日本語の勉強日記: Time for Some Changes

I've been thinking lately that it's time to change up my Japanese study method. I've internalized a lot of vocab and grammar, and now it's time to put it into practice.

1. Stop Using Anki. 

I have over 3,300 active words in Anki right now. It's not the total of my passive vocab (which probably hovers around 6,000 or so), but it represents a substantial number of the words I've learned in the past five months. I credit Anki with vastly improving my ability to understand both written and spoken Japanese.

At this point, however, it's just a drag. I feel like I'm learning more - and more quickly - by reading and listening. Anki was great when I could barely make sense of the basics, but now that my comprehension is starting to pick up speed, it feels like it's time to take off the training wheels. So I'll be shifting over to using Steve Kaufmann's "random repetition" approach to language learning. 

I still plan to make short lists of words I don't know that I encounter in my reading, and studying them briefly after reading an article. And I'll drill myself on random kanji readings in KanjiBox, an app I absolutely love. For the most part, I'm going to rely on repeated exposure to drill new words into my noggin. 

2.  More Speaking Practice

My spoken Japanese still sucks, mostly because I only speak once every one or two weeks. So, starting today, I'll speak at least three times a week for the next month.I want to see, after all of this studying, if it's possible to push my speaking ability up a level or two with regular practice.

3. Continue As Much Reading and Listening as Possible 

This is status quo, though I might try and push myself to read even more NHK than average. On the listening side, I'm continuing to listening to ＮＨＫジャーナル, NHK's daily news show podcast. I can usually pick up a lot from this if I've read the news earlier in the day. I'll also be working my way through アメリカの小学生が学ぶ歴史教科書, a.k.a. What Young Americans Know About History. This little gem, which I picked up at Half Price Books, is a summary of E.D. Hirsch's books on American history, with Japanese and English parallel text.　すごい！

Not sure how it'll all turn out, but looking forward to the journey. I'll keep you updated on my progress in the coming weeks.