dampingwire Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4662 days ago 1185 posts - 1513 votes Speaks: English*, Italian*, French Studies: Japanese
| Message 249 of 256 10 March 2016 at 2:30pm | IP Logged |
(This update is also posted on the alternate forum).
W/E 2016-03-06 34h48m
Audio: 08:13
Vocab: 00:08
Reading: 14:04
Grammar: 02:35
Video: 09:48
I managed to read NHK News on only four days this week, but I did spend nearly an hour on 新完全マスター N2 読解 on one of the other days, so I
think I can claim to have done some useful reading on at least five days.
I've spent a reasonable amount of time watching drama. I've managed to pick up Japanese subtitles for ドラゴン桜 so I'll start working through
that in more detail soon. The language is quite different to the other series I've worked through in some detail, ミス・パイロット. ドラゴン桜 is
set in a school, so there's a lot of teenagers chatting, whereas ミス・パイロット is all about a group of trainee pilots, so the speech is
usually more formal.
I'm working to get my Anki sentence deck under control. As I write this there are ~500 reviews waiting out of ~4700 active sentences. The
number of outstanding reviews was ~1500 a week or so ago, so it's clearly coming back under control. As expected, all the striaghtforward
sentences are shuffling off into the distance and those with more challenging vocabulary are repeating quite often. That's as it should be.
I'm using colour to highlight new vocabulary; I'll soon probably manually write out those new words that don't stick to help get them bedded
in. I'm also activating 10 new sentences per day from iKnow. I'll probably pick up the pace there soon, as I'd like to activate a further
300 sentences by the end of the month.
Apart from working through みんなの日本語中級 for my weekly tutorial, I've not done any grammar work. That said, I do think that repeatedly
seeing the DOBJG sentences is helping cement in a few of the grammar concepts that don't come up regularly enough in my normal reading.
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kraemder Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5181 days ago 1497 posts - 1648 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish, Japanese
| Message 250 of 256 10 March 2016 at 4:03pm | IP Logged |
About what level would you rate the みんなの日本語中級? I've always been curious about those books but kind of think it
would probably be too easy. It sounds like we're doing a similar routine.
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dampingwire Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4662 days ago 1185 posts - 1513 votes Speaks: English*, Italian*, French Studies: Japanese
| Message 251 of 256 12 March 2016 at 9:49pm | IP Logged |
I think みんなの日本語初級 I & II (the earlier series) get you to N4 or so.
みんなの日本語中級 I & II probably get you past N3 and on the way to N2.
They are not aimed at JLPT, so for the JLPT I think you would have to supplement them with something like
新完全マスター to be confident of having covered enough grammar. Similarly, for vocabulary you are going to
need to pick up a bunch from general reading.
That said, I'm enjoying the new みんなの日本語中級 and I like the approach that they've taken with book I
(I'm only on the second chapter of book II so it's a little early to judge that one).
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dampingwire Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4662 days ago 1185 posts - 1513 votes Speaks: English*, Italian*, French Studies: Japanese
| Message 252 of 256 16 March 2016 at 2:11am | IP Logged |
(This update is also posted on the alternate forum).
W/E 2016-03-13 32h26m
Audio: 12:55
Vocab: 00:00
Reading: 10:14
Grammar: 02:19
Video: 06:58
I managed to read NHK News on five days this week, but I only managed one article on Monday. I'm now trying to force myself to read the first two articles regardless of length,
rather than looking for shortish single paragraph ones. I'm still cutting myself some slack if any of them are longer than 3 paragraphs though!
I've managed to fit in a reasonable amount of drama, although less than last week. I've not gone back re-watch ドラゴン桜 while working through the Japanese subs yet,
My Anki sentence deck is slowly coming under control. In fact, as I write this on Tuesday, I've managed to complete all the reviews. I'm pleased about that but it has cut into the
time that I wanted to devote to reading practice. I could still probably activate a further 300 sentences this month, but I'm going to leave it at an average of 10/day or
thereabouts for now so that I don't risk any form of Anki burnout. I also need to get my Kanji deck under control so that I can target the vocabulary for みんなの日本語中級 Chapter
15, which I'll probably be starting on Monday.
I've not written much about the weekly Japanese lessons at work. The initial 10-week course is now over, but we've found the budget for ~17 more lessons to take us to the end of
the scholastic year (the tutor is employed by a local FE college). Half a dozen people dropepd out but a few more have sprung up to replace them, so each of the two classes still
has about a dozen people in them. There's slightly more emphasis on seeing hiragana now, the pace has picked up a little and there's actual 宿題 (although it's pretty brief and
optional). I'm still finding the speaking practice useful.
Edited by dampingwire on 16 March 2016 at 2:13am
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dampingwire Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4662 days ago 1185 posts - 1513 votes Speaks: English*, Italian*, French Studies: Japanese
| Message 253 of 256 29 March 2016 at 12:58am | IP Logged |
(This update is also posted on the alternate forum).
W/E 2016-03-20 33h28m
Audio: 06:25
Vocab: 00:20
Reading: 13:51
Grammar: 03:33
Video: 08:35
W/E 2016-03-27 26h23m
Audio: 05:37
Vocab: 00:08
Reading: 11:00
Grammar: 02:37
Video: 06:44
I managed to read NHK News on five days of the first week, but I only managed two days of the following week. I'm still trying to
remember to read over lunchtime at work, but sometimes I still forget.
I've started going through ドラゴン桜 using Japanese subs, although I've not put enough time into it yet. I am finding plenty of drama
to watch though, so I'm getting to hear a reasonable amount of Japanese.
My Anki sentence deck still needs more work, but I am completing the daily reviews. I've yet to get back to the Kanji deck: that can
wait a while longer.
I'm now working on Chapter 15 of みんなの日本語中級 II for my tutorials. There are (generally) three audio pieces per chapter to listen
to and understand, so that's providing useful listening practice too.
I've managed to sit down and read a few pages of 新完全マスター N2 読解 over this fortnight: I'm conscious of the fact that I need to
find more time to get on with reading. I think it is on the way to becoming my weakest skill.
Edited by dampingwire on 29 March 2016 at 1:01am
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dampingwire Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4662 days ago 1185 posts - 1513 votes Speaks: English*, Italian*, French Studies: Japanese
| Message 254 of 256 26 April 2016 at 10:41am | IP Logged |
(This update is also posted on the alternate forum).
W/E 2016-04-03 26h44m
Audio: 09:45
Vocab: 00:19
Reading: 11:23
Grammar: 02:40
Video: 02:37
W/E 22016-04-10 25h29m
Audio: 03:20
Vocab: 00:29
Reading: 12:25
Grammar: 03:37
Video: 04:44
W/E 22016-04-17 31h57m
Audio: 07:57
Vocab: 00:17
Reading: 14:19
Grammar: 03:31
Video: 03:55
W/E 22016-04-24 31h32m
Audio: 11:15
Vocab: 00:22
Reading: 12:29
Grammar: 02:51
Video: 06:33
I didn't realise that I'd neglected this log for a whole month!
I've been concentrating on working through the 新完全マスター N3 sentences, and I've finally managed to activate all of them. I'm still in the
process of taking the problematic ones to my tutor to sort out, but they are all popping up regularly for me to digest even before that.
I've started to watch ドラゴン桜 intensively. It's tougher than I thought it would be but I am finding it useful so I'll keep going with that.
Something that has been much improved lately has been my consistency with NHK News. For the pas 10 days or so it has almost exclusively covered
just the earthquake in 熊本, but that has meant a constant reinforcement of vocabulary in that area.
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dampingwire Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4662 days ago 1185 posts - 1513 votes Speaks: English*, Italian*, French Studies: Japanese
| Message 255 of 256 31 May 2016 at 8:33pm | IP Logged |
(This update is also posted on the alternate
forum).
W/E 2016-05-01 26h19m
Audio: 12:36
Vocab: 00:15
Reading: 11:36
Grammar: 01:52
Video: 00:00
W/E 2016-05-08 36h53m
Audio: 15:23
Vocab: 00:27
Reading: 16:57
Grammar: 02:37
Video: 01:29
W/E 2016-05-15 34h04m
Audio: 13:52
Vocab: 00:23
Reading: 16:08
Grammar: 02:31
Video: 01:10
Once again I've managed to avoid writing anything here for a few weeks.
I've been putting quite a bit of time into my sentence deck. I've been systematically entering sentences from 日本語を学ぼう
N3 and I think reviewing them is helping me internalise some of the grammar that previously didn't want to stick. I've also
been working on a subset of my Kanji deck, basically anything that I've tagged as coming from みんなの 日本語. I've done this
as I thought it would help me with the new vocabulary I need for tutorials, and so far it seems to be working well.
I've seemingly managed to keep up my consistency with NHK News. Of the 21 days covered by this status update, I've read at
least one article on 19 of those days. Mostly I've read at least two articles, which generally takes 20 minutes or so. On a
few occasions I've read all 7 main articles. Whether I've understood them correctly is something else :-)
The amount of video I've watched has dropped, as I've been working on sentences, but I have kept up a little bit of
watching ドラゴン桜 intensively. It's still tough, but I'm working through it.
Edited by dampingwire on 31 May 2016 at 8:33pm
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dampingwire Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4662 days ago 1185 posts - 1513 votes Speaks: English*, Italian*, French Studies: Japanese
| Message 256 of 256 31 May 2016 at 8:35pm | IP Logged |
(This update is also posted on the alternate
forum).
W/E 2016-05-22 41h05m
Audio: 15:05
Vocab: 00:21
Reading: 18:55
Grammar: 02:47
Video: 03:57
W/E 2016-05-29 33h34m
Audio: 12:30
Vocab: 00:14
Reading: 14:30
Grammar: 04:50
Video: 01:30
I've mostly kept up the habit of reading NHK News every weekday over the past two weeks. I'm now noticing that stories often continue over several days or
weeks. That's no surprise of course, but I'm pleased that I can occasionally read the first sentence and immediately twig that this is the "gambling
baseball player" scandal, or whatever. That's certainly encouragement to keep reading!
I've also gone back to watching drama, currently 富豪刑事デラックス 2. It's incredibly silly, but there's lots of repetition so it makes it feel like I know
what's going on (although I still need the subtitles to make sense of it). I've not kept up the intense watching of ドラゴン桜, but I have occasionally
intensively listened to various JPOD101 lessons instead.
I've resumed working through the exercises in 新完全マスター N3 文法. This time through I'm just doing the exercises and noting the results. Previously I was
studying the grammar and tackling the associated problems the next day. What I'm really trying to see is how much of the grammar I've retained, especially
now that I have the example sentences in Anki. So I don't want to slow myself down by working through the grammar first. The other side-effect is that I can
do more than one lesson each day - in fact I'm only limited by the amount of time I can make available. I think I have less than 20 problem sets left to do,
so hopefully they will all be done by the end of June at the latest.
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