掲示板 Forums - JLPT N1 vocabulary recommendations wanted JLPT一級語彙力についてのおすすめ募集中

Well, what do you read? Because as far as I know the N1 focuses on relatively formal vocabulary and non-fiction texts, particularly opinion essays. So reading a bunch of romance novels won't help you much.

A trick that I'm using to learn a lot of vocabulary is to create a word schedule with only the kanji->kana and kana->kanji vector enabled without bothering with the definition. Once I more or less "mastered" the main readings of a kanji and its meanings, it's relatively easy to learn tons of words like that. Or more accuratly to learn a new "combination" of kanjis that I already know. I also choose a lot simple combination like 雨水 when I started even if it's not really common.

The reason I started to learn like that is because I could not understand how a lot of japanese could memorize words with frequencies that are beyond 50 000. If it was technical vocabulary I could have understood but it was not the case. At the same, I watch a few video on youtube where people asked the reading and meaning of rare words or kanji. And most of the time, they try to guess from what they know of the kanji or from the part. The surprising part tho was the number of japanese that got it right with just their intuition. That plus some discussion with some japanese about 語感, 解字, 字面, etc made me think they just don't remember words the way we do. They rely more on that "語感" first and then, if the word is common enough, they remember it.
Another thing that convinced me is how they study ancient chinese text in high school despite not knowing the word or how to read. Which didn't make any sense for me at the beginning. But if they rely on their 語感, it makes more sense. For ancient chinese text as well as modern japanese.

So I tried to do the same thing with the renshuu schedules. I didn't bother with the definition if I could understand the word from the kanji (while checking if my guess was more or less accurate) and I just tried to guess or remember the reading correctly. I also didn't bother with being able to recall the word or remember them perfectly. I only check if my guess was correct. Because if I could guess the reading and meaning of a word correctly, why would I bother with remembering them perfectly? And after I just leave to immersion which word I should "remember" or not. By that, I mean which words should be part of my active vocabulary and which word should I be able to recall easily. As for the others, they will just be a part of my passive vocabulary.

And so far, it worked pretty well for me. I'm sometimes even able to understand that I never learn before in context. I even guess the meaning of one kanji from its parts one time (it only happened once tho....). Currently, I almost only learn that way and use a pop-up to check the definition in japanese from time to time when I need it. But otherwise, I don't bother with the translation or the definition if I don't need to. Well, I'm exagerating a bit here but at least, I try to avoid translation when I can (sometimes, I also just tired too).

It doesn't help with irregular reading and ateji but still, there are tons of words that you can learn for "free" like that. If you wan to try, I have created a few lists for that based on the kanji kentei. It still a work in progress tho, I'm only at the kanji kentei 五 so far.

Anway, whatever you choose, 頑張ってね :3

As low as possible =p. But speed run it each time you're doing it. Quality is not the important factor here
Usually, I have 2 big phases:
1) One word per reading per kanji
2) Learning a massive amout of word per kanji

In the first phase, I try to pay more attention to build the foundation. But in the same, it don't take me that much time per day because I'm only learning a few word per kanji. At the best, it can take me one month for each kanji kentei level (around 200 kanjis) and at the worst, a few.

In the second phase, I don't pay as much attention to each word or kanji, so it doesn't take that much time either. I also start slowly until it start to become easy. Typically, I start at 5-10 words per day and later 40-60. Or even a hundred. It may seems like a lot but honnestly, past even a few words per reading, you will be like "whatever, gimme more". Past 10 words per reading, you will start to get sick of some kanjis. I usually spend a few month on that phase and end up with around a 1000 words per kanji kentei level which is more than enough to get a good grasp of most kanji.

I don't know how you can incoporate that into your rotation but that's the basic idea. Also, I really speed run it each day (around 5 to 20mn per day) without paying attention to the details or if I'm getting everything correctly. Because not all kanji are equal in difficulty and some are also less common. Even the reading are not equal in difficulty or frequency. But once you saw all the different angles of an abstract kanji, even those will become easier.

So yeah, for that kind of "formal" exercises ("formal" by opposition to "free reading" or immersion), speed and quantity is the key. Well, you probably already know that since you're at N1 but anyway. Also I don't know your rotation but since you seems to already have a pretty busy rotation, a 5-10mn speed run should be the best, I think? Since you're already at an advance level, you could probably study 20 new word per day, maybe? With the review and only the kanji->kana and kana-kanji, it should fit. If you really do it like "I only need the reading correctly first and understand the rough meaning if it's not too abstract". But need to test that in practice.

Anyway, thanks also and good luck again =p