Feed Me Japanese

From Nihongo Notes:

If you read or hear anything in Japanese add it to Anki. Everything! Names, places, sentences, signs.

Keep it up. Try not to miss a day or you will begin to forget the cards. You don’t want to end up with hundreds of cards to review as it will only demotivate you. Try to practice small amounts but often.

Given the dangers of burnout in language learning, what and how much can go into an SRS? - or any review system for that matter?

The idea of putting “Everything!” in there seems reasonable, but only if you don’t read or hear very much. If you consume hours of Japanese every day through watching, listening and reading, collecting everything becomes a daunting task.

Not only because of the effort required to input all that data, but because acts of entertainment, discovery and play are reduced to work.

If an SRS is the core of learning a language, then everything else, including enjoyment, must submit to the time and effort it demands.

The reality is that an SRS is a tool to complement memory, not replace it. So let’s change the question, instead of asking what to put in an SRS, let’s ask, “What do you want to play with?”.

What words, kanji, patterns do you want to explore? What did you hear or read that you didn’t understand and want to spend more time developing an understanding? Not, what do you feel obligated to study; Not, what do you think you have to review - What do you want to play with?

By its nature, an SRS will push away what you understand, what you “know”. If you don’t want to play with what’s left, you’re in for a boring ride.

So how do you “play” with the material you don’t know or understand? This question, to me, represents the weakness of most language learning resources (and a lot of classroom learning in general). What we don’t know, we need to study, study, study.

In Physics, trying to learn what isn’t understood is called experimentation. In Astronomy it’s called exploration. In Marketing, it’s a test. In Finance, it’s called speculation. In life, it’s called living.

A lack of understanding is a reason to go out and explore, not a reason to buckle down and study harder.

And if an SRS helps you to focus your efforts on what you don’t understand, it’s really giving you starting points for further exploration. Topics to read about, blogs to find, short stories to uncover, podcasts, movies and TV shows to enjoy - All these can be found through exploring what you don’t understand.

So, what goes into an SRS? Whatever you want. Just be prepared to adjust if you find the SRS dumps a steaming pile of boredom on your plate every day.