How can you be so sure you're not making progress? We're not able to constantly feel the same rate of progression as we improve, because the more we learn, the more we move on to infrequent uses of the language.

When we start out, we start with the more common words and phrases, and being that they're common we obviously come across them often, making us really feel the progress.

As we move away from the most common stuff, we get into less and less common things as we go. You could be learning at the exact same pace, but since you're not coming across and getting a sense of confirmation of what you learn as much as you used to, you might simply not feel like you're learning as much as you did.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqMXRpREFO8

You're still probably making the same amount of progress if you are putting in the same amount of effort it just doesn't feel like it. If you are starting out at zero then one new "piece of knowledge" is a 100% increase from where you started but if you have 100 "pieces of knowledge" one new "piece" is only a 1% increase. If you have 10,000 pieces then you can guess that you're going to need a whole bunch of new "pieces" to feel like you're making any progress.

Yeah I agree, I wouldn't expect to feel the difference after two months with that amount.

Read more! Read read read

It might help to try for a JLPT.  N2 or N1?

TwoMoreCharacters - Interesting video, it might just be that I'm spoiled by learning all these common words and hearing them constantly and now that grammar is probably what keeps me from understanding more progress feels slower.

PotbellyPig - I've neglected grammar for far too long, I did read through Tae Kim but only while I was already in Japan D:
So I think that's what mostly hinders my comprehension.

thistime - Yeah I am probably making progress... just doesn't feel like it... or just feels too slow

Realism - I'll take this as a challenge. I'll try to read a novel every month in the new year.

EasyJapanezy - It took me a little over a year. I started this deck around September '11. I got the 10k by merging a JLPT 1 vocab list with the core 6k, deleting duplicates and anything I thought was useless and adding a lot of vocab I encountered on the way. I have no idea what level I am at currently. I think my Japanese is pretty lopsided.. I have good understanding of kanji/vocab and on the other hand poor grammar/general comprehension.

Tzadeck - JLPT is only once a year in December where I live. So the next possibility would be in one year. Do you recommend any books to study for N2 or N1? I already learned all vocab from the JLPT 1 vocab list I found online, but I don't know where I'm at grammar wise.

dtcamero - You mean like... a Japanese gf/bf? I'm not living in Japan, so I don't think that's a realistic option.

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To someone who has poor understanding of grammar (only what's in Tae Kim mostly), but knows a lot of vocab, would you recommend just reading / listening a lot, or also to work through some sort of grammar book? I really only am interested in understanding Japanese at the moment, not worried about speaking too much.

Thanks for all the input guys/gals, I appreciate it a lot.

I learned a couple of languages (including English) by just reading, watching TV and listening to radio (regular books and media, no educational materials). Granted, that's not gonna happen with Japanese (because learning the writing system takes studying), but if Japanese was written with the Roman alphabet, that's definitely the only method I'd use. Unfortunately, the writing system is the one thing that's holding me back, so my tried and tested method isn't helping me.

Sound like your situation is the complete opposite of mine, so you should give my method a try.

thistime wrote:

If you are starting out at zero then one new "piece of knowledge" is a 100% increase from where you started

Well, technically, it's an infinite % increase. And then it's 100% from 1 to 2.

I'm a huge fan of vocab decks (built mine to 18,000 before I stopped studying)... but... I think you did it wrong.

I mean it's a bit late now but you should have done grammar up to N2 level first and THEN done the 10k vocab. I did it that way and made insanely good progress. So yeah, definitely get your grammar up to speed and you'll notice a lot of improvement I think.

Go re-read something you had trouble with before (6Mo to a year ago).

Looking where you're going is daunting, looking where you are is discouraging, but look back and you'll see how far you've come.

Then just focus on reading. Most other skills are situation dependent, but you can read by yourself, for yourself, at your own pace, and it does your language learning brain no end of good.

drdunlap wrote:

If you have 10,000 vocabulary then just read a lot. Read things you like. Read novels. The more you do the better you'll get...

Reading: check. But what would be the counterpart of this plan for listening? NHK Easy is all fine and dandy, but there is only so much robotic-sounding news you can bear on a daily basis. And the same goes for fairy tales being read by a kindergarten teacher.

I've been doing the opposite: listening to things I don't like but can partly understand without having read a script first. In a way, it's more fun than ploughing through fun material of which I don't get even 5%. May I ask how you trained your listening?

Thanks for all responses, reviving this thread just to ask a question:

Since I've posted this on 15th December I've worked my way through the dictionaries of Japanese grammar, I've already got through Basic, Intermediate and am now at the end of the Advanced dictionary, srsing one example sentence per grammar point.

Now my question would be, is there still a lot of grammar to be covered, how exhaustive are the dictionaries, at what JLPT level do the dictionaries put me, grammar wise?

I also haven't disregarded the advice concerning reading, I'm currently reading my second light novel, clocking speeds at about 7 minutes per page (it feels sooo slow, I hope my speed improves soon). Now that I have some basic grasp of grammar I plan on just keeping up with srs reviews, but not too many, and reading as my primary method of studying.

Maybe someone has some information, maybe articles or something on rate of improvement in reading speed, I could use some encouragement. Recently had a good laugh, when I watched the first episode of the kokoro connect anime and they performed a scene which took me about 2 hours to read through in about 5 minutes, talking at the speed of lightning.

edit:

Just for clarifying, I'm asking for the JLPT level because I want to take the test in December, but am not sure what level to aim for. I think N2 would probably be possible for me, but maybe I could reach N1 within the next year? I don't know.

Last edited by apirx (2013 January 22, 1:52 pm)