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How many words do you learn per day?

 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies Post Reply
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theallstar
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United Kingdom
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Studies: Japanese, Esperanto

 
 Message 25 of 213
19 June 2009 at 10:29am | IP Logged 
@JS-1:

I'm currently doing Heisig and I do anything between 10 and 30 kanji a day. It feels like it's going to take forever to get though the book. How do you find doing that number per day? Do you find you can recall each kanji easily regardless of doing so many? If you're entering them into an SRS don't you find the number of repetitions per day takes a long time to get through?
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irrationale
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China
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Speaks: English*, Spanish, Mandarin, Tagalog
Studies: Ancient Greek, Japanese

 
 Message 26 of 213
19 June 2009 at 10:59am | IP Logged 
Keep in mind everyone, this isn't a competition or anything. People need to memorize what fits their needs. I think anyone, not memory impaired, can memorize an indefinite amount of words a day, restricted by time only. If you really want to be some kind of genius, you can use fancy memory tricks and the like and probably get even more.    

For me, the words a day I feel comfortable memorizing increase logarithmically with time, starting at 5 to 10 a day and topping off about 40 to 60 words a day after 9 months. I haven't tried to go over 60 to 70 words a day yet. For me, anything beyond that number means decreasing returns of effort. These days, I currently memorize about 50 chinese words a day (including characters, how to write, the word, etc. I don't need to memorize the tones, they always stick). (I use an SRS).
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querido
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United States
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Studies: Mandarin

 
 Message 27 of 213
19 June 2009 at 4:10pm | IP Logged 
Breaking down my chosen Chinese textbook-series into audio flashcards, I've averaged 5 characters per day for six months, which is better than I had imagined.

My flashcards are intentionally redundant: full sentences with audio, their words with audio, and their individual characters- reading, writing, listening, speaking. I wanted to guarantee total mastery of this material, and I have to the extent that I'm able, but my procedures are over-controlling. I should probably (let myself) read ahead and let my brain learn things out-of-order; I'm not a machine.

Ironically, maybe flashcard-making should come after a free-flying mind has already almost guaranteed retention anyway. Then the flashcard program would be a memory leak stopper, period.
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JS-1
Diglot
Senior Member
Ireland
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Speaks: English*, French
Studies: Arabic (Egyptian), German, Japanese, Ancient Egyptian, Arabic (Written)

 
 Message 28 of 213
19 June 2009 at 4:36pm | IP Logged 
theallstar wrote:
@JS-1:

I'm currently doing Heisig and I do anything between 10 and 30 kanji a day. It feels
like it's going to take forever to get though the book. How do you find doing that
number per day? Do you find you can recall each kanji easily regardless of doing so
many? If you're entering them into an SRS don't you find the number of repetitions per
day takes a long time to get through?




I find it easier to remember the way the stories are related to the keywords when I
don't pay attention to how the kanji are actually written so I do this separately.

First of all I try to remember the way the keyword relates to the primitives, just like
Heisig, but I try to use clear and vivid images that are easily recalled instead of
elaborate stories. That way the memorisation takes care of itself. So for 'detach', I
work on the image of a villain wearing a top hat with a belt around his elbow (like one
of those automatic blood pressure machines), which a turkey is pecking at in order to
DETACH it. This takes care of the primitives (top hat, villain, belt, elbow, turkey)
and the keyword. For 'rotation' I think of a plane with a banner streaming behind it
advertising a zoo, and flying around in circles (banner, zoo are the promitives for
ROTATION). I don't like elaborate stories as they can be difficult to recall and it is
easy to forget small details. Then I will go through the flashcards trying to make sure
I remember how the keyword and image relate to each other, but not how the character is
written.

After going through the day's keywords a few times, I will find that there are some
that I have problems with, so I change the images if necessary. Only then do I pay
attention to how the characters are written, and if I can remember the stories easily,
this part becomes fairly straightforward.

I use the printed set of Heisig flashcards, which suits me as they have the keyword on
one side along with the primitives (which are written upside down) and the kanji on the
back. This way I can review both the primitives and the written characters seperately.

As the most important thing for me is to remember the way the primitives and the
keywords relate to each other, this is what I spend most of my time working on. Recall
isn't really a problem if I have made up good enough stories -this was a difficult
lesson for me to learn initially:)

One more thing... I find an SRS slows me down in the early stages of memorising kanji.



Edited by JS-1 on 20 June 2009 at 2:54am

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Ashiro
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United Kingdom
learnxlanguage.com/
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Studies: Spanish

 
 Message 29 of 213
20 June 2009 at 12:24am | IP Logged 
zerothinking wrote:
Between 30 and 250


Holy hell!!??! What?!

:-o <-- this smiley does little justice to my shock at that number.

I'm struggling with 20 per day.
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Ashiro
Groupie
United Kingdom
learnxlanguage.com/
Joined 5787 days ago

89 posts - 101 votes 
Studies: Spanish

 
 Message 30 of 213
20 June 2009 at 12:26am | IP Logged 
It seems everyone is learning words as opposed to sentences.

I've been doing a mix of both and I've found sentences to be much more effective. If I learn just a word then it takes more time for me to recall it in natural usage. As I have no context or 'place' for it. Whereas words I've learnt via sentences have a place, feel and meaning.
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icing_death
Senior Member
United States
Joined 5846 days ago

296 posts - 302 votes 
Speaks: English*

 
 Message 31 of 213
20 June 2009 at 5:12am | IP Logged 
irrationale wrote:
Keep in mind everyone, this isn't a competition or anything.

Many people thrive on competition, so why deny them? If competition hinders you , then don't do it, but there is no
reason to discourage others, right?

Quote:
For me, the words a day I feel comfortable memorizing increase logarithmically with time

Interesting, I find words much easier to learn in the beginning stages.

Edited by icing_death on 20 June 2009 at 5:12am

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vaasha
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Newbie
Czech Republic
lelaon.com
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Speaks: Czech*, English, Norwegian, Finnish
Studies: Welsh

 
 Message 32 of 213
20 June 2009 at 12:29pm | IP Logged 
I think that learning list of separate words does not bring good any results (no offense).
I prefer to learn whole phrases. I like to listen to a song and then translate a several lines of the lyrics. This way I refresh 10-20 words and learn 5 new and because I sing the song to myself few times a day I see what I forgot and renew. Next day I go to the next strophe.



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