I decided to try and take a new approach to Japanese recently. I want to get better at grammar and
Kelsy suggested I try something called “Sentence Mining”. The idea behind that is that you find a
grammar point - such as what does the は particle mean - and then you find a ton of sentences that
use it and add those to your list of sentences. The eventual goal is to have thousands of sentences
that you can flip through and recognize / understand.
There’s a few tricky parts about this process, though:
- How do you get the sentences?
- Once you find some sentences, where do you store them?
- Likewise, how do you use them?
Finding the sentences
I’ve been using a grammar site for the past few months called BunPro. Fortunately for me, that site offers a variety of sentences for each grammar point. I didn’t find the example sentences super useful in the past because I was only really shown one or two sentences per grammar point and I’d end up just memorizing the sentence on instinct without ever understanding why a certain particle would go where. However, now that I’m trying to focus more on the grammar points - it’s making me really think about the sentences.
Another nice part about this site is that there are links to other sites as well that go into more detail about each grammar point. Often times I will go to these other sites and find useful sentences that I can add to my list there.
The last place I’ve been finding sentences is actually with the Kanji studying app I use called Wanikani. For some kanji or vocab words I’m struggling with, I’ll look at example sentences that use those things and add that to my list of sentences.
Where do you store the sentences?
This is out of date. I ended up dropping Quizlet due to the lack of an SRS system. I didn’t realize how bad Quizlet’s learning algorithm is (where it considers you “knowing” something to mean you got it right twice in a row regardless of the time between the two right answers). I’ve since gone back to Anki since it was the only tool I could find that did what I wanted. It still has a terrible UI but at least it works :shrugs: I wrote a post on this adventure if you’re curious.
At first I was a bit skeptical of this sentence mining approach because I didn’t really know how I would go about making the sentences and saving them. I sure as heck wasn’t going to write 1000+ flashcards for this.
I originally thought of a tool called Anki - but when I tried it I found it to be really bad. The UI is confusing and difficult to use. Entering sentences and answers is unsatisfying and frustrating. Etc.
Fortunately, I was saved by Kelsy again who suggested I try out something called Quizlet.
Entering sentences is a breeze in there! The site appears to recognize and understand Japanese to
a mind boggling degree. For instance, when I typed 綺麗 into the card - it automatically populated
the answer of the card to be きれい pretty (the pronunciation + the meaning).
This site also offers apps on all my major devices - so the computer, my phone, and tablet. It’s also pretty cheap - especially if you use a discount code (I was charged $25 for a year).
How do you use the sentences?
I have the Quizlet app on all of my devices. One things I absolutely love about it is how intelligent the app is. It will literally read out the Japanese to me if I push the audio button - which helps tremendously as I practice pronunciation.
I can use the flashcards as traditional flashcards - and it can track if I’m getting them right or wrong to bring back up the sentences I get wrong more quickly. It will also offer stats on them.
The real cool part, though, is that it can actually build up tests or more complex interactions
based off of the flash cards. For instance, it might show me 海だ at the top and then it will pick
It is the sea (the right answer) along with 3 other wrong answers such as It is a cat and have
a multiple choice test type of thing.
Concluding Thoughts
Overall I’m really liking this new approach and I’m so glad that Kelsy discovered this Quizlet app for me to use. I already feel like I’m making better progress on grammar than I was in the past. We’ll have to see if I’ll still be happy when I have 1000+ sentences, though lol.
Have any of you studied grammar at all in a foreign language? What has helped you with it?