Having sufficient vocabulary to express yourself in a given situation is important for any Japanese learner (or for that matter, a learner of any language). One of the keys to increasing your Japanese vocabulary is simply remembering and being able to reproduce the new vocabulary you come across. Remembering is not necessarily an easy task, but it can be done with the following approach:
First, expose yourself to new vocabulary, then set to remember it by testing yourself systematically, frequently and in a variety of ways. New vocabulary can be gathered from various sources and captured and managed as cards used in a flashcard system employing spaced repetition. Let’s start with how to get exposed to new vocabulary.
For absolute beginners, it will be your primary learning material such as your textbook, or a system for learning Japanese such as JapanesePod101.com. For lower levels and all the way up to advanced, there are JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) study materials. As you become more autonomous, you can branch out to resources like Web Easy News from NHK.
For intermediate and higher-level learners, you can listen to podcasts or watch YouTube videos intended for Japanese learners while reading the transcript or captions. No matter what level you are, another thing not to forget is to take advantage of your speaking practice with your private tutor. When you get stuck on how to say something, your tutor can give you the word or expression you need.
And of course… once you get to a high enough level, you can consume native materials such as news articles and novels. In the end, I think there is less of a problem in finding new words and more of a problem in memorizing and managing them. Below we’ll discuss how to retain and manage all the vocabulary you come across.
The following are links to further information about the above-mentioned resources. I have written about the great Genki series beginner textbooks that I learned with here, and about learning with JapanesePod101.com here. I have also written about how to ‘read your way to proficiency’ with some links to additional reading resources here. For a list of podcasts for all levels with descriptions of each, please see here.
The Keys to Learning and Retaining Japanese Vocabulary
Learning is maximally offsetting forgetting.
Dr. Andrew Huberman
The above quote is from a Huberman Lab podcast episode entitled Optimal Protocols for Studying & Learning. For me it is a very important reframe for how to think about learning and the question then becomes how to go about it. One of the keys is to periodically stop and test yourself on the material you are learning [1]. In other words, “testing yourself is studying” [1].
In terms of learning vocabulary, I would say there are at least two main goals which are (1) to be able to recognize a word and its meaning when you see it or hear it, and (2) to be able to use it appropriately when the situation calls for it. Goal (1) is easier than (2), but the way to achieve both is an extension of the point above which is to test yourself systematically, frequently and in a variety of ways.
Some ways to test yourself on Japanese vocabulary
- Use flashcards with spaced repetition
- Written repetition
- Make your own sentences with the target words
- Extensive reading
I am a big believer in flashcards, particularly app-based systems with spaced repetition features. I will discuss various ways of making cards and a few different app-based systems below, but first let’s go over the other points on the above list. Written repetition and making your own sentences come from a study entitled “Japanese language learning strategies by high and low achievers”.
The study examined the strategies for learning kanji, vocabulary and grammar. Although there was a bit of overlap, “the high achievers used a wider range of strategies” [2]. More specifically, lower achievers tended to stop short at the point of being able to recognize and understand the material whereas higher achievers employed additional strategies to be able to produce the materials on their own.
Written repetition was a surprising one for me, but indeed it is a form of production. To put this into practice you could use word lists or your flashcards, but the idea would be to use the English word(s) as a prompt, then write down the corresponding Japanese word. This has the added benefit of being able to practice your kanji writing and linking the kanji to the word.
Making your own sentences is the most challenging strategy, but the benefit is probably a little more intuitive in that it integrates the use of vocabulary, kanji and grammar, plus develops a sense of the natural use of the vocabulary in an appropriate context. As a double check, I recommend you have your sentences checked by a native speaker, such as your tutor.
As the name suggests, extensive reading (ER) involves reading a lot, but the idea is that the difficulty level is appropriate for you and ideally, the material interests you. With ER, you will be doing incidental learning of new vocabulary, that is you will come across new words and try to infer their meaning, without intentionally trying to learn them. This sounds good but seems to have some limitations.
In a study entitled “At what rate do learners learn and retain new vocabulary from reading a graded reader?”, the researchers state “it is our contention that ultimately learners do not learn a lot of new words from graded reading, but in fact graded reading helps to deepen and consolidate already known language” [3].
To repeat, the biggest benefit of ER is deepening and consolidating what you already know, which indeed makes it another form of testing and dare I say, an enjoyable one? But if I may, just because we may not learn words automatically from just reading, we can still learn those words by capturing them as a flashcard and learning intentionally! Which is what we’ll discuss next.
Using Flashcards with Spaced Repetition for Retaining Japanese Vocabulary
I highly recommend using an existing flashcard app or web-based service with a built-in spaced repetition system (SRS) to capture and manage the study of your words. These apps/services automatically keep track of your progress with each card and each day presents you with the cards that are scheduled to be reviewed on that day.
An SRS works by presenting cards at preset intervals. At first, review intervals will be on back-to-back days, then as time progresses, they will become further and further apart, that is, days to weeks to months. Marking a card correct will move it to the next preset interval, but if marked wrong it will automatically be presented more frequently to you.
There are many flashcard apps/services available, but Anki is the one I recommend. It can be used on desktop, browser, and smartphone, and will sync across all three. You can customize many settings in Anki, but a few important ones are your intervals, number of new items per day, and max reviews per day.
In Anki, review of a card is divided into a learning stage and a retaining stage. In general, you first learn a card at predefined “learning steps” measured in days, then once you’ve passed the last learning step, the card graduates and Anki’s algorithm takes over to manage the frequency of the card’s review. I recommend trying the interval settings below. For more information see Anki’s wonderful manual.
| Learning steps | 10m 1d 1d 1d 1d 2d 3d |
| Graduating interval | 7 |
The number of new items per day and max number of reviews per day are personal choices which depend on your goals and the time you have available to study per day. Another personal choice is the maximum interval, which is the max number of days before a card will automatically come up for review again no matter how well you know it. Personally, I like to set it 60 to 90 days.
Flashcard Card Types for Learning Japanese Vocabulary
Let’s talk about some examples of card types. For this discussion, we’ll call the front side of the card the prompt, and the back side of the card the answer. Perhaps some types may not seem that helpful at first glance, but below I provide additional details which will hopefully explain what makes them helpful.
Type 1
Prompt: Japanese word
Answer: corresponding word(s) in user’s native language (e.g. English)
Type 2
Prompt: corresponding word(s) in user’s native language
Answer: Japanese word
Type 3
Prompt: Japanese sentence with a cloze or blank where target word would be
Answer: completed Japanese sentence
Type 4
Prompt: English sentence with target word underlined
Answer: corresponding Japanese sentence with target word underlined
Example of Type 4
Prompt: I commute to work on weekdays.
Answer: 平日は仕事に通勤しています。
Type 1 and 2 are conventional and work well for words where there is good one-to-one correspondence between the Japanese word and English word(s), but some words are hard to translate and have specific nuances, so add as much additional explanation and example sentences as needed in the answer. Emphasis on the example sentences for context!
Do use both type 1 and type 2. You want to practice in “both directions”, Japanese to English and English to Japanese, but note that type 2 (English to Japanese) is the more challenging of the two [4]. Early on when you are just getting started in your learning journey, type 1 and 2 may be the only types feasible to work with, but this leads to a complicating factor for learning Japanese specifically.
Japanese has multiple scripts, including romaji, hiragana, katakana and kanji. I always wanted to have 3 sided cards, a side for each of English, hiragana and kanji. But I realized that you don’t need 3 or more sided cards, you just need to make multiple cards for a given word, e.g. one with an English/hiragana pair, one with an English/kanji pair…
You can extend the answer of type 3 by adding the English translation of the sentence alongside the Japanese sentence. You can also add additional explanation of the Japanese word’s meaning and nuance. The utility of type 4 can be increased by trying to recall the entire Japanese sentence before turning the card to the answer. Also note that type 3 and 4 don’t have to be standalone.
Type 3 and 4 can also contain the same target words as type 1 and 2, and they should. You’ll end up with a lot of cards for just one target word, but it’s a good thing. In addition to spaced repetition, you also want to maximize the number and variety of exposures to a word you are trying to learn. It is suggested that you need about 17 exposures over time to get a new word into long term memory [5].
We can further extend our flashcard use to include learning kanji as well. I know we’re talking about vocabulary here, but in Japanese many words are made from kanji, called jukugo, and some jukugo are inextricably linked to their component kanji meanings. I have written in detail about jukugo here, and I have written about strategies for learning kanji here.
With kanji, there are several kinds of cards you could make. One example is to have a kanji as the prompt and the meaning, most frequent pronunciation and keywords as the answer. Another example would be to have the meaning and pronunciation as the prompt and the kanji as the answer (which you would need to write).
But the shortcut for learning kanji and practicing how to write them would be to use Wanikani and Skritter respectively. I use both and I have written about both and several other kanji learning systems here. By the way, you could also use your flashcards for grammar as well. But now I really am straying from vocabulary… So, let’s talk about another great way to help you memorize your new words.
Audio Flashcards: A Powerful Way to Memorize and Review Just about Anything (including Japanese vocabulary!)
Audio flashcards are a great way to make extra time for learning and memorizing information. Audio flashcards are analogous to conventional flashcards, but the questions/prompts and answers on the corresponding sides of the card are in audio format as opposed to text format. Users are therefore free from having to read the information and can listen instead.
The main benefit of audio flashcards is that the shift from text to audio makes it possible to study with just your ears during time that might otherwise be lost when your eyes need to be focused on another activity. For example, I use them while walking to work, doing house chores, working out, eating meals… But of course, they can also be used as a solo activity without multi-tasking.
I use audio flashcards as a supplement to conventional text format flashcards. They are a great way to get more exposures to target words in a different format. I started using them to support my Japanese vocabulary learning because I felt my vocabulary was not improving quickly enough and it was hindering my progress. Since using them my results have been positive, which I will mention below.
Note, here we are specifically talking about using audio flashcards for foreign language vocabulary memorization, but of course they could be used for many other domains outside of language learning. There are probably many cases in which information that could be put in text format into a conventional flashcard could probably be recorded as audio.
How to Make and Manage Audio Flashcards
One of the main ways to make an audio flashcard is to record your own voice stating the prompt and the answer (front and back of the card respectively). In terms of managing your audio flashcards, for example, you could use a dedicated app. Try searching in the app store and play store. Many offer features to record a prompt and answer separately, so you could also play a card in reverse order.
I actually don’t currently use a dedicated app, but instead I use the music player app Flacbox to approximate the same thing. In the app, my card decks are playlists. When you want to learn cards from a new playlist, you can play cards from just that playlist in shuffled order. There is also a shuffle feature to review all cards from all playlists when you want to review everything.
To make a card, I use the Voice Memos app on my iphone. In a single recording, I first state the prompt in English, usually the corresponding English word(s), sometimes with additional explanation. Then I leave a pause. Then I state the answer which is the Japanese word I am trying to recall based on the prompt. A drawback of doing it this way is that the card can only be played prompt to answer, not vice-versa.
In terms of the pause between the prompt and the answer, I have experimented with various pause lengths, and I recommend no less than 5 seconds. Tip, I use headphones with a few handy buttons on them, if I need more time between the prompt and answer, I can press the pause button. When the deck ends, there is a button I can press which plays the deck from the start again.
To get the recordings into Flacbox, I first put them into the iphone Files app, then from the Files app, I can share them with Flacbox. They appear in Flacbox as imported files. I can then add the recordings to a new playlist. I make playlists (decks) of 20 recordings (cards). I tried 70, which represents 10 words a day over the course of a week, but that was quite difficult. In the end, I found most success at 20 cards per deck.
Using the method I am describing, as I alluded to, the number of cards (words) you want to try memorizing as a ‘cohort’ will be a personal preference. The way I go about it is to just play a playlist over and over until I can successfully recall all words with no errors. Some I will begin to recall more quickly than others, and I have found it takes many replays over the course of many days to recall a full cohort.
The biggest drawback of my system… there is no spaced repetition, it’s just shuffled at random. Many of the dedicated audio flashcard apps probably do offer an SRS (spaced repetition system), so if you find an app that suits your needs, take advantage! Another drawback is even if you make recordings where you play the Japanese word first to try to recall the corresponding English word(s), you cannot see the word’s kanji. But more on kanji below.
Despite a few drawbacks, I have seen some good results. If I take time to focus on learning new cards as well as reviewing old cards, my retention is about 85%. But, if I just focus on learning new cards without taking time to review old cards, my overall retention drops to about 70%. In terms of rate of learning, in general I spend about 1 week working with a new 20 card cohort (although you could do 21, which would be equivalent to 3 words per day).
Types of Audio Flashcards in the Context of Language Learning
For language learning, there are a few different types of audio flashcards. Vocabulary is one type, which we have discussed. Another type for Japanese specifically is for learning to write kanji. This may seem odd, but what you can do is record the meaning of a kanji and a keyword (or a few keywords) that use the kanji as the prompt, then try to recall the mnemonic to write the kanji (without necessarily writing it).
Another type is full sentences. In general, you want to keep them short, but for long ones, you may want to adopt a part-by-part strategy. Actually, I first started using audio flashcards while preparing for a trade show. There were various phrases that I wanted to be able to say on demand in the booth. I recorded full sentences and listened to them in a playlist on a loop while driving to and from work.
The first side of the card was the sentence in English, then there was a pause sufficiently long for me to try to recall the sentence and say it out loud, then the sentence in Japanese would play. I practiced this way for several months and made use of time that would have otherwise been lost. In the end, it was effective, and I feel like I did quite well at the trade show.
Note, you could use an imitation or “repeat after me” approach instead, but a study published in the Psychonomic Bulletin & Review found that retrieval practice (recalling and producing the foreign language from a native language prompt), was the technique that resulted in more robust gains [4]. I can say that my own experience is also in line with the study findings.
Ideally, you want corresponding audio flashcards for each of your text format cards, but this is a tall order. When I started using audio flashcards it was audio only, but I am working towards one-to-one correspondence between the mediums. However, the beauty of audio flashcards is that they can be used independently. So, if you are really strapped for time, audio flashcards alone can still be a workable option.
References:
[1] Huberman, Andrew. (2024). “Optimal Protocols for Studying & Learning”. Huberman Lab Podcast. Podcast audio.
[2] Mori, Sachiho. (2010). “Japanese Language Learning Strategies by High and Low Achievers“. 小出記念日本語教育研究会18 2010.3.
[3] Waring, Rob., & Takaki, Misako. (2003). “At what rate do learners learn and retain new vocabulary from reading a graded reader?”. Reading in a Foreign Language Volume 15, Number 2, October 2003.
[4] Kang, Sean H.K., & Gollan, Tamar H. (2013). “Don’t just repeat after me: Retrieval practice is better than imitation for foreign vocabulary learning”. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 20(6) May 2013.
[5] Bennett, Colette. (2021). Top 17 Exposures to Learn New Words. Retrieved from https://www.thoughtco.com/vocabulary-reps-4135612