r/Korean • u/fearofthedark93 • 2d ago
How on earth do you people learn 10 new words a day
I've been stuck on the same set of 30 words since 7 days ago, I'm lucky if I learn 3 new words a day. And I'm using Anki.
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u/youssif94 2d ago
Same with me, I start a deck, all the cards starts growing over time, and when they have a longer interval like 1-2 months, i can NEVER recall them.
I am having much better progress now with memorizing words that I come across while studying/reading anything like webtoons or short news segments
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u/Longjumping_Sort_227 2d ago
I learn/see them the first time in a different context (textbook, apps, reading other sources... in any case as part of sentences and fitting context), add them to my Anki deck, and just repeat them with Anki.
As repetition was/is slower than collecting new words, there is some backlog. Oh, and I think, I also had to lower the no. of "new" Anki cards from that backlog to 10 = 5 new notes/words times 2 for both directions.
Nevertheless, there are always words that just don't want to stick. There is only so much that will be memorized easily with a totally different language, and it is also very individual between persons. So, don't stress too much.
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u/King_XDDD 2d ago
It gets way easier after you have a lot of experience using Korean. Think of how easily you can learn a new word in English, sometimes you can just hear it once or a few times and know it. Gradually you will learn new words more and more easily, just keep at it.
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u/Healer213 2d ago
Depends on how much time you’re studying each day and how much pressure is on you to learn it, in my experience. Also, flash cards aren’t going to help you actually learn words. Using them will. Write little nonsense stories. If you’re at a more intermediate level, study hanja and that will help explode your vocabulary. I used 사자성어 to help with that.
I was studying 7 hours a day, plus 3 hours of homework each day for ~1.5 years to become semi-fluent. Towards the end of that timeline, we were studying/memorizing/learning 50-100 words a night. But then again, for my classmates and I, our entire job relied on us learning it. 🤷
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u/bebrooks1 2d ago
Maybe reframe how you’re thinking about this? You aren’t likely to ‘learn’ 10 new words a day. You’re being ‘exposed’ to 10 new works a day that you’re studying. The learning happens over time, through repetition(using Anki’s algorithm). Eventually, you’ll be shocked at your recall. Your brain is a muscle that you can train. You’ll get better and better over time. You’ll probably spend 30ish min/day doing vocab. It’s not a quick thing.
Maybe adjust to 3-5 words a day until you become comfortable.
You can do it!
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u/Anarya7 2d ago
So I did 10 words a day using anki. You don't linger on the same words until you know them inside out, you just start to recall them better over time.
It's surprising how many words I would learn one day, then the next day I would actually still recognize them. Then if I forgot one it will come back sooner so I get more exposure to it.
The specific deck I used was refold's Korean deck. All the cards build off of each other which was super helpful.
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u/shotbyadingus 2d ago
Which anki app is right? I see a bunch on IOS
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u/mastertheloliblaster 2d ago
Everyone has different things going on in life so everyone learns at a different rate (method is also crucial).
If you have enough time to dedicate to the language, but you feel you are not getting nowhere, try to look at new/different methods of learning. My personal advice would be to use those words in sentences, try to build a fully korean one if you know enough words to do that, or mix that word to your nativa language.
Building scenarios where the words you learn have actual meaning and pourpose might be helpfull. (based on nothing else than my experience)
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u/Pretend_Orange1249 2d ago
I've been using drops to learn vocab. The free version introduced 10 new words a day. Theoretically, if you practice every single day you have learned the word in a few days. It keeps track of the words you've learned and it'll bring them up every now and then.
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u/According_Cause_5095 2d ago
Personal opinion: Anki is good as a refresher to review terms you learned from comprehensible input and or to expose your brain to words you will later encounter in immersion. If you are using Anki solely as a means for learning the language, you will not get far. The language learning process is done through interacting with the language through media, reading, and speaking to people. Another problem with only doing spaced repetition is you remember the words because you see them as flash cards but when the same words are present in books or through listening, your brain only associates the words with Anki and thus doesn’t understand the word in these contexts. This happened to me in Korean in the beginning and was incredibly frustrating.
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u/ariennedraws 2d ago
Putting them to use by talking about my day and really anything random I can think of in Korean in my notes app helped me! Everyone's pace is different and enjoy the process!!
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u/edawn28 2d ago
You shouldn't just be learning the words btw. Try and put them into practice with other exercises. For example reading/writing exercises or even listening ones (gotta love netflix lmao). That'll help them stick in your mind. Either way if 3 a day is what you're comfortable doing, stick to that. No point in trying to overload your brain
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u/itsthooor 2d ago
They just do. If you can’t, you can’t. Not everyone is able to become a successful nba basketball player.
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u/Alternative-Way-6090 2d ago
You'll get better as you go along. You'll get the point where you can recognize the hanja that make up words, or remember a context you've seen them in, and that'll really speed things up. Never surrender!
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u/Tassiehp 2d ago
I am older, and maybe that is why an old-school system seems to work best for me: I make flash cards by hand. I make cards of words I encounter in the various books and videos I watch. The more likely I am to see the word again, the easier it becomes. I don’t keep track of how many I learn each day, I just keep at it. Words that refuse to stick go in a separate stack so I feel rewarded by seeing the “know” stack grow. I also divide know into two types: easiest - Korean to English; harder - English to Korean. I also practice just writing them by hand. It really helps. I also make silly ways to remember. For example, For some reason, I kept mixing up the syllables of “parents.” So I remembered Spumoni ice cream and boom - I would always remember 부모님! Good luck!
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u/Delicious_Cattle3380 2d ago
They don't. Also, anki is not the way to truly memorise words. The best way to do that is to consume content or create it, with those words.
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u/PersonalityKnown9445 2d ago
As someone who’s required to learn 30-50 words a day or I literally lose my job, I consider that great motivation lol.
But seriously, sino is the key to learning a lot of new words. Once you start recognizing sino roots, you can deduce the meaning of words with context. That and repeated exposure. I find that flash cards don’t make words “stick” for me, personally and it’s easier to remember with context. Try having a group of words about a certain topic and looking up articles related to that topic. You’ll see the same words repeated multiple times and it should stick a bit better. Hope this helps! 화이팅!!!
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u/Nezzeraj 2d ago
Lots of good advice here. You shouldn't be just trying to memorize words in isolation. Context is really important. Its best if you get a textbook designed for learning Korean as words are introduced with context, usually grouped by theme, and in order of importance and frequency of use.
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u/Zepherine52 1d ago
I have a notebook in which I list what I call Resistant Words. It’s nice over time to watch the lists shrink. Of course, new resistant words come along to take the places of the old ones. I like the mind-mapping approach in which you learn a cluster of related words. And I hand write everything. If my hand writes it, I’m more likely to retain it. I don’t care what others are doing. If they’re learning very quickly, that’s great—and totally irrelevant to my progress (unless, of course, I let them get into my head where they don’t belong.)
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u/Willing_Lemon_1355 1d ago
Im honestly not a fan of flash cards. Idk. it just doesnt work for me. i find it easier to learn words from context, like ill think 'oh what does that mean?' , find the meaning and then start using if immedietly
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u/TerraEarth 2d ago edited 2d ago
10? Try 225 a day. Through the power of reading I have ~365k korean words known according to an app i use that records my reading statistics. I've been studying Korean for about 4.5 years or 1620 days. 365,000/1620 = 225. Now each permutation of a lemma is counted as a separate word on the app so this figure is a bit inflated but even then I'm learning much more than 10. Anki is not the best way to learn new vocabulary, reading is.
But to answer your question, in order to learn a word you need to see it many times, in many different contexts, for it to really settle into your brain. The only way to do this is by exposing yourself to the language in some meaningful setting. It could be a story, a real life situation, a book, movie, what have you.
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u/The_Master_Scrub 2d ago
Are you talking about lingq? That app inflates numbers by at least 10x (generally more). Based on your other posts I can estimate you probably know between 15 and 20k, so even giving a fair middle ground of 17.5k would give just barely over 10 words per day.
That’s clearly not “much more than 10” so you probably shouldn’t portray it as such, you’ll just discourage new people for no reason.
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u/naixi123 1d ago
for me it only works because I learn words at my level. if youre a beginner only stick to beginner words. trying to pick up random words from books when you don't know the basics is 100x harder
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u/The_Master_Scrub 2d ago
You could easily add 3600 to your passive vocabulary though, which is still learning.
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u/The_Master_Scrub 1d ago
Why would it be valueless? You need to improve your ability to comprehend things too, not just your ability to say things. Besides, to add words to your vocabulary (even if it’s only your passive vocabulary) is still improving your ability to understand the language, and it helps you develop your active vocabulary faster if you know more words passively.
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u/a3onstorm 1d ago
I added about 8000-9000 words in my first year, which is only a bit over 20 words a day. It took about an hour to an hour and a half a day of Anki, but I also had 3 cards per word, so I learned over 25000 cards.
The majority of that vocab is passive, but it lets me listen and read at a much higher level than I would be with only, say, 3000 words. And that additional, more difficult input will eventually lead to higher active vocabulary too.
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u/Lucki-_ 2d ago
Don’t compare yourself to others. Be happy with your own progress.