Hi all, as holidays are fast approaching and I've finally got the time to settle down and start learning the language, I'm thinking of pushing the boundaries of what I can learn this holiday. I've already got hiragana and katakana down, and my main reasons for cramming are essentially:
1. I seem to work a lot better and tend to give up and procrastinate a lot less when I've a huge workload and deadlines to adhere to.
2. I'm eager to see meaningful initial progress during a short time frame so that I would have got the basics down to be able to study through easy native material once I'm back at school with less time;
3.The fun and fulfillment of it.
Would it then be realistic to go through something like Japanese the Manga Way (which I have) within a week and blast through Core2K and another grammar book simultaneously for the rest of the month and a half? With regards to grammar studied from JtMW and the fast speed I'm striving for, would not SRSing the cards be fine or would I risk low retention despite the fact that most grammar in there is relatively basic? What would be the most effective way to go about "cramming" and what common pitfalls should I be aware of? Would reading "simple" material or other basic / intermediate manga like Yotsuba be a realistic goal within this month or month and a half be remotely possible, or am I way off base here? Thanks all!

Reading through a textbook might work, but I'm not sure if I'd use Japanese the Manga Way for that. There aren't any exercises, and there aren't that many examples. (Though they are manga examples ^^) And as far as I'm aware, it's not as if there are long text passages where you might encounter the stuff from earlier chapters again. So I'm really not sure how much would stick if you just read through it. I don't think there's much vocab introduced as well. I think many people use Japanese the Manga Way as a supplement or for review, but not as their main study tool. (Correct me if I'm wrong) I think a more comprehensive textbook might be better in your situation.

For different textbook recommendation, the most popular one currently is probably Genki. There are a few others though. There's also Minna no Nihongo or the Nakama series. But currently in the english speaking world Genki I and II is what many self learners go with.
In another forum (over at wanikani) there recently was someone who sprinted through Genki I and II at roughly 1 chapter a day to prepare for a longer trip to Japan. I think there are 23 chapters overall, so it took him 23 days, not sure if he took 1 or 2 longer in the end, but not much more. He didn't start completely from zero but he said he didn't know that much and I think he didn't really study grammar previously ("I can't really say more than, maybe—maybe—forty or so phrases.")
His aim though wasn't to study everything properly but more to get a lot of exposure to a lot of japanese in a short time span. So what he did was essentially read through the chapter, one chapter a day, and write a grammar cheat sheet for himself along the way and that's it.
I think at the end his head was spinning quite a bit, but he managed to get through somehow. I think he wrote some paper flashcards afterwards (for grammar points) to review. I don't know how much actually stuck because I think he's still on his trip through Japan currently

Now, given that you want to "be done" with the basics and probably also want to retain it a bit better than him, you'd have to do a little more than just read through it. So, if I were a diligent person and had too much free time on my hand I'd probably try it this way: Find a vocab deck that covers Genki I+II vocab (there are some on anki, iknow and memrise I believe, so use your platform of choice) and set a daily limit of how many cards to add. I think there are around 1300 words, so I'd probably go for 50 a day, Just because it's a nice number and it roughly lines up with the pace for learning the chapters. If it's a bit faster that's fine, cause it'll probably just make it easier to work through the chapters. (edit: 50 new cards is quite a lot, and reviews will pile up a bit. If it's a lot, consider spreading your reviews a bit throughout the day, you don't have to force through them all at once. Or (probably an even better suggestion) start learning today and not in a month )
And appart from that: Read through one chapter a day, make a grammar cheat sheet for all the grammar points of the chapters, do as many exercises as manageable (I probably wouldn't focus too much on finishing all the exercises but that's just me, might be different for you). I'd probably put it in a "recap day" every 6 days (so after every 5 chapters), where I'd go over my notes once more, maybe correct what I now understand better. If I feel very motivated, read through the chapters again (maybe not all of them but the last 5?) or at least through the main texts of them. And yeah, well that's just it. That would be 23 days for the chapters + 5 recap days, so 28 days overall. Doesn't sound too bad.

Why I'd go for a comprehensive textbook instead of learning grammar from Japanese the Manga way and learning vocab elsewhere? Mostly because the common context makes it stick a bit better. I think it might be a nice idea to read through Japanese the Manga Way after the Genki sprint. For reinforcement and picking up a few new points here and there. I think it also covers some common contractions used in manga, so it might be a nice idea anyway.

Why (and what?) I'd srs: I'd try to srs the vocab. Mostly because it'll help you to retain the knowledge after your sprint. After the sprint is done and you might decide to not add as many cards (or non at all) it will take a few days, but the review count will drop, If you try to cram so much into your head in a short amount of time and then lower your exposure a lot afterwards, you are bound to forget a lot. I don't know for how many tests I crammed and now don't remember anything at all about the topic. But if it was important for me and I'd put into it so much effort, I'd just want to try to retain it, especially if it's not that much effort. (edit) apart from "after the sprint" I also believe it has some benefit during the sprint. Yes the reviews will hurt a bit, especially if you are not used to it. But when learning so fast, you will sometimes feel overwhelmed. But srs makes you notice how your foundation grows. Words you struggeled with ("oh no that's the one I ALWAYS forget") suddenly stick and I think that's a pretty cool thing. It also helps against the feeling of "I don't even understand chapter 2 properly, how can I be working on chapter 6 right now?!". And you'll probably also don't feel as if you have to look up old words all the time (edit end)
You could make grammar notes as well, but that's your choice If your cheat sheets are good, I don't think you'd need them all that much anyway

Is it possible to read stuff like Yotsubato afterwards? Well there certainly will be stuff you won't fully get, but I think there are quite many people reading Yotsubato at around that level, so give it a shot. And I think there are some Yotsubato vocab decks out there, which you could study as well if you feel like it. Lots of that should be everyday stuff, so it should be pretty useful anyway

Sadly I'm not good at sticking to my study plans so it might be the worst idea ever Good luck anyway.

edit: another guide how to proceed for a beginner: http://forum.koohii.com/thread-13728.html It's using memrize, so I guess you could go as fast as you wanted by adjusting the number of cards you add each day ^^

You're not going to be more efficient by cramming without SRS. The whole point of SRS is to minimize the amount of repetition needed to learn something. So you should definitely SRS everything you are trying to cram.

And yes, you can SRS all the stuff you listed, within the timeframe you mentioned. I've added over 5,000 sentences to my review pile, in the past seven weeks, and I doubt I've ever spent more than two hours a day reviewing them. I'm at a fairly advanced level, and the sentences were relatively easy, so it might take you a little more time to get through your daily reviews, but you'll still have plenty of time left over for immersion...as long as you SRS in the most speedy way possible. That means a couple of things ("a couple" turned into seven ...but they're short):

1. Don't waste time with the technical grammar explanations. You should browse through Japanese the Manga Way once, but only to make sure you understand the meaning of the sentences...don't worry about the "why?" of it all. It doesn't matter why a sentence means what it means. You just need to be clear on what it means, and you're all set.

2. Find the Japanese the Manga Way pre-made deck (it has a thread somewhere on this site, shouldn't be too hard to find with google), don't try to make your own. And make sure you use the OPTIMIZED Core2K deck, not the one in the original order.

3. When SRS-ing, format the cards to be as easy to answer as possible. For me, that means having both the Kanji sentences and their audio in the question ( Core has audio, and for the Japanese the Manga Way deck, you can generate the audio automatically, in Anki), and passing them when you know both the meaning of the sentence, and the meaning of each word used (except the particles...which don't have meanings...they do have a function, but the way you understand their function is by understanding the meaning of the sentence...there's no reason to worry about individual particles). I've been doing my SRS-ing this way for a long time. It worked just as well as if I had done it the other way around. And it took me half the time...or less.

4. Suspend i+2, i+3 sentences (sentences that are too hard, because they have more than one unknown thing in them). Also suspend sentences where the translation is unclear, or you suspect there is some kind of error. Also suspend sentences that contain words that seem too exotic or rare to be worth learning this early in the process. Also suspend sentences that just plain bug you. Also set your leech threshold to 4 or 5, so that sentences that you have trouble with get suspended. What I'm getting at is: learn only that which is within your grasp, don't waste time trying to learn stuff that's too hard.

5. Make a plan that allows you to pace yourself. Don't add too much content at once, or you'll end up getting overwhelmed. 100 cards/day, while skipping days from time to time (when the reviews pile up, or when you haven't had a good night's sleep), should be a good pace that will allow you to finish a couple of days early.

6. This is probably the most important part. Keep reviewing, even after the end of the month and a half. Indefinitely, in fact. It's actually on the back-end of the process that the power of SRS really kicks in. And it doesn't take a huge amount of time. With the approx. 2,500-3,000 sentences you intend to learn, you'll be under a half hour per day within a few days after you stopped adding content. Within a month, it's going to be 15 minutes or less.

7. If you only add 100 cards/day, the SRS won't take more than three hours/day. Probably less, most days. So do other things as well. Immersion, tutorial videos, Erin's challenge, whatever. But make sure what you're doing is IN JAPANESE. Don't spend your days reading a treatise some guy wrote about Japanese grammar, in English. As fascinating as Linguistics can be, it's not going to teach you the language. Especially not if you read about it in English. Maybe later on, once you can read about Japanese grammar in Japanese, it will be worth doing that.

P.S. If you format your SRS questions the way I suggested, you won't be practicing the Kana. That's unfortunate, but it's worth sacrificing Kana practice for the benefits of having the audio in the question (speeds up your reviews, but it also helps with listening comprehension tremendously, AND it forces you to pay attention to the Kanji more than if you were relying on Kana to read the question).

Besides, you can practice your Kana by reading manga, or other texts with furigana on them. You can add furigana to most webpages...by creating a bookmark with this code in the "Location" field:

Code:

javascript:void(document.location='http://trans.hiragana.jp/ruby/'+%20escape(document.location))

, and "visiting" that bookmark when you wish to add furigana to the current page.