Vocabulary is definitely the biggest challenge to becoming fluent in Japanese. In the beginning, you feel like you're making a lot of progress, because everything you learn is immediately applicable. After a while though, you're not able to make use of everything you learn immediately, meaning that it can feel like you're not progressing anymore. This is when many people seem to quit. Good job on making it this far 👍
i always use what i learn immediately. i usually talk to myself and making scenarios about the vocabularies i learned. and i'm making progress so efficiently
Tolerate the Ambiguity. That's one thing I've learned the true extend of when I found a line in Lucky Star that I couldn't understand even with Japanese and English subtitles. I just couldn't understand what they meant. But at the end of the day, not understanding 10 seconds of a 24 minute show isn't that big of a deal. Whatever joke they were trying to tell isn't worth the effort.
That is why it is good to watch things u understand only 70% so when you revisited it a week/month later you'll feel your progression by understanding it then.
5+ hours a day is no joke. I tried to do something similar over the winter break from university and I only managed ~80 hours in 3 weeks which isn't a bad effort, but after seeing people like days of french n swedish doing similar challenges, it really put into perspective just how much farther the road ahead stretches. Some days I could only manage 20 minutes of anki reviews for the whole day
Alright, this is my personal story on language learning : I'm Italian and like 95% of Europeans we have to get into language learining since we're 5 or something like that ( depends on where you are from ), so i've been learning english for my entire life basically so i've got plenty of experience with language learning. Than in high school i found out about anime, mangas and how beatiful the japanese culture is. So last year during the start of the pandemic I started to learn japanese for about 3 months, than i stopped. I still have no idea why my self, but than i found your videos these days, and you remembered me how language learning can be done without textbooks, teachers etc ... by simply using online material and mangas aswell, making it way more funny to do. So thanks to you I rediscovered Japanese, plus found out that the korean culture is also a really beatiful culture aswell. Your videos also improved in quality, keep up the good work :D
So interesting, I'm currently trying to follow you on the path of learning Japanese and you are giving me so much motivation to reach your level, Thanks !
You're the reason i started learning japanese, and i gotta say that i thank you for recommending it and getting more people into it. I say this since doing anki daily in the morning forced me to get an actual normal morning routine and actually made me more productive during the whole day as well. I couldn't recommend it more and thank you again for getting myself and other people involved with this and at least making me more productive.
I'm doing an average of 3.5 hours and tracking with the same tool. I do Kanji every day, reading every day, Anki every day, Podcasts everyday, TH-cam videos every day. The ones I do 2 to 3 times a week (1 hour for each of those times) is grammar using (now) N3 textbooks and speaking with a Japanese woman.
I've been studying regularly like you've been, but just yesterday I started immersing for 3 and a half+ hours a day, (through anime, youtube and twitch where I've met a couple japanese friends) anki for 1 to 1 hour and a half, and handwriting for another hour under a set schedule. I'm very excited to see how this turns out! I might do more with my remaining time if I feel like it, but this is the minimum to meet every day.
@@rudalph529 I stopped anki since i finished my pre-made decks and I found too bothersome to make my own cards, but I still watch anime in japanese only regurarly and consume japanese content online (also addicted to j-pop so, that 24/7), so, mostly focusing on immersing nowadays. I handwrite whenever I feel like it. I've improved a lot, Even when I feel I shouldn't lol. I maybe should get back yo anki atleast to Review a bit, tho getting through that backlog sure is gonna be tough.
hey man i just wanted to thank you for your videos on japanese. you've motivated me to try and learn the language once and for all after trying & failing for many years. i am very happy to have discovered the immersion + anki method, i've been having so much fun and have made more gains in one month than in one whole year when i tried to study it before. 心の底からありがとうござました！
Lmao, I just realised: I've been doing this emersion thing with english since I was like 13 (or 12?). this is so weird lol. I just never thought of it as studying or anything, it just happened naturally when I was younger because of how interested I was in the western culture and I just felt like english content is _far_ superior to content in my mother tongue. I guess this puts me in a position where I can give you my thoughts. first of all, don't worry too much about the language skills you don't practice. practicing a certain language skill gets you better at it much more efficiently of course. However, merely being in contact with some language makes you better in all of its aspects. I remember just 2 years ago how unnatural and coarse my english was, that was only natural though, since I never had the chance to give much output in english, and I still don't (other than the occasional comments on youtube and reddit). I just immersed myself and got a shit ton of input that my output just naturally gotten better (I mean, I hope so). Second of all, as long as you are in constant contact with new vocabulary, you're effectively expanding your vocabulary. I never used anki or anything to memorise new vocabulary, merely looking up new words was enough. I imagine that's the most cost efficient way but using anki is the most time efficient. (there was a point when I stopped looking at the translation and just looked up the definition in english, if you're studying some language, that's the point you should be aiming for.) Lastly, I think immersion should never feel like a chore. You should do it because you want to do it, not because you think you should be doing it. If you're good at english you'll probably never need any other language, the dubs are often good and if not the subs are basically always there; if you want to learn a certain skill or something the best resources you'll find are almost always in english; and the list goes on. So unless you really want to learn japanese, you can find better use of your time.
This happened to me last year, TH-cam started recommending videos in English to me, I could only understand the minimum to not be painfully to watch and basically I watched a minimum of 3 hours of youtube every day the entire year and the results are amazing, I can listen, read and write very well but I didn't try to talk yet
@@capitalismoburgues5549 your english is great! except for a few mistakes here and there (e.g. "I haven't tried to talk yet" I believe would've better than "I didn't try"...) the results really are amazing
@@xXDarQXx yeah, the thing about English is that in languages derivative from Latin is the part grammatical is easy to learn and a lot of time unnecessarily to even study only mattering the vocabulary (which is very similar too)
bro i really love your videos they are source of my motivation. but what i wanted to say here is i really really really admire your choice of music for your videos
Great point about understanding fundamentals over time. I started immersing this time last year after doing a couple weeks of Duolingo Japanese (I know... not good) and the old MIA RRTK (1000 most common). Before that I only knew "arigato," so I really did start from nothing. I average about 2.5 hours a day in active immersion watching something (I never do passive listening since I am incapable of multitasking), plus 1 hour of Anki (rtk, mining, and using the Tango sentence decks, never pure vocab cards). In the past 3-4 months I feel like I can get very good comprehension in slice-of-life shows, and even more complex shows like Gintama or Full Metal Alchemist, but many things still go over my head due to a lack of vocabulary. At this point grammar is virtually automatic, I rarely need to think about it. But if I don't know a word, I am out of luck. I typically find sentences known as T+1 where I am missing just one component. Great work with this 5 hours challenge! My immersion has been slipping in the past few weeks, so I need to do something like this. Also, I never use subtitles except when on TH-cam where they are sometimes baked into the video. The reason why is I typically use my iPad to watch TV, so I am relegated to Netflix, Hulu, and Crunchyroll which rarely offer J-subs. I imagine this is making me better at listening, since I really have to focus. However I still seem to be fine at reading since I use Anki consistently and periodically read books, manga and news in Japanese. Do you find your comprehension tanks without subtitles? One thing I am always worried about is the fact that real-life conversations don't have subs, Japanese or otherwise, so I always thought it would be counter-productive to have them on. I am curious what you think about this.
In my personal experience I think if you use Japanese subtitles all the time then you can begin to form a dependency upon them, so it's good to also listen without them for pure listening practice.
Sounds like a solid plan. I'm currently using Mnemosyne (Anki alternative) every day because I took a break from studying for about three years and now I have to re-learn thousands of kanji/vocab. After I get back up to N2 vocabulary I'll probably start on translating games and such for further study.
As a trilingual in English, Norwegian and Amharic, I think I have some tips. Norwegian is my mother tongue and I moved to Ethiopia in 2013. I was still young then so learning Amharic wasn't something I loved doing, I hated it. But I had friends who didn't speak Norwegian and I didn't speak English at the time so I was forced to speak Amharic for communication. I learnt how to read and write before moving to Kenya where there was a norwegian school. I forgot EVERYTHING. I had no amharic left in me, none at all. My norwegian definitely improved during this time and we had english classes which taught vocabulary and reading. My english accent was terrible. It was during this time that I got a phone and what did I do with it? I watched youtube with American creators. It helped a LOT. I still didn't speak it though. Also, I started watching anime after a friend of mine begged me to watch Naruto. I watched the dub until I reached Shippuden as I couldn't find it in dub anymore, so sub it was. This was great and I got a good grasp on the Japanese language sounds. The language was exaggerated but it was a fun way to immerse myself. I moved back to Ethiopia and started school again. It was an international school but no one was fluent or comfortable with speaking English. I was forced to speak amharic again. The first years I didn't, I flat out refused to speak amharic as I had been teased about sounding like a baby with my terrible accent. But, I grew more confident over time and finally opened my mouth after a while. I got better every day and now I can say that my accent, although not native, is a whole lot better than what it was before. My reading skills evaporated though and I can't read numbers. Still, it's good enough to say whatever I need to, just without the fancy words. I had neighbours who went to an american school so they spoke fluent english and I was kind of forced to speak english with them too. This came a lot quicker than amharic thanks to those english lessons and youtube videos. And now, I'm trilingual. 1. The best way to learn the language is putting yourself in a spot where you have to speak it. This is the best way, nothing can beat it. Move to that country and just speak and listen, you'll get to the point of fluency in ~2 years even with minimal effort. But if you can't do that, there's always other ways. 2. Make friends speaking target language (WHERE YOU DON'T KNOW A LANGUAGE IN COMMON!!) Forces you to practice that language whether you like it or not and your friends will be patient to teach you. If you don't know anyone, you can make online friends speaking a certain language through language exchange apps. I haven't personally done this but believe it to be effective. 3. Consume content. Consume it day in and day out. This is why so many gen z speak english, they've simply seen that the best content is in English (Which I'm ngl, most is) and they've consumed it, wanting to be in on the trend. Only problem with purely consuming is the lack of speaking practice. If you don't speak it, your face will not be used to using those muscles and you won't reach anywhere close to a native level. You need to speak it. 4. Vocabulary. I would say this is the biggest hurdle, especially in tonal languages. Not only do you have to remember its writing (If you're learning to read and write) but you also have to remember the pronunciation and tonal rule for that word. It can be difficult and that's where flashcard apps like Anki really help. Or, just consume the kind of content where they mention it a lot. For example: If you're watching a crime television show in target language, you can expect there to be a lot of vocabulary related to crime. 5. Consistency. Personally, I find this to be the one I struggle with the most. I've jumped around trying to learn french, german, spanish, danish, swedish, japanese, chinese and korean. I never did any one for longer than a couple of days except for Japanese. I'm on a good streak for learning Japanese now, some 21 days. Consistency is the key to everything that you try to learn, anything at all. If you're doing one of these things for learning, do consistency. Just a little everyday makes such a difference over time. And finally: Place a bet or just learn it with your friends so you can speak in privacy. This is such a good one. If you and your friend learn the language together, you will keep each other accountable AND you'll be able to say whatever you want (that you've learnt of course) without the chance of people hearing in. Just be sure no one around speaks said language (There's some embarrassing stories behind this one) Honestly I'm all over the place but I hope this helped anyone.
You make very quailty videos man . I like hearing about your journey learning new skills .Your video format has it's on personaliry suprise you dont have more subs your diffently going to have 1 million subs 1 day.
Don't worry about not being able to express yourself perfectly. A lot of japanese people will be impressed with your level and support you. 心配しないで、海外のみんなは日本語上手w
The first 1,000 people to use this link will get a 1 month free trial of Skillshare: skl.sh/livakivi07211 I had to re-upload this video because TH-cam decided to delete 30 seconds of audio for no reason of the previous upload lol. Hopefully no issues this time! EDIT: As promised, here's the 3 years update video, where I actually speak Japanese: th-cam.com/video/JVAcg1FuyOY/w-d-xo.html
Also I feel like I am going sooo slow with learning Japanese because my memory sucks so most days I spend not learning anything new, but just reinforcing the words I already know.
Thank you for this video I started learning Jp at the start of 2021 but Sadly i dont have a set schedule for myself, but I do want to gradually learn more.
Sul on nii palju pühendumine(dedication?)! Ma arvan et ma õpin mingi 5 tundi nädalas! See ei ole piisav aga ma saan parem. Aga ma olen natukene jealous et sul on nii palju meedia Jaapani keeles (subtiitridiga). Ainult "Õnne 13"'l ja "Siin me oleme"'l on subtiitrid ETV's! Ja aitäh video eest - väga lahe vaatama.
64/64 Anki days here since starting Japanese, certainly feels like I'm better than when I started, let's see how I feel at 600/600 [hopefully not missing a single day lol]
@@tofuchewer Being able to make content about it definitely does motivate me a bit as it makes it more fun! Although I haven't really made all that much from TH-cam overall yet, especially because most of the views my channel received were unmonetized for the longest time, and I had already learned Japanese for 800+ days before my channel got more than 200 subscribers lol.
Immersion is very OP, I knew a language that was my mother tongue that I just knew but they had really bad movies in that language so there are two other languages, hindi and telugu, i watched those movies with my parents(they know them), occasionally asking them what each word means due to curiousness and sometimes speaking it around the house as a joke and I thought i was cool by saying dialogues but now I realize that helped me a lot and now i almost completely understand both languages( keep in mind my mother tongue is already super similar to hindi)
As someone who has no life I don't find 5 hours a day at all challenging. What's challenging is figuring out what to do to make added time more beneficial.
Did you hear of the Marugoto books? I kinda like them ngl, they got books from a1 to b2 with 2 different types of books for 2 different learning styles
i was wondering, at 3:28 i saw you had yomichan set up for making cards. why didn't you use yomichan for it, instead of manually making them? it lets you add the audio of the word (not directly from the source you're watching, but it is what it is), it can add the pitch pattern whenever it has data on it, and overall takes a lot less time.
I'm wondering what you are using to get the text on the side of the Berserk anime at around 3:25 (I only know about animelon for this kind of subtitles) I believe it's this texthooker thing but I don't know what that is anyway, thank you for the crazy load of motivation
Great video! I would really advise against mining sentences with more than 1 new word though. I used to do it but those cards have consistently ended up causing trouble for me, and I don't learn either of the words well enough. If the word is useful, it will pop up in a 1T sentence sooner or later! Things are so much smoother for me now that I've been stricter in limiting myself to 1T sentences only.
I sometimes have no difficulty even learning 3 to 4 new words from a single card, but sometimes even 1 new word is really hard. Its pretty random honestly, but I have a pretty good intuition about when I think a sentence is going to be too difficult to mine, then I dont mine it indeed!
Possibly, but not sure. Kind of doubtful as I feel like I'm nowhere near done with Japanese, and there are so many other things I want to spend my time on as well once I'm "done" with Japanese.
@@Livakivi If you learn another skill as well, you could probably land a job in Japan if you want to. It's really fun to stay in Japan for a longer period of time. You really get to experience the country in a different way than if you were to just visit for a week or two.
@@SmartJapanHacks you could? to my knowledge, merely being good at english (and the skill the job requires obviously) won't help you get a job in the US or the UK. isn't that the same in japan?
I wouldn't recommend it. Using Anki and reading a lot is all you need to recognize kanji fast. Writing each kanji takes too much time and is mostly useless unless you're planning to live in Japan. Even then most people don't even have a job that requires constant handwriting, and you would have to keep up your writing skills for years and years until then. IMO put all your effort on understanding, then if you think it's worth it try out writing which should be easier since you would already recognize a lot of kanji.
"Tolerating ambiguity is a big part of immersion" TIL I don't immerse myself right in my native language because I use English subtitles all the time when I can lmao
please consider making the background music even quieter, especially given that this video doesn't have subtitles. it really does make it difficult for some people (like myself) to not get fatigued when trying to listen to you.
@@Livakivi i'm listening through my laptop's speakers. they're probably not very high quality speakers. i do find that i'm sensitive to background music being too loud; it confuses my brain when trying to hear the speaker. on the other hand, some youtubers do make their background music very quiet, which is good for me. one example of this is: th-cam.com/video/o_U42kIUme8/w-d-xo.html . the melody in that video "stands out" and would have been too distracting for me, if the volume was any louder than it is in this video.
@@Livakivi In my testing I've generally found that the cheaper and more "tinny" the speakers (e.g. laptop or small TV speakers), the MORE the voice stands out, whereas with good headphones or speakers, the music comes through more. Although it may be because your music is quite treble heavy that this isn't occurring.
Yeah it definitely can be the case. I've resorted to lowering the music volume way more in the newer videos. I always wanted the music to be part of the video, but I do realize that it can get really annoying with specific audio setups and when the listener is trying their hardest just to hear what I'm saying lol. Although, another thing I've noticed, is that with headphones, you can hear the music better indeed, but that makes it into a more unified experience. With bad speakers, you can't really properly make out the music, so its just going to be some distracting noise next to the voice, so it doesn't create the more immersive experience like with headphones.
maybe try deep dive, OhTalkWho オタク is also youtuber that explains it how to do it, basically it's sentence mining(with subs2srs) but with tiny bit of improvement.
how is your workflow for creating new sentence cards in anki? the thing that stops me from making the most of anki is how long it takes to make a card. it seems like such a chore for me if it takes longer than a few seconds. if i could overcome this hurdle, anki will be so much more valuable for me.
Its on my Patreon, I made it a Patreon reward because I don't recommend using it, so its just for those who are curious and want to support the channel.
Hello! I use Netflix which usually has Japanese subs, and I sometimes download subtitles from kitsuneneko. You can find links to decks in the description of my first video!
I don't really know what's the best anime for learning Japanese, it all depends on what level you're at and what you enjoy watching. Personally I used only the Tae Kim's online textbook for learning grammar early on.
Vocabulary is definitely the biggest challenge to becoming fluent in Japanese. In the beginning, you feel like you're making a lot of progress, because everything you learn is immediately applicable. After a while though, you're not able to make use of everything you learn immediately, meaning that it can feel like you're not progressing anymore. This is when many people seem to quit. Good job on making it this far 👍
i don’t feel like i’m making progress at all at the start but alr lol
i always use what i learn immediately. i usually talk to myself and making scenarios about the vocabularies i learned. and i'm making progress so efficiently
@@idekwthow is your japanese nowadays?
My mom introduced my grandma to duolingo about 11 months ago and my grandma has consistently been doing French for 6 hours a day 7 days a week
Let's go that's so wholesome
stop letting her waste her time lmao, introduce her to something like speakly or babbel
Tolerate the Ambiguity. That's one thing I've learned the true extend of when I found a line in Lucky Star that I couldn't understand even with Japanese and English subtitles. I just couldn't understand what they meant. But at the end of the day, not understanding 10 seconds of a 24 minute show isn't that big of a deal. Whatever joke they were trying to tell isn't worth the effort.
That is why it is good to watch things u understand only 70% so when you revisited it a week/month later you'll feel your progression by understanding it then.
Actually on the topic of LuckyStar, have you ever seen someone try to translate the opening song? Lmfao it's absolutely indecipherable 😂
5+ hours a day is no joke. I tried to do something similar over the winter break from university and I only managed ~80 hours in 3 weeks which isn't a bad effort, but after seeing people like days of french n swedish doing similar challenges, it really put into perspective just how much farther the road ahead stretches. Some days I could only manage 20 minutes of anki reviews for the whole day
Alright, this is my personal story on language learning : I'm Italian and like 95% of Europeans we have to get into language learining since we're 5 or something like that ( depends on where you are from ), so i've been learning english for my entire life basically so i've got plenty of experience with language learning. Than in high school i found out about anime, mangas and how beatiful the japanese culture is. So last year during the start of the pandemic I started to learn japanese for about 3 months, than i stopped. I still have no idea why my self, but than i found your videos these days, and you remembered me how language learning can be done without textbooks, teachers etc ... by simply using online material and mangas aswell, making it way more funny to do. So thanks to you I rediscovered Japanese, plus found out that the korean culture is also a really beatiful culture aswell. Your videos also improved in quality, keep up the good work :D
Com'è andata alla fine? Sei arrivato ad N1?🧐
So interesting, I'm currently trying to follow you on the path of learning Japanese and you are giving me so much motivation to reach your level, Thanks !
And these videos serve as extra motivation, it's a great cycle
Exactly LOL
You're the reason i started learning japanese, and i gotta say that i thank you for recommending it and getting more people into it. I say this since doing anki daily in the morning forced me to get an actual normal morning routine and actually made me more productive during the whole day as well. I couldn't recommend it more and thank you again for getting myself and other people involved with this and at least making me more productive.
hows learning japanese going rn?
I was thinking it was crazy for him to get a sponsor so early in his channel then BOOM starts talking about fortnite
Your dedication is truly impressive. As always, thanks for the vid.
I'm doing an average of 3.5 hours and tracking with the same tool. I do Kanji every day, reading every day, Anki every day, Podcasts everyday, TH-cam videos every day. The ones I do 2 to 3 times a week (1 hour for each of those times) is grammar using (now) N3 textbooks and speaking with a Japanese woman.
I've been studying regularly like you've been, but just yesterday I started immersing for 3 and a half+ hours a day, (through anime, youtube and twitch where I've met a couple japanese friends) anki for 1 to 1 hour and a half, and handwriting for another hour under a set schedule. I'm very excited to see how this turns out! I might do more with my remaining time if I feel like it, but this is the minimum to meet every day.
Update?
@@rudalph529 I stopped anki since i finished my pre-made decks and I found too bothersome to make my own cards, but I still watch anime in japanese only regurarly and consume japanese content online (also addicted to j-pop so, that 24/7), so, mostly focusing on immersing nowadays. I handwrite whenever I feel like it.
I've improved a lot, Even when I feel I shouldn't lol. I maybe should get back yo anki atleast to Review a bit, tho getting through that backlog sure is gonna be tough.
hey man i just wanted to thank you for your videos on japanese. you've motivated me to try and learn the language once and for all after trying & failing for many years. i am very happy to have discovered the immersion + anki method, i've been having so much fun and have made more gains in one month than in one whole year when i tried to study it before. 心の底からありがとうござました！
Awesome to hear!
Lmao, I just realised: I've been doing this emersion thing with english since I was like 13 (or 12?). this is so weird lol. I just never thought of it as studying or anything, it just happened naturally when I was younger because of how interested I was in the western culture and I just felt like english content is _far_ superior to content in my mother tongue. I guess this puts me in a position where I can give you my thoughts.
first of all, don't worry too much about the language skills you don't practice. practicing a certain language skill gets you better at it much more efficiently of course. However, merely being in contact with some language makes you better in all of its aspects. I remember just 2 years ago how unnatural and coarse my english was, that was only natural though, since I never had the chance to give much output in english, and I still don't (other than the occasional comments on youtube and reddit). I just immersed myself and got a shit ton of input that my output just naturally gotten better (I mean, I hope so).
Second of all, as long as you are in constant contact with new vocabulary, you're effectively expanding your vocabulary. I never used anki or anything to memorise new vocabulary, merely looking up new words was enough. I imagine that's the most cost efficient way but using anki is the most time efficient. (there was a point when I stopped looking at the translation and just looked up the definition in english, if you're studying some language, that's the point you should be aiming for.)
Lastly, I think immersion should never feel like a chore. You should do it because you want to do it, not because you think you should be doing it. If you're good at english you'll probably never need any other language, the dubs are often good and if not the subs are basically always there; if you want to learn a certain skill or something the best resources you'll find are almost always in english; and the list goes on. So unless you really want to learn japanese, you can find better use of your time.
This happened to me last year, TH-cam started recommending videos in English to me, I could only understand the minimum to not be painfully to watch and basically I watched a minimum of 3 hours of youtube every day the entire year and the results are amazing, I can listen, read and write very well but I didn't try to talk yet
@@capitalismoburgues5549 your english is great! except for a few mistakes here and there (e.g. "I haven't tried to talk yet" I believe would've better than "I didn't try"...) the results really are amazing
@@xXDarQXx yeah, the thing about English is that in languages derivative from Latin is the part grammatical is easy to learn and a lot of time unnecessarily to even study only mattering the vocabulary (which is very similar too)
@@xXDarQXx i havent tried sounds correct (im a native english speaker)
@@verykittypretty wdym? What's sound correct?
Yesterday I hit 1000 cards on the 2k6k deck and you can't imagine how happy I was
Now just the same 5 times more😭
you inspired me to learn japanese, its gonna be heard but im not gonna give up!
I haven't even started the video and I already know I'm gonna love it. You have no idea how fast I clicked this video when I saw you had a new upload
Update: I loved it
bro i really love your videos they are source of my motivation. but what i wanted to say here is i really really really admire your choice of music for your videos
Great point about understanding fundamentals over time. I started immersing this time last year after doing a couple weeks of Duolingo Japanese (I know... not good) and the old MIA RRTK (1000 most common). Before that I only knew "arigato," so I really did start from nothing. I average about 2.5 hours a day in active immersion watching something (I never do passive listening since I am incapable of multitasking), plus 1 hour of Anki (rtk, mining, and using the Tango sentence decks, never pure vocab cards). In the past 3-4 months I feel like I can get very good comprehension in slice-of-life shows, and even more complex shows like Gintama or Full Metal Alchemist, but many things still go over my head due to a lack of vocabulary.
At this point grammar is virtually automatic, I rarely need to think about it. But if I don't know a word, I am out of luck. I typically find sentences known as T+1 where I am missing just one component.
Great work with this 5 hours challenge! My immersion has been slipping in the past few weeks, so I need to do something like this.
Also, I never use subtitles except when on TH-cam where they are sometimes baked into the video. The reason why is I typically use my iPad to watch TV, so I am relegated to Netflix, Hulu, and Crunchyroll which rarely offer J-subs. I imagine this is making me better at listening, since I really have to focus. However I still seem to be fine at reading since I use Anki consistently and periodically read books, manga and news in Japanese.
Do you find your comprehension tanks without subtitles? One thing I am always worried about is the fact that real-life conversations don't have subs, Japanese or otherwise, so I always thought it would be counter-productive to have them on. I am curious what you think about this.
In my personal experience I think if you use Japanese subtitles all the time then you can begin to form a dependency upon them, so it's good to also listen without them for pure listening practice.
Sounds like a solid plan. I'm currently using Mnemosyne (Anki alternative) every day because I took a break from studying for about three years and now I have to re-learn thousands of kanji/vocab. After I get back up to N2 vocabulary I'll probably start on translating games and such for further study.
Was wanting for the update. Keep up the good work
As a trilingual in English, Norwegian and Amharic, I think I have some tips. Norwegian is my mother tongue and I moved to Ethiopia in 2013. I was still young then so learning Amharic wasn't something I loved doing, I hated it. But I had friends who didn't speak Norwegian and I didn't speak English at the time so I was forced to speak Amharic for communication. I learnt how to read and write before moving to Kenya where there was a norwegian school. I forgot EVERYTHING. I had no amharic left in me, none at all. My norwegian definitely improved during this time and we had english classes which taught vocabulary and reading. My english accent was terrible. It was during this time that I got a phone and what did I do with it? I watched youtube with American creators. It helped a LOT. I still didn't speak it though. Also, I started watching anime after a friend of mine begged me to watch Naruto. I watched the dub until I reached Shippuden as I couldn't find it in dub anymore, so sub it was. This was great and I got a good grasp on the Japanese language sounds. The language was exaggerated but it was a fun way to immerse myself. I moved back to Ethiopia and started school again. It was an international school but no one was fluent or comfortable with speaking English. I was forced to speak amharic again. The first years I didn't, I flat out refused to speak amharic as I had been teased about sounding like a baby with my terrible accent. But, I grew more confident over time and finally opened my mouth after a while. I got better every day and now I can say that my accent, although not native, is a whole lot better than what it was before. My reading skills evaporated though and I can't read numbers. Still, it's good enough to say whatever I need to, just without the fancy words. I had neighbours who went to an american school so they spoke fluent english and I was kind of forced to speak english with them too. This came a lot quicker than amharic thanks to those english lessons and youtube videos. And now, I'm trilingual.
1. The best way to learn the language is putting yourself in a spot where you have to speak it. This is the best way, nothing can beat it. Move to that country and just speak and listen, you'll get to the point of fluency in ~2 years even with minimal effort.
But if you can't do that, there's always other ways.
2. Make friends speaking target language (WHERE YOU DON'T KNOW A LANGUAGE IN COMMON!!)
Forces you to practice that language whether you like it or not and your friends will be patient to teach you. If you don't know anyone, you can make online friends speaking a certain language through language exchange apps. I haven't personally done this but believe it to be effective.
3. Consume content. Consume it day in and day out. This is why so many gen z speak english, they've simply seen that the best content is in English (Which I'm ngl, most is) and they've consumed it, wanting to be in on the trend. Only problem with purely consuming is the lack of speaking practice. If you don't speak it, your face will not be used to using those muscles and you won't reach anywhere close to a native level. You need to speak it.
4. Vocabulary. I would say this is the biggest hurdle, especially in tonal languages. Not only do you have to remember its writing (If you're learning to read and write) but you also have to remember the pronunciation and tonal rule for that word. It can be difficult and that's where flashcard apps like Anki really help. Or, just consume the kind of content where they mention it a lot. For example: If you're watching a crime television show in target language, you can expect there to be a lot of vocabulary related to crime.
5. Consistency. Personally, I find this to be the one I struggle with the most. I've jumped around trying to learn french, german, spanish, danish, swedish, japanese, chinese and korean. I never did any one for longer than a couple of days except for Japanese. I'm on a good streak for learning Japanese now, some 21 days. Consistency is the key to everything that you try to learn, anything at all. If you're doing one of these things for learning, do consistency. Just a little everyday makes such a difference over time.
And finally: Place a bet or just learn it with your friends so you can speak in privacy. This is such a good one. If you and your friend learn the language together, you will keep each other accountable AND you'll be able to say whatever you want (that you've learnt of course) without the chance of people hearing in. Just be sure no one around speaks said language (There's some embarrassing stories behind this one)
Honestly I'm all over the place but I hope this helped anyone.
You make very quailty videos man . I like hearing about your journey learning new skills .Your video format has it's on personaliry suprise you dont have more subs your diffently going to have 1 million subs 1 day.
Don't worry about not being able to express yourself perfectly. A lot of japanese people will be impressed with your level and support you.
心配しないで、海外のみんなは日本語上手w
Crazy that this video started me on my journey to learning Japanese myself and now 2 years in I'm doing the same challenge as you xD
What's that app you use to keep track of what you do in the day ?
Edit: Btw, great video!
TogglTrack
You're killing it man! Love the osrs vibes in the vids too
4:59 Made me laugh so much - very relatable
The first 1,000 people to use this link will get a 1 month free trial of Skillshare: skl.sh/livakivi07211
I had to re-upload this video because TH-cam decided to delete 30 seconds of audio for no reason of the previous upload lol. Hopefully no issues this time!
EDIT: As promised, here's the 3 years update video, where I actually speak Japanese: th-cam.com/video/JVAcg1FuyOY/w-d-xo.html
@Vasco Sony Vegas and After Effects
What are you using to leaen japanese and can it be used on mobile
@@TheJAYGAMING485 I made a video about it, check it out: th-cam.com/video/SaVHrzF3-2E/w-d-xo.html
Anki can be used on mobile, yes
i really hope you keep uploading. this is good stuff :D
Very impressive!
You got this Liva!
Also I feel like I am going sooo slow with learning Japanese because my memory sucks so most days I spend not learning anything new, but just reinforcing the words I already know.
Just wanted to say that your channel is awesomely appeasing
I love your videos and channel! They motivate me!!
your content is amazing
So glad l found your channel, although I'm not even learning Japanese :)
You're the first estonian youtuber that actually makes good videos
I literally decided to start learning Japanese today and got recommended this video lol, I hope I survive the long road forward.
This is very inspiring! I don't think I could find 5 hours in a day to do any single thing 😅
I love u bro, so inspiring
I'll never get tired of that runescape music man
Thank you for this video
I started learning Jp at the start of 2021 but
Sadly i dont have a set schedule for myself, but I do want to gradually learn more.
I watch these so I can inspire myself to continue learning another language
Sul on nii palju pühendumine(dedication?)! Ma arvan et ma õpin mingi 5 tundi nädalas! See ei ole piisav aga ma saan parem. Aga ma olen natukene jealous et sul on nii palju meedia Jaapani keeles (subtiitridiga). Ainult "Õnne 13"'l ja "Siin me oleme"'l on subtiitrid ETV's! Ja aitäh video eest - väga lahe vaatama.
Your video is very superb 👌🏻
64/64 Anki days here since starting Japanese, certainly feels like I'm better than when I started, let's see how I feel at 600/600 [hopefully not missing a single day lol]
how can you be so dedicated?
It really is impressive. It's motivating to follow along, even for working on other things as well.
The hardest part is to BEGIN.
He is literally getting money for it.
its not about motivation imo, its more about forming habits, i think he already touched on that topic.
@@tofuchewer Being able to make content about it definitely does motivate me a bit as it makes it more fun! Although I haven't really made all that much from TH-cam overall yet, especially because most of the views my channel received were unmonetized for the longest time, and I had already learned Japanese for 800+ days before my channel got more than 200 subscribers lol.
Immersion is very OP, I knew a language that was my mother tongue that I just knew but they had really bad movies in that language so there are two other languages, hindi and telugu, i watched those movies with my parents(they know them), occasionally asking them what each word means due to curiousness and sometimes speaking it around the house as a joke and I thought i was cool by saying dialogues but now I realize that helped me a lot and now i almost completely understand both languages( keep in mind my mother tongue is already super similar to hindi)
Your thumbnails are literally top notch every time 😏👌🏼
頑張ってください
damn dedication
video is 7:27 minutes long and it was also posted on 7/27
727
As someone who has no life I don't find 5 hours a day at all challenging. What's challenging is figuring out what to do to make added time more beneficial.
Did you hear of the Marugoto books? I kinda like them ngl, they got books from a1 to b2 with 2 different types of books for 2 different learning styles
Haven't heard of them
i was wondering, at 3:28 i saw you had yomichan set up for making cards. why didn't you use yomichan for it, instead of manually making them? it lets you add the audio of the word (not directly from the source you're watching, but it is what it is), it can add the pitch pattern whenever it has data on it, and overall takes a lot less time.
I'm wondering what you are using to get the text on the side of the Berserk anime at around 3:25 (I only know about animelon for this kind of subtitles) I believe it's this texthooker thing but I don't know what that is
anyway, thank you for the crazy load of motivation
Check this video out by Matt on the MPV player and its plugins: th-cam.com/video/bbg6ztWecbU/w-d-xo.html
Sir you are inspirational
Great video! I would really advise against mining sentences with more than 1 new word though. I used to do it but those cards have consistently ended up causing trouble for me, and I don't learn either of the words well enough. If the word is useful, it will pop up in a 1T sentence sooner or later! Things are so much smoother for me now that I've been stricter in limiting myself to 1T sentences only.
I sometimes have no difficulty even learning 3 to 4 new words from a single card, but sometimes even 1 new word is really hard. Its pretty random honestly, but I have a pretty good intuition about when I think a sentence is going to be too difficult to mine, then I dont mine it indeed!
The book “fluent forever” by Gabriel Wyner is a great read.
Another great thumbnail
make a video about the hardest things of russian gramar that you had to learn in school
I don't remember that well, but probably verb/noun conjugations based on gender
Me: Sees 4:19
My brain: DURO MONSTA CADO!
Rip. Weevil, nice vid btw :)
Are you planning on learning any other languages, after you become confident enough with your Japanese?
Possibly, but not sure. Kind of doubtful as I feel like I'm nowhere near done with Japanese, and there are so many other things I want to spend my time on as well once I'm "done" with Japanese.
Doses any know the name of the traker he used at 0:25
Toggl
What do u plan to do after u become "fluent" in japanese?
Not sure, probably enjoy content and do/create fun stuff in Japanese!
He’s gonna go pro in Fortnite, obviously.
@@Livakivi If you learn another skill as well, you could probably land a job in Japan if you want to. It's really fun to stay in Japan for a longer period of time. You really get to experience the country in a different way than if you were to just visit for a week or two.
@@SmartJapanHacks you could? to my knowledge, merely being good at english (and the skill the job requires obviously) won't help you get a job in the US or the UK. isn't that the same in japan?
he's gonna get an idol gf :)
Do you memorize writing for Kanji? I’m debating, I’m going to learn them for recognition but should I learn how to write?
Personally I don't
I did, though not necessary but helps them stick in your head slightly better and different fonts will be more easily recognized.
I wouldn't recommend it. Using Anki and reading a lot is all you need to recognize kanji fast. Writing each kanji takes too much time and is mostly useless unless you're planning to live in Japan. Even then most people don't even have a job that requires constant handwriting, and you would have to keep up your writing skills for years and years until then.
IMO put all your effort on understanding, then if you think it's worth it try out writing which should be easier since you would already recognize a lot of kanji.
@@x123Juancho123x Yes, this is what I’m thinking along with being to write some more known kanji. Thanks for the reply it helped 🙏
Can you list or link a list of all the apps, websites you use?
"Tolerating ambiguity is a big part of immersion" TIL I don't immerse myself right in my native language because I use English subtitles all the time when I can lmao
Nice monitor brand
please consider making the background music even quieter, especially given that this video doesn't have subtitles. it really does make it difficult for some people (like myself) to not get fatigued when trying to listen to you.
I wonder if you listen with headphones, earbuds, or speakers, and if so, what kind of speakers?
@@Livakivi i'm listening through my laptop's speakers. they're probably not very high quality speakers. i do find that i'm sensitive to background music being too loud; it confuses my brain when trying to hear the speaker. on the other hand, some youtubers do make their background music very quiet, which is good for me. one example of this is: th-cam.com/video/o_U42kIUme8/w-d-xo.html . the melody in that video "stands out" and would have been too distracting for me, if the volume was any louder than it is in this video.
@@Livakivi In my testing I've generally found that the cheaper and more "tinny" the speakers (e.g. laptop or small TV speakers), the MORE the voice stands out, whereas with good headphones or speakers, the music comes through more. Although it may be because your music is quite treble heavy that this isn't occurring.
Yeah it definitely can be the case. I've resorted to lowering the music volume way more in the newer videos. I always wanted the music to be part of the video, but I do realize that it can get really annoying with specific audio setups and when the listener is trying their hardest just to hear what I'm saying lol.
Although, another thing I've noticed, is that with headphones, you can hear the music better indeed, but that makes it into a more unified experience. With bad speakers, you can't really properly make out the music, so its just going to be some distracting noise next to the voice, so it doesn't create the more immersive experience like with headphones.
My second language is russian. Third is english. And I'm trying to learn japanese. Oh boy japanese is hard.🤯
When you see it!!!
maybe try deep dive, OhTalkWho オタク is also youtuber that explains it how to do it, basically it's sentence mining(with subs2srs) but with tiny bit of improvement.
Did rtk in 2 months, around 3hours or more of pure kanji on anki everyday
What is that template/application you are using to monitor your progress? Anyone?
What was that deck you used for the conjugations from tae kim?
It was a deck I made myself from the book: ankiweb.net/shared/info/199568219
@@Livakivi thanks much appreciated!
I don't know English but I like your videos! this one had no subtitle ;-;
If you increase your daily study time would that mean you add more sentences to Anki every day? How would you figure out how many to add if so?
Does anyone know how to say "afterthought" in Japanese? Does the word exist in Japanese? Or something similar?
how is your workflow for creating new sentence cards in anki? the thing that stops me from making the most of anki is how long it takes to make a card. it seems like such a chore for me if it takes longer than a few seconds. if i could overcome this hurdle, anki will be so much more valuable for me.
I explained how in this video: th-cam.com/video/SaVHrzF3-2E/w-d-xo.html
53% retention rate!!! How do you sustain your motivation? I feel like shot when I have less than 80% retention rate. It feels like I’m always wrong
Damn dude, 5 hours a day? I feel like my brain is fried in only an hour or two.
Start reading light novel will help with vocab
Hull vend oled :D Ma teen päevas ainult 15 minutit kas duolingot või ankit.
This real interesting!! what apps or sources do you use for all ur Japanese material??
I made a video about that on my second channel: th-cam.com/video/SaVHrzF3-2E/w-d-xo.html
@@Livakivi Okay… thanks a lot!
Can you put automatic subtitles on your video? My English is not yet good enough to understand everything
Where are you from?
Could you share your Anki immersion fcard deck pleeeeaaaase
Its on my Patreon, I made it a Patreon reward because I don't recommend using it, so its just for those who are curious and want to support the channel.
Hey i am new to your channel.
Can you give me links for Anki (Already deck card) or How to watch Japanese drama and Movie with Japanese subtitles.
Hello! I use Netflix which usually has Japanese subs, and I sometimes download subtitles from kitsuneneko.
You can find links to decks in the description of my first video!
What app/sites are you using to watch raw animes/anime with jp subs?
Made a video on my second channel where I mentioned those recently: th-cam.com/video/SaVHrzF3-2E/w-d-xo.html
What Japanese podcasts do you listen to for learning?
Nihongo Con Teppei/Japanese with Teppei and Noriko
@@Livakivi Thanks for responding, When I get better at Japanese I’ll use them
Can you give us the best anime for a Japanese learner? And what apps or websites did you use for grammar learning?
I don't really know what's the best anime for learning Japanese, it all depends on what level you're at and what you enjoy watching. Personally I used only the Tae Kim's online textbook for learning grammar early on.
The video was deleted no ?
Yeah it had some audio issues thanks to TH-cam, so I had to re-upload.
What's the name of that time scheduler you use?
TogglTrack
I think VR chat would be great for output practice
Super Pog
Where do you learn japenese
Im betting your gonna get n1 within another year or 2 maybe less.
Could you have a link to the websites you use to watch your animes with selectable subtitles?
I just use Netflix with subadub, or the mpv player with some plugins: th-cam.com/video/bbg6ztWecbU/w-d-xo.html