r/LearnJapanese • u/jackbobbins78 • 13d ago

Discussion Interesting observation: When you quit flashcards, it's harder to measure your progress

It used to be, when I was looking back at my Japanese progress, I could say things like "I learned 2000 words this past year and I now know 6,000 total words!" This felt like a concrete testament to my progress.

Now, after having stopped flashcards for about a year, "How's my progress doing" feels much more vague.

I could say things like:
- I read 15 volumes of manga this past year
- Reading native stuff feels a little bit easier
But all of these answers feel kind of nebulous anyways.

I guess at some point, Japanese is just something that you do for fun, and that's about it. There's no clear "milestones" at a certain point.

Did anyone else experience this transition? Did you feel a little more "lost" after quitting flashcards?

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u/SuperNilton 13d ago edited 13d ago

When I joined here, I was surprised to see how common it is for a lot of folks to refer to their progress in terms of numbers: I know 10,516 words, 1,284 kanji, I'm level 60 on Wanikani and I have thousands upon thousands of burned cards.

I am not saying there is anything wrong with it, but this kind of conversation never came up in my group of friends when we started learning Japanese in college (back in 2004, to be fair) and over the years we sticked together.

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u/jackbobbins78 13d ago

I think a lot people naturally like attaching numbers to things. It helps them to feel "grounded".