Keeping track of learned vocabulary

[jannesan]

Hey everyone,

I was wondering how do you all keep track of learned vocabulary in order to keep practicing it (especially the 汉字)?

I am personally still using Skritter and that's where I add all new words that I encounter, so basically that's my central repository for all the vocabulary I know.

However, as I know more and more single characters this approach becomes a bit annoying for learning new words.

So what are your methods for collecting and learning new vocabulary?

 

looking forward to your answers,

Jannes

[Tomsima]

Use Pleco, I add flashcards into a deck for new words I come across, Anki for SRS learning, and then later excel spreadsheets (better than big notepads filled with words, easier to edit and organise.

[jannesan]

Nice, I actually also use Pleco first just to gather new words until I have a dozen or so and then they go into my Skritter queue.

So do you end up putting everything into Anki or just a selection of the words you encounter?

And how do you organize your spreadsheets?

 

I'm thinking to also have a second storage for vocabulary linked to some examples.

Just not sure if I should just start an Anki deck and add stuff as I feel like or create it more strategically .

Thanks for your answer:)

[Tomsima]

Perhaps an easy start would be to take a textbook you are working on, and gradually input it into anki, or write/type out each chapter separately. Once you have studied a chapter inside out, start a new deck in anki, or start a new page/doc and do it again. The benefit of anki is you dont need to worry when you should go back and review the words from each previous chapter. Do that for a few textbooks and I think you'll probably find a good rhythm. Don't worry too much about new words that are coming up outside your study schedule, if you think they're interesting, try adding them to a deck in your pleco called 'interesting words', then when you have a spare minute, you can get out your phone and skim through them every now and again. Just a few ideas, there are many more to find on the forums

[calibre2001]

Once I see new words/phrases, I would immediately type it (character, pinyin with tone marks, translation) on a Google Doc document. I no longer review the words learnt this way but I never really forget words learnt this way.

[DavyJonesLocker]

Anki for me first into a spreadsheet and then upload to anki.

Much more flexible than pleco but more manually intensive and no examples .

 

Your can export from pleco too , which is what I do with Pleco Graded Readers

[永鈞]

This is something I’ve been thinking about a lot.

 

i used to have a detailed form I’d fill out in google docs where I’d add a new word, list it’s pinyin, it’s word class, a found examples, some sentences I’d come up with myself, notes about where I came across the word, notes about usage (formal or informal etc.), study notes (how well I know it, it’s importance, plan for studying it), a picture that illustrates the word...... etc etc 

 

as you can easily imagine, it was not easy to fill out this form for every word. It was sort of doomed to fail and I knew I was doing unnecessary work, but I sort of enjoyed having a detailed archive that I would edit and revise and go back to. Anyway. I gave that system up after about a week.

 

around half a year later, I decided I did still want to record vocab and common phrases. I know use a super streamlined template. Just the word/phrase, an example, and ‘notes’. The notes always includes where I found the word/phrase. I sometimes look at my original template for inspiration of other stuff to put into the notes. I never include stuff like pinyin and word class, because it’s all in pleco if I need it. The example I take is always one from a native context, not learning materials or a translated line of English. 

 

I use google keep app for this. It has very few formatting options, but this stops me from wasting time thinking about formatting.

[Wurstmann]

I use Anki for characters and words. When I come across a word I want to learn, I mark it on the kindle or write it down in a text document. Then once a day I add 10 new cards from that list to Anki. It's quite fast and easy that way to make cards.

 

汉字：

 

生词：

[Tomsima]

I must commend you on your very aesthetically pleasing card templates...you do not want to see mine

[Wurstmann]

Haha, I just used the Solarized colors.

[khakiphantom]

Is the third version of the 汉字 card your own writing?    If so that's kinda interesting idea.  How do you incorporate it into the card?

[VocabSplitter]

How about giving a try to Vocab Splitter? It can segment any Chinese texts into words and has an SRS system for tracking your vocabulary. It also allows you to export your vocabulary to Anki.

 

The following are a few screenshots:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And it looks like the following after exporting the vocabulary to Anki:

 

 

 

 

[Wurstmann]

1 hour ago, khakiphantom said:

Is the third version of the 汉字 card your own writing?

 

No, it's a font called 孙运和酷楷.

[jannesan]

On 4/7/2019 at 3:55 PM, Wurstmann said:

I use Anki for characters and words. When I come across a word I want to learn, I mark it on the kindle or write it down in a text document. Then once a day I add 10 new cards from that list to Anki. It's quite fast and easy that way to make cards.

 

I am basically doing the same, but I see you also have example sentences on your cards. Where do you get these from?

And what kind of cards are you creating for new words?

 

As Skritter just does single words or characters I feel like I'm a bit short on reviewing how to use certain words and I want to get started with creating an Anki deck with sentences and usages of words, also showing which kind of words match and which don't. I find that is one thing I am encountering more and more, I know the words, but not how to match them.