WaniKani is a popular kanji learning tool from the producers of Tofugu. I only have positive things to say about their team and products. Since they have so many users (way more than Jalup!), one of the most commonly asked questions I get of course involves them. Does WaniKani and Jalup mesh well together as learning companion tools? Some general thoughts Using more than one … Continue reading →
Japanese From Zero was reviewed here almost 5 years ago by our guest author Daniel. I was happy that Daniel could point people to this excellent resource. Since I had my own unique experience with it, like I did with Tofugu, I decided to personally write about Japanese From Zero, because the site meant a lot to me early on in my studying. Japanese From Zero, … Continue reading →
If you study Japanese, or even just had interest in Japanese culture, you probably ran across Tofugu at some point. Tofugu is one of the largest and longest running Japanese learner websites around. A while back, my friend James reviewed WaniKani (Tofugu’s kanji product) here on Jalup, and shared his positive experience with it. Tofugu has been something special over the years, and I wanted … Continue reading →
A lot of people on the Jalup Line Group and social media have been talking about this new online pronunciation course offered by Waseda. I figured it was worth checking out and giving a review of it, now that the course has reached its final week. I went through most of the lessons and videos, and want to share a few thoughts about it. Everyone would … Continue reading →
I once complained that there were not enough Japanese learner resources when I started studying in January 2005. Well I was wrong. I am quite interested by how people study Japanese past, present, and future. It shows how while some things change, others don’t, and there are some ideas and methods that really have stood the test of time. Towards the end of the 90s … Continue reading →
Back in the day, the best option for learning hiragana and katakana was to write it out using worksheets, hope you could guess or remember the pronunciation right, and (perhaps) repeat that process over and over until you got it. Now there are a lot of games which let you hear the kana as you study them, give you immediate feedback on your writing, and … Continue reading →
A lot of people talk about the Core 2000. If you go to the Anki shared decks, you can find a variety of decks for the Core 2000, Core 6000, and even the Core 10,000. Many people on Japanese forums who are studying for the JLPT will talk about the Core 2000. Although it may sound like some fancy ab workout, the Core 2000 has quite a history … Continue reading →
When I first heard learners in the Japanese community talking about MCDs, I did what any sensible internet user would and Googled it. Okay, I probably should have seen that coming… But even more refined searches lead me to scattered information about MCDs. In the past two years, many in the Japanese community have shifted to MCDs based SRS cards instead of sentences. So what’s … Continue reading →
