana working in Firefox! I'll have to try your tips for removing the furigana.


I haven't updated in a while. I changed project at work and am working at a 'startup' that involves a lot of travel at the moment -- hopefully it will all settle down. At least I can complete my reviews during the commute. I still am completing a lot of hours on iTalki and I can tell my conversation ability has improveds. Signed up for the June challenge, which is only 12 hours

Currently still adding 15 sentences a day. I am using a mixture of JLPT tagged core cards and Genki sentences ordered by Morphman. I think by September/October I'll be able to stop adding sentences and focus more on reading.

I can't give my stats from this computer, I'd need to install and configure the plugins.

みんなガンバレ！

EratiK Wrote:So I went to NHK News Easy for the first time in three weeks, and I'm surprised to see there are furigana all other the place. Turns out my firefox didn't support ruby (hence furigana) until the new version 38 (which is, idk, a week old?).

Anyway, the point of this post is a huge part of the benefit reaped from NHK News Easy is lost because of the furigana imo, which is why I'd like to share this "hide furigana" Stylish found on reddit. Furigana only clutter space when things like rikaichan exist.

https://userstyles.org/styles/86595/nhk-...e-furigana

I also add the original page because there is another work-around for those without Stylish:
http://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/co...na_on_nhk/

This is awesome! Before this I was using this plugin:

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detai...ofhi?hl=en

The problem there is that you have to click the button every time the page loads. I couldn't see a way to make it default to be off. Plus, the Stylish you link to allows you to selectively add the kana by just hovering over the word.

Thanks!

RawToast Wrote:...
I haven't updated in a while. I changed project at work and am working at a 'startup' that involves a lot of travel at the moment -- hopefully it will all settle down. At least I can complete my reviews during the commute. I still am completing a lot of hours on iTalki and I can tell my conversation ability has improveds. Signed up for the June challenge, which is only 12 hours

Currently still adding 15 sentences a day. I am using a mixture of JLPT tagged core cards and Genki sentences ordered by Morphman. I think by September/October I'll be able to stop adding sentences and focus more on reading.
...

Nice to hear from you again. I haven't done much with italki, but 12 hours of lessons a month sounds like a lot. Do you feel that you really learn a lot from it? I'm kinda in a nice groove with 1 hr / wk lessons at JOI. I'm not sure if it's worth moving to italki for a month to check it out or not.

I'm curious: how much time would you say you spend with anki a day?

[RawToast]

Recently I've been terrible at completing reviews on the weekend. I've got into a groove of using Anki on the train to work, so here are my 'time spent' stats:

Average for days studied: 15.7 minutes/day
If you studied every day: 12.0 minutes/day

I usually have 60 reviews and 15 new cards per day, but I by missing weekends I end up with around 10/11 new cards per day. I do sentence recognition cards and read them out loud and I can tell how much easier the cards have become. You must remember, I previously completed 3000 individual vocab cards -- so I often get to press 'Easy'.


I know my speaking has improved drastically from using iTalki, but I am not what I would call conversational. I am using it to 'activate' my passive knowledge, which at the moment involves using Genki with tutors. I can read the passages and find the reading exercises easy, but it's harder when you have to speak! I want to be able to speak at N3 level, not just read!

12 hours is only 3 hours a week. I usually do 2 hours with one teacher per week on the weekends and am currently doing 1/2 hours with a cheap teacher to compliment the lessons. I do plan on eventually just doing 2 hours a week with my main tutor.

I tried a language exchange on Wednesday and to be honest, I found it almost as useful as my old 'conversation only' lessons. Pretty good for no cost!

Failed December 2014 test by 5 points, so this will be my second time taking N3 test.

Study so far has be using NHK Web News Easy for reading and Listening.
imabi.net for grammar and webjapanese.com for kanji, vocab quiz aswell as a using a dozen anki decks.

[RawToast]

redshoulder Wrote:Failed December 2014 test by 5 points, so this will be my second time taking N3 test.

Study so far has be using NHK Web News Easy for reading and Listening.
imabi.net for grammar and webjapanese.com for kanji, vocab quiz aswell as a using a dozen anki decks.

Ahh soo close! :*(

With another 6 months worth of study, you should be set for a sold pass. You may wish to transition off NHK Easy after a while and use some other reading materials. I find the grammar tends to be closer to N4 than N3, but it's still good reading practice.

I failed the december test by 7 points. Overall I found the test quite dificult and had to guess for a lot of the questions. My time ran out on the reading section as well.

I think it highly beneficial to really know the vocab you have studied. I find that in Anki it's easy to learn to recognize a word in a specific sentence, but that doesn't mean you really own it. Which in turns mean there is a risk that you can't remember the word when you encounter it in a different context, which will then throw you off. I have stopped adding new words to Anki as I would rather spend more time reading and getting things solid, than learning even more vocab. I'm at 5000 now and in hindsight maybe stopping at 4000 and then reading more would have been better.

That being said, there will proably always be some words that you cannot understand. For instance in the Kanzen N3 reading book the word 活性酸素 is used. It means 'reactive oxygen' and that's not on any N3 vocab list that I have seen... But if you have a solid understanding of "what you can consider N3 level" you can work around such words, and you time is better spent gaining such a solid understanding than studying heaps of vocabulary.

Hinsudesu Wrote:I failed the december test by 7 points. Overall I found the test quite dificult and had to guess for a lot of the questions. My time ran out on the reading section as well.

I think it highly beneficial to really know the vocab you have studied. I find that in Anki it's easy to learn to recognize a word in a specific sentence, but that doesn't mean you really own it. Which in turns mean there is a risk that you can't remember the word when you encounter it in a different context, which will then throw you off. I have stopped adding new words to Anki as I would rather spend more time reading and getting things solid, than learning even more vocab. I'm at 5000 now and in hindsight maybe stopping at 4000 and then reading more would have been better.

That being said, there will proably always be some words that you cannot understand. For instance in the Kanzen N3 reading book the word 活性酸素 is used. It means 'reactive oxygen' and that's not on any N3 vocab list that I have seen... But if you have a solid understanding of "what you can consider N3 level" you can work around such words, and you time is better spent gaining such a solid understanding than studying heaps of vocabulary.

I totally agree with this, and it's something that I struggle with. My relationship with vocab that I have encountered in reading or used in converation is very different than for vocab that I have only learned thru making flashcards from textbooks.

What do you use for reading practice? So far the only thing I use is NHK Easy News. I try to read a few couple of articles myself a week, and try to read one outloud a week with a native speaker. Overall, I find that finding good reading material is a challenge.

ariariari Wrote:What do you use for reading practice? So far the only thing I use is NHK Easy News. I try to read a few couple of articles myself a week, and try to read one outloud a week with a native speaker. Overall, I find that finding good reading material is a challenge.

If I may, I think you should read more. The month before the test, I was reading 3 NHK Easy article a day, in addition to the Soumatome N3 読解 lesson (6 week program, amounting to 2 pages a day. The pages weren't challenging so I don't recommend this book, but there are 6 mock reading tests inside and they are closer to what you get on the exam).

Before that the only (other than NHK Easy) reading practice I had was with J-subbed anime (Slam Dunk and Crayon Shin-chan movies). Sport anime are kind of easy in general, so I'd recommend those but it's now near crunch-time for you guys, I should warn you Slam Dunk's pacing is sluggish, and they speak like delinquents, so not the best way to develop a rounded competence just before the test. Stuff like Dia no Ace or Haikyuu might be ideal but I haven't watched them so I don't know for sure.

Shin-chan was too hard, but I wanted to watch it, and so like Aya said before it's important to have content you're interested in, so try to find a balance between stuff you can get through quickly enough to stay motivated (easy stuff) and stuff you would to watch anyway.

@EratiK, I'm not taking the test until December. Were you thinking that I was taking it in July?

Haha, silly me. :o

EratiK Wrote:The month before the test, I was reading 3 NHK Easy article a day, in addition to the Soumatome N3 読解 lesson (6 week program, amounting to 2 pages a day. The pages weren't challenging so I don't recommend this book, but there are 6 mock reading tests inside and they are closer to what you get on the exam).

Before that the only (other than NHK Easy) reading practice I had was with J-subbed anime (Slam Dunk and Crayon Shin-chan movies). Sport anime are kind of easy in general, so I'd recommend those but it's now near crunch-time for you guys, I should warn you Slam Dunk's pacing is sluggish, and they speak like delinquents, so not the best way to develop a rounded competence just before the test. Stuff like Dia no Ace or Haikyuu might be ideal but I haven't watched them so I don't know for sure.

Shin-chan was too hard, but I wanted to watch it, and so like Aya said before it's important to have content you're interested in, so try to find a balance between stuff you can get through quickly enough to stay motivated (easy stuff) and stuff you would to watch anyway.

EratiK, since you highlighted your preparations for the test, may I ask how well it prepared you for test day?