I know (probably) how you remember. All of us here are familiar with the SRS approach, but how do you learn material before you start remembering it with your SRS of choice? My learning methods are very inconsistent and this has started to bother me.

For Kanji I usually make stories but sometimes rely on brute memory (I'm sorry Dr. Heisig)

For vocabulary I sometimes try brute force but often put together a sloppy mnemonic with the link-word technique.

For grammar points I find several sentences that all have the point that I'm trying to learn and drill them Japanese to English until it sticks. I do not memorize them and I do not force myself to think of them or use them outside of my reps.

Another question I'd like to ask is, how many of you put data into your srs before you actually learn it?

Thanks in advance!

For words I just throw them in Mnemosyne and learn them when they come up. I don't usually add more than a few (maximum of 20~25) new words at a time... So I pretty much just read them out loud, check translation... and press 0/1 until I 'know' them and rate them 2... Then the next day the same happens until I really learned the words.

Probably not the most efficient way, but it's how I've been doing it since I started last year... so... Yeah, I'm used to that

Some words that just don't stick I try to connect to something ("Hey, it sounds like ---, so this must mean ---" or, now I'm finally into RTK, I use the kanji ('this word uses this kanji ---, *makes connection*, so reading is --- and meaning is ---')

For sentences, I usually add sentences I could understand already, but has 1 or 2 new kanji, or 1 or 2 new words... Or a new grammar point. I use Anki for sentences and just review them until I understand them (minimum time span between reviews = 15 minutes), that's usually pretty fast, the second time I see them I usually remember what it was.

Kanji are the only thing I 'learn' before adding, basically.

For me this works... I wouldn't know how do to it in any different way as well. I imagine that it would be the same, essentially... You just drill them *before* adding, instead of after... I guess that would be the only difference?

Words I found in manga/games/anime and looked up, then added, I usually remember those much easier and don't even have to really 'learn' them in the first place. If I see them, I'll immediately think "Oh, that was from D.Gray-man!" or something, and make the link to the meaning

For Kanji, I of course use this website. At the moment (around 1200 in), I'm doing something like 60-80 a day, and tend to break them up in chunks of usually 20 or 25, whatever's closest to a half/a third/whatever of a 'lesson'. I complete the chunk, add them here, review them. Do the next chunk, repeat until I've got what I want for the day. I delete them all (all the ones for the day), add them again, and review them one last time together. Finally, I'll try to delete/add them one last time before the end of the day (I tend to do the first bit in the morning), then let the site take care of them for me.

The only other thing I use an SRS for is sentences, so I probably wouldn't say I learn the material before I throw it in, per se. Typically I read a sentence I understand/mostly understand (save vocabulary), pop it into the SRS, look up any words I don't know in a J-J dictionary, and plug the definitions into the other side. I don't do any sort of mnemonic or anything for vocabulary so far, I just expect to be able to remember them through repetition, Japanese definitions (which, as a quirk/blessing of the language, typically involve all the same kanji as the word itself), and associative meaning of their kanji makeup. Similarly, I don't drill Grammar other than to put sentences which happen to contain grammar into my SRS - I especially wouldn't attempt any kind of translation. As long as I understand it (whether I can give you a coherent English translation or not, perhaps ESPECIALLY if I can't give you a coherent English translation), I consider it gravy. Honestly, I think the grammar comes easier than the vocabulary in this regard. I didn't really have a good conception at all of what the -tara form was before I started reading, but a few pages in to any manga of your choice and you'd be hard pressed to ever forget it (not that it's complicated). That is some *frequent drilling*.

But that's just my current (and ideal) learning method. I intend to learn by doing, so there's no 'learning' stage before my drilling. Reading/listening IS drilling (play a Military game some time, you'll drill 了解 plenty....), and the drilling IS learning. SRS is my backup drilling.

Anyway, it's terribly possible that I'm just not far enough into the language yet. But as it is, this is how I do.

How did you switch to J-J... I'm almost a year into 'learning Japanese' (only 820 or so kanji though) and I'm still mainly working J-E .. I'm just afraid I'll miss the important details, or won't be able to figure out the meaning of a certain grammar pattern if I don't look up the translations.

I don't think it's a huge problem, and when I read manga I don't translate it in my thoughts, only the words I didn't know before (I look them up, J-E).

My DS dictionary does have J-J entries as well, for even more kanji and compounds than in English... But I can't understand them at this level. ... Still, I sorta feel like I *should have reached* that level after all this time... Being able to go J-J.

Maybe I could but I'm just afraid to miss those details. But... if you can't understand those details, how will you ever learn them, if you don't translate?

Ditto on the still using English. I don't quite understand how I am supposed to go J-J to be honest. Or what purpose it serves. If I come across I word I don't know, I still want to know the English equivalent.

Savara: I use http://www.sanseido.net, which is very concise and therefore a lot easier to use. I still use English as well at the moment, but I also always read the Japanese definition and the Japanese definition is the only one I insert into an SRS. I want to break off English rapidly, but am too scared to go cold turkey (outright laziness, largely), and plan to wean myself. The goal is to make Japanese self-sustaining, which, achieved, is an incredibly powerful thing. It also just gets the meaning much deeper, explaining Japanese with Japanese. These are really simplistic examples that would not cause any difficulties anyway, but for instance, explaining to yourself that a 「電車」 is a 「電力でレールの上を走る乗り物」 or that a 「大勢」 is a 「多くの人」 is completely, completely invaluable reinforcement and you learn even more words and grammar on the way.

As for missing the details, I really don't think you need to worry about that at all. The reason being that, in my opinion (I've said this on the site somewhere else I think), a word (or whole expression) can never be defined by it's definition, only by it's usage. Somewhat contrary to what I said above, try looking up the definition of any English word in the dictionary, and seeing if it REALLY let's you understand how you should be using it. It doesn't. English is useful for a general idea at first, in the same way that describing 'sorrowful' as 'quite sad' is useful, but the actual meaning, the nuance, the situations where it finds common use.. none of these can just be described to you. The TRUE meaning of the word sorrowful is only found in it's use by the people who use it. I'm sure you'll agree that most of the Japanese words you're comfortable with only bare passing resemblance to the English words associated with them in their usage (sugoi, anyone? Wakaru? Takai? Hiroi? Every other word?). You didn't learn any English expressions or words by having them explained to you, not really - at your youngest, there were no words to explain them to you WITH.

So recap: the details are only found in use, so you'll never miss them by listening to how they're used - on the contrary, it's the only place you'll ever find them.


tomusan: Everything I said above, but specifically: The purpose is to let your Japanese feed your Japanese, because one of the minds most POWERFUL tools is it's associative power. Memorizing that 「電気」 is electricity and 「電力」 is electric power/wattage is nice, but memorizing that 「電力」 is [電気の力」 is FANTASTIC. As for wanting to know an English equivalents in general, as above, that's fine and all, but words in another language don't typically have true equivalents anyway. Only vague synonyms, with an even lower level of equality in use than synonyms within English have. Even the loaned OK (and, indeed, most other loaned words) doesn't actually mean what the English OK means. Nothing *does*.


nest0r: I still primarily think in English (sadly), so when I'm reading Japanese there's an English track going on the very back of my head, but it's (usually) not a translation. It's usually a commentary running something like "Oh right" and "Used here I think that means..". Even that I try to cut off as much as possible. Beyond that, I'm not exactly sure what you're asking. I translate as little as possible (when I do, it's generally pidgin, the same kind of english that pops into my head when trying to remember kanji I've already dropped the story for, more like flashes of meaning and half-words), and an SRS (along with natural encounters) is my memorization. I don't stare at a word and run it through my head over and over and over when I first encounter it or anything. It's more like my SRS 'first reminder' of a word I didn't actually know yet. I failed. Oops! Quick review, and back into the queue! I mean, memorization isn't this thing that has to take especially concerted effort. I memorize things accidentally all the time. I've memorized how to play Halo by playing it, not by staring at the B button and whispering "B means PUNCH B means PUNCH" over and over again. There is a brief 'memorization' phase at the start, if you want to call it that, but it's so identical to my reviews (the goal of which is also memorization?) that I don't feel a need to distinguish the two artificially.

I'm just really confused by what you're asking. Why would someone need to translate a sentence into English to either understand the meaning or be able to put it into an SRS? Isn't the whole idea of learning a language NOT to need to do that? Maybe we ARE having some clash of semantics

Thumbs up to tokyostyle XD and a wish of seriously good luck to your post-RTK work, nest0r! Kicking it in to high gear!
Actually posting to quickly apologize for making the base assumption in my post that English was Savara's native language. I believe it's come to my attention that would actually be Dutch? That makes some of my comments aimed toward you specifically comically less applicable, but I hope you understand what I was trying to say regardless

(I seem to be invading about every topic on this forum at the moment, sorry about that.)

I just find it very hard to imagine what you would put in the answer field of a sentence, if not the translation. I do have about 5 sentences without translation in Anki, and I put something like "^_^" in the answer field, for one card (I can remember it just because it's my only J-J card, well.. sorta) I've put "王 － 国などを治める人。" but together with that I also put
"王家 - royal blood/family.
治める - to rule"

so I suppose it doesn't even count as a J-J card.

I guess I should check things first in J-J and if I still don't understand only then go J-E ... But it's hard to give up that control of 'understanding *everything*' (while, if you translate, you still don't understand everything - I do realise that.). I guess it's the same thing that made/makes giving up subtitles so very hard.

... It's crazy to think I never watched anything in English without Dutch or English subtitles until last year. (A bit of a control freak, in certain areas, I suppose.)

Try making j-e (or whatever..) cards for your j-j definitions..

I totally hear you, and I'm very much a 'whatever method gets you across the finish line' kind of guy, so as long as you're getting there, power to you. But since you said you couldn't imagine what'd be on the answer side of a J-J card, I figured I'd grab a random one of mine. Sometimes I actually leave them blank, too, if I just want to remind myself of some grammar. But otherwise... random from the collection, this one specifically is from one of the very first pages of Yotsubato:
Question: そういえばうちの隣の空き家に新しい人が来るって
Answer: そう　いえば　うち　の　となり　の　あき・や　に　あたらしい　ひと　が　くる　って
１．　そういえば

２．　うち【家】
家庭． ◇ (類)うち
３．　となり【隣】
右（左）のすぐ横． ▼～の家
４．　あきや【空き家】
人が住んでいない家．
So, that's how I do it. Sentence on one side, sentence in hiragana on the other side with any particular points I want to remember listed with writing and kanji (in dictionary form regardless of the sentence, though you can't see that here because they're all nouns), followed by dictionary definitions. I'll occasionally divide a particular number further with A and B or whatever, giving definitions of the definitions, heh. But I frequently use definitions I don't 100% understand, because the definitions aren't what you're drilling - they're just helpful. You'll notice there's nothing under point 1 because it was just an expression I wanted to make sure I took note of on review. Normally I wouldn't write anything at all, but at the time I'd never seen that expression before, and it seemed useful, so I wanted to make a point of it.
So, that's it. I read the sentence. If I can both understand it and give the writing for all of the kanji, I consider it passed. If I can't, it's failed. If it's failed because I didn't understand it, I check out the definitions, and if necessary would also look up any grammar points. Usually, though, I'll understand it just fine (I understood it the first time, after all). The real point for me is to learn the vocabulary, and to have correct Japanese sentences popping back up at me consistently.

Thanks for explaining.

There's a few blog posts regarding the move to J-J here:

http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blo...ctionaries

I often have one-sided sentence cards, or else they have very little on the other side...
Sometimes I can figure out the sentence on my own, but I still want to repeat it and learn it better.
For my sentences, I just put the info I don't know already. So if there's a new word, I'll put the reading and meaning on the other side.
人間は土を耕すのに棒の先に平たい石を取り付けて道具にした
I do know most of those words, but I'd like to get more exposure for some of them... I didn't know the meaning of 取り付ける, so that's the only thing I put for the answer(J-E)

So, another question on J-J cards...Using the above examples seems sensible, so
電力でレールの上を走る乗り物 I can`t read the Kanji yet. I know what it means roughly, "electric car above rails running thing." So I am basically just translating the meaning into English. Do you still enter in definitions that you can`t read?

Using the example on AJATT (The how to use Sanseido page) ここ

ここ ｛▲此△処/▲此△所｝ All the different Kanji with that reading?

〈代〉
（１） 話し手に近いところをさす語．
（２） 自分のいる所．
（３） この点・状態． ▼～一番（＝最も大事なところ）
（４） 現在．今．

For all of those, as I can`t read them yet, I am just using Heisig keywords and basically guessing what they mean. (Not blind guessing, been learning Japanese for nearly a year now)

I think I understand the why J-J could be helpful, thinkin back, a lot of the words I remember well are ones I`ve thought about literally and found amusing. Things like "toriniku", or anything with the word "mono" come to mind.

Ideally, if you don't understand a word in the definition you can look it up as well and enter definitions of those too. If you're really committed (like the AJATT guy), you can just keep tunneling like that until you get it. Personally, I utilize English dictionaries (commonly rikaichan to save time, actually, but I'm careful to only pop up words I genuinely don't know) to help me understand definitions if I can't get them after tunneling once or twice, and plan to until I have enough of a foundation that I don't have to tunnel too deeply, because I don't have that level of obsessive drive. So I do sometimes use definitions that I might not understand upfront, but I make sure I do understand them (at least through English assistance, and at least roughly) before entering them. Even if you have to use English a step or two down in your (mental, not SRS) definition, you still have a Japanese route in between the two (provided you don't just mentally substitute the Japanese definition with the English assistance wholesale), which I personally find useful. Describe the one with the other and you're learning two things at once The definition describes the word, and the word the definition...

So, in that example of ここ, I'd make sure I understood the definition sentences even if I had to resort to English, while still making sure to note the reading of the words so I can read the definition to myself in Japanese (at least at the time I enter it in). I don't sweat it if I can't remember the exact readings or anything in a DEFINITION during review later, because as in an above post, the definition isn't what you're reviewing in that particular card - it's just assistance. Though, I have been known to grab a particularly interesting definition and use THAT as a NEW card...

Actually, I love your example, because just scanning through those example definitions you posted was (as typical) enlightening for me on how the Japanese explain things, while also seeing them use Japanese to explain the word in a very similar way to how it was originally explained to me in English, which handily reinforces the word (not that koko needs a lot reinforcement!). I think it really illustrates the point of the whole exercise.

Since I drill sentences and not words, though, I wouldn't put every single definition down there like that. I'd only plug in the definition(s) appropriate to it's use in the particular sentence, both to save space and just for.. rationality. Since the word is koko, they're pretty much all apt no matter what sentence you're dealing with, so I'd just pick one or two definitions on preference. I find 話し手に近いところをさす語 (word indicating locations near the speaker) interesting, and I might put it in simply for an interesting circumstantial review, but 自分のいる所 (place one exists) is very to-the-point

And, yeah, exactly what you said. It's hard to ever forget a word like toriniku when you know how it's composed, and hard to ever forget that 鳥 and 肉 have those two (among other..) readings as well. That sort of wonderful cross-associating double-memorization is the benefit of kanji in general, and this whole thing is just another piece that helps put it all together in a very similar way.

Oh, just for the record, 電力でレールの上を走る乗り物 is like "An electric powered vehicle run along rails" (lit: electric power by rail-top along run vehicle). I mention this only because that specific sentence is what actually first let me realize that normally intransitive verbs like run and swim can use を with whatever it is you're running on/swimming in/flying through/etc. I had no idea before that, and think it's worth pointing out! Power to the dictionary

I wish I could ever write a post shorter than a novel! Curse my verbiage!

Anyway, good luck, and as always, adapt to what suits you. If you find it's useful to define your definitions with English on the same card or something, all the more power to you, it's just not what I do.

QuakingShoe, a lot of the stuff you are writing is pure scripture. Some of the stuff you wrote echoes some of the things I put in a recent blog post, http://www.glowingfaceman.com/2008/04/wh...nyway.html

Here's how I've been doing sentences lately. On the question side, of course, the sentence. On the answer side, I put readings of words. I also put the English translation IF one is available (ie, if the sentence comes from Yahoo辞書 or Tae Kim), but I put the English translation invisibly. With my SRS, Mnemosyne, there's a "cheat" to add invisible text, just enclose it in <>. That's because Mnemosyne parses html code, so the English translation gets parsed as nonsense html code and ignored.

EXAMPLE (a sentence from Tae Kim, who provided an English translation)

質問: 「寒い」とアリスが田中に言った。

答え: <"'Cold', Alice said to Tanaka.">寒い　【さむい】
田中　【たなか】

When reviewing, IF you need to see the invisible text, just edit the card. (For other SRS's than Mnemosyne, you'll have to figure out some other trick)

The amazing thing is, if you're like me, you almost never need to check the invisible text.

Right now, I don't add J-J definitions, and certainly not J-E definitions. Right now I don't add definitions at all. As QuakingShoe said, the word is defined by how it's used. So what I do is just add a bunch of sentences for each new word. Of course, I have the advantage of a huge vocabulary... when you're starting, its very hard to find a sentence using the target word without other unknown words.

The exception to the invisible English translation, is if the sentence is idiomatic or has highly unfamiliar grammar. In that case, I'll make the English translation visible until I've reviewed it enough to understand it, then I'll go back and make it invisible.

IN-DEPTH EXAMPLE

I recently added the word 追う to my lexicon. Here are all the cards that entailed (you can go ahead and use them to add this word to your own lexicon). I think these all came from Yahoo辞書. These use the invisible text trick, if you dont use Mnemosyne, figure out how to make text invisible on your own SRS.

Some of these are a little redundant (chasing a 泥棒 vs. chasing a 犯人...) but that's cuz I go for lots of fast cards; my daily review session usually consists of about 300 card reviews, all done in about an hour.

Q: 彼は警察に追われている
A: <"The police are after him.">警察 【けいさつ】
追う 【おう】

Q: 日を追って暖かくなってきた
A: <"It is getting warmer day by day.">追って 【おって】
暖か 【あたたか】

Q: 時間に追われる
A: <"to be pressed for time">時間 【じかん】
追う 【おう】

Q: 泥棒を追う
A: <"to chase a thief">泥棒 【どろぼう】
追う 【おう】

Q: 牛を追う
A: <"to drive cattle">牛 【うし】
追う 【おう】

Q: 彼は母親の後を追うように死んだ
A: <"his death followed shortly after his mother's">母親 【ははおや】
後 【あと】
追う 【おう】
死ぬ 【しぬ】

Q: 彼は物質的快楽のみ追っている
A: <"He is only after physical pleasures.">物質的 【ぶっしつてき】
快楽 【かいらく】
追う 【おう】

Q: 犯人を追う
A: <"to chase a criminal">犯人 【はんにん】
追う 【おう】

Q: 猫を追う
A: <"to chase a cat away">猫 【ねこ】
追う 【おう】

Q: 羊を追う
A: <"to drive sheep (in or out)">羊 【ひつじ】
追う 【おう】

Q: 仕事に追われる
A: <"to be pressed by work">仕事 【しごと】
追う 【おう】

Q: 国を追われる
A: <"to be exiled from one's country">国 【くに】
追う 【おう】

Q: 地位を追われる
A: <"to be driven from one's post">地位 【ちい】
追う 【おう】

By the way, if you absolutely insist on a direct J-E card, one way to "cheat" it into a J-J sentence is to take this sentence (courtesy of Tae Kim) and modify it appropriately:

Q: 「友達」は、英語で「ｆｒｉｅｎｄ」という意味です。
A: 友達　【ともだち】
英語 【えいご】
意味 【いみ】

(This is kind of a joke. I don't really recommend doing this...)

Hmm.. That blog entry was good and I'm getting really interested in the whole concept of using a J-J dictionary. I very rarely use other than E-E dictionary for English words so why should it be any different for Japanese. I just haven't really given it any thought before..

Well.. One reason for not getting one before would simply be because you just cant find any Japanese books around here and shipping overseas can cost some serious clams.. Well perhaps it's not really that expensive in comparison but anything can be too expensive for a student..

Still. I think I'm going to buy that dictionary for kids that they recommended.


Some great posts everyone!!

http://forum.koohii.com/showthread.php?p...1#pid19171

I just posted it here ^_^