Hi. I've been learning Japanese for a little less than a decade by going over Kanjidamage/core2k/6k in anki + Tae Kim guide and YouTube grammar videos. Then, I jumped right into reading and consuming content. Since the end of last year, I've been having weekly conversations and journaling classes to improve my output and get over the intermediate plateau. I'm feeling good about the progress, so I thought of taking the JLPT this December.
I've never taken the JLPT before. My tutors suggested I try N2, but I stopped my formal studies at N3. So I did a few mock tests to decide between N3 and N2. N3 was pretty easy, and for the N2 test, I got 58% and 66% (I calculated the percentages myself for accuracy across all questions/sections, just to see my starting point. So it's not exactly what the JLPT does). Due to the mock results and my tutor's opinion, I thought N2 might be the better choice.
Now for preparation ... For grammar, I used Bunpro, and I'm almost done with N2 grammar (30 more grammar points to go). However, I am not sure what to do about vocabulary/kanji :( I know I could find a kanji and vocabulary decks and cram them, and in fact, I did find a few good ones. The problem is that there are just so many words I know, so cleaning all of this sounds like a hassle. I am busy with work and kids, so when I have time to study, I would rather sit down and study 20 new words instead of going over 100+ cards, deleting the ones I know until I find 20 new words.
I could also technically just mine words I don't know from the wild. But the problem is that my language knowledge is pretty uneven because I only consume things I like. So I must cover those N2 words somehow and not rely on my interests.
For those who decided to take the JLPT later. How do you deal with this? I had this issue with grammar too, but it's easy to filter out the grammar points I know out of 221 grammar points. But not as easy for a deck with 2000 words.
I only consume things I like
What are those things?
anime and manga XD With the italki classes, we also go over a new passage every week on a variety of topics, but they've mostly been related to ones I like. But even then, I love romance/slice-of-life, so I know many more words there than business/politics-related words. Recently, I also realized I'm not that good with health-related words after going over a passage about diabetes :(
go try mock test N2 in bunrpo, and see how good you so far
OH! I didn't know they had mock tests and I've been a lifetime member for years omg!! Gonna try it tonight, thank you so much!!
Similar situation wrt Anki, I just go through card by card (setting 30 per day) and then use a shortcut to suspend or mark a card as known. Since it’s just a single press of a button it’s painless. Obviously best to do it with an N2 deck to avoid wasting your time relearning family member vocab or whatever in an N5 deck
Anki on the desktop is truly superior. I think my last option will be studying with my laptop (at least new words) and reviewing on Android while commuting to work.
Honestly, plenty of people have mined stuff just from stuff they like and been just fine. N2 vocab is super common. So if you like anime and manga, then just continue with those and mine a bunch of words. To be sure, you will undoubtedly mine a lot more than the test covers for but that's probably a good thing.
I'm also in the same situation. Its also my first time giving JLPT, hopefully Listening carries me. I'm very scared about the Grammar
Highly recommend bunpro! I really liked it
Two free mock tests are available here for every level, in addition to the resources other people have mentioned: https://www.jlpt.jp/samples/sampleindex.html?mode=pc Should give you a good idea of where you stand.
When you get a new word on jpdb.io it gives you an option called "I already know this word, but may forget", which puts it somewhere back in the deck and an option called "would never forget" which just puts that word as permanently known.