A post was split to a new topic: Japanese problem
Hi @kristoferjanke,
A rough guideline for “whether it’s a Jouyou Kanji” or not" is whether it literally means what the Kanji means? For example, 面白い for "おもしろい” is not preferred because the word doesn’t literally mean “white(白い) face(面)”. Since Memrise does not have a good system of teaching Kanji yet, I didn’t want to unnecessarily burden the learners with extra Kanji that they can get by without knowing.
That said, I understand how you would find it useful to learn the Kanji for these words too. It is useful to know extra Kanjis for when you read novels or manga since the art of expression goes over the boundaries of Jouyou Kanji. In a similar way, knowing more Kanji will allow you to enjoy more cultural or Japanese word jokes or even meaningfulness of your Japanese friends’ Kanji names.
Actually, for me to understand better, could you tell me why you’d like to learn more Kanji? That will be super interesting and informative for me:)
Given the current functionality and teaching policy, we probably won’t teach Kanji as the primary way of writing those words (“面白い/おもしろい”, “いろいろ” etc), but as an alternative solution, would you find it useful to see these as additional information on the presentation screen? We could maybe add a section for “Alternative Kanji” under literal translation and Furigana sections.
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Hi @MariusHD,
Thank you for your reports!
I have fixed the Romaji issues for
私には姉が二人います
人見知り
いってきます
Good catches and I find them super helpful, thank you!
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I’m not so much concerned abut learning the kanji themselves, since that’s a whole other complicated manner in and of itself, but when a word has a kanji spelling my concern with not learning it is that if I encounter the kanji spelling I won’t know or understand what that word is. Even if the Jouyou guide says it might not be best to use the kanji, the fact that such kanji spelling exists means that some literature and potentially even official documentation will or may still use it. As you mentioned, it could show up in manga or novels, and I feel something like that would be common enough knowledge for the author to not bother with furigana, though if it’s something a foreigner hasn’t learned they’d end up being stumped, likely trying to search through a kanji dictionary or trying to draw the kanji out in Google Translate on their phone. To use a perhaps extreme example, I know that the kanji for 下さい/ください has fallen out of common usage. However at a few train stations and on some posters on some businesses when I was in Japan I still encountered it. I initially guessed that it was ください, and then had to look it up to confirm whether that was the case.
I do think that if the decision going forward is to not use the kanji spelling primarily, that having the kanji alternative spelling on the presentation screen would be a good compromise. It can at least inform the learner that there is an alternate spelling that they might want to learn about.
One question I do have is would these changes be as visible to desktop users as app users? I know that at the moment the primary focus is on the app, but I am primarily a desktop user myself (as frustrating as it is not having the new grammar learning section).
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So since I’ve finished the new Japanese 1, I thought I’d offer some… Criticism? Comments? Either way, take it as you will.
I like that the course was oriented kind of as if two people were having a conversation.
In Section 1-1, the phrase “へー！” being translated as “dear me!” seems a bit odd to me. As far as I’m aware, へー！ is kind of just a general expression of surprise, and can be used in places where “dear me” wouldn’t make much sense. Likewise, “dear me,” can have negative connotations to it that へー！ would not. I think that having the translation just be something like “Exclamation of surprise.” would probably convey the meaning better than a particular phrase that might not actually be the best fit.
In Section 1-4, “変わってますね！” seems to me like it’d have negative connotations if said to a person. You’re basically saying “You’re weird,” but in a somewhat polite way maybe? Granted, I might just not understand the Britishness of the given translation.
In the same section, “どんな映画が好きですか？” is “what kind of films do you like?” but “好きなマンガは何ですか？” is “what manga do you like?” This seems inconsistent to me, unless the latter is talking about a particular manga while the former is talking about genres. In which case, I think the fact that the first topic is general while the second is specific to a particular manga, rather than a kind of or genre of manga, needs to be better conveyed.
In 1-7, “週末” is translated as “a weekend,” but each week only has 1 weekend. I think “the weekend” may be better. There are many weekdays in a week, hence why 平日’s translation makes sense, but there’s only one weekend.
In 1-10, “おー、さすが日本人！” I feel like this can only really be said to a Japanese person. I feel like it’d be kind of strange to tell a foreigner this, but the translation doesn’t really convey that I feel.
In 1-12, “お味噌汁” being “a miso soup” and “しょうゆ” being “A soy sauce” seem odd. The connotation of “a -something-” is that you’re talking about one specific thing. I know that both of those refer to the general thing as well, so I feel like for both of these the “a” at the beginning of the translation can be dropped.
In 1-13, “自慢” is translated as “a boast; a pride.” Pride is not quantifiable. You cannot have “a pride” for/in something, you just have “pride” since it’s a concept.
Immediately following that is “私の自慢の父です” which is translated as “I am proud of my dad.” I might just not be understanding the connotations of the Japanese here, but I feel like this would be more like “My dad, who I am proud of.” Again, I might just not be understanding the Japanese in this.
In 1-15, what’s the difference between “頭がいい” and " 賢い" given that the former is translated here as “clever,” and I know the latter is also translated as “clever.” Like, I know the literal translation of the former is “head is good,” which, granted, there is an English phrase “You’ve got a good head on your shoulders,” which means someone’s very, like, with-it mentally.
Hi, on the android app for Japanese all phrases with a comma or pause return as incorrect in pronunciation mode. I hope I have posted this correctly, sorry I don’t use forums.
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No worries, I can move this post for you @emilysbunn68 (as this thread is old hat now).
Can you add a link to the course you have in mind, please - ie is a MemRise official course or a Community course?
Once done, I may close this thread as a lot has happened in the last year.
We are here to help 
PS
I’ve now moved the posts to MemRise’s Japanese 1-7.
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Sorry, I honestly can’t figure out how to do that. I purchased the Japanese course through the app on Google play. Everything else works but the section where you record audio is super dodgy.
Any word on when grammar review is going to launch? It’s annoying having 3 unreviewable words from Japanese 0 that lower the number of words I can review in a general review session, it’ll be even more annoying once I add the 11 grammar points from Japanese 1.
Update: We are working on a solution for the punctuation in the pronunciation mode.
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Hi @kristoferjanke
I know it’s annoying, and we’re sorry for this delay! Our team is working hard to release the Grammar review as soon as it’s ready.
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Good day! @KanaTsumoto
At Japanese 2 (US version), level 12 Work Hard, Play hard.
The furigana for 七年前に転職しました was:
nana nen mae ni tenshoku shi-mashita.
But the audio and romaji stated:
shichi nen mae ni tenshoku shi-mashita.
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Thank you @N0vember for spotting this!
Should be fixed now. You may have to log out and log in again to see the changes:)
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I completed Japanese 2 but it still says I have one word left to learn. It always recommends that I do ‘plant new words’ but then it says an error occurred.
Also is it possibly for the cards from Japanese 1 and 2 to be added to the reviews for Japanese 3 ( and 4 etc.) It feels silly to have to go to each course individually. And the streaks are separate so every time I advance to the next course I lose my streak. Could the streak be based on anguage and not course?
Thanks,
Jake
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A seemingly common theme for me to question the absence of kanji, but again, looking at Japanese 2, Level 1, why is the kanji for 靴/くつ not used? As far as I’m aware that’s the only real meaning of that kanji.
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Hi @jklingen9290,
Thank you for getting touch, and thank you for learning on and completing Japanese 2
I’m sorry for the inconvenience caused by that mysterious one last word to learn. Let’s see what we can so… There are a few different versions of “Japanese 2” course. Could you send me a screenshot of the course dashboard or, if you are on web, send me the link to the course you are learning on?
Thank you also for the suggestion for making the Review function more universal. Could you help understand this further? I’m sorry for my super stupid question, and I really know this, but some of the app function are still mysterious for me and this is one of them. I understand that there are two types of streak. One that is course-specific, which is based on the number of words learnt or reviewed, and the other is account-specific, which is based on activity time. If I’m correct, you won’t lose the streak for the latter as long as you enough time on your account, regardless of the course. So is it the case that what you are trying to attain is to maintain your streak across all courses you are learning on?
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Hi @kristoferjanke,
Thank you for your questions!
To be honest, the decision here was quite subjective. I’ve tried to avoid the complicated Kanji as much as possible due to the obvious (and painfully loud) absence of “Kanji teaching mode”. However, I have included some of the complicated Kanjis when I think there is enough benefit to be able to recognise that Kanji, either because it is commonly seen in town (e.g. “楽しい”) or it helps you to distinguish words better (e.g. “熱い” and “暑い”). くつ is a complicated Kanji, and I personally thought it is not super helpful to learn it especially without a good Kanji mode. So, that’s the reason. I’m pretty sure you’re not convinced 
Let me try to understand the relevance of this issue a bit better, could you help me?
What would you say your pain point is when you see these issues or inconsistencies?
Is it the frustration for when the system marks you incorrect when you use the correct Kanji in typing tests? And that is a super valid frustration, you should not be marked wrong for using the correct Kanji just because that is not used in that particular course.
Adding the Kanji versions as “other alternative answers” is something I may be able to do (although, the current system means that I’ll have to do this manually). Let me hear your thoughts…
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The course is Japanese 2 for American English speakers. I’m not sure what the dashboard is, but here’s a screenshot:
I don’t believe I’ve ever seen an account streak. I looked at my profile page and it only displays my longest course streak. I guess I’m sort of asking if Japanese 1 and 2 and 3 can be made into one big course, but I understand that it’s nice to break them down. But if I spend a lot of time learning Japanese 3, then a lot of review cards accumulate on Japanese 2. It would be nice for those to all be in one place. And for the streak to be my “Japanese streak” instead of my “Japanese 2” streak.
Does that make more sense?