Quote:
Originally Posted by Kai13
I must say that I use anki software to study, and each sentence I have has 2, 3 or more words, so I might have way more than 4000 (I have almot 5905 - around 500 not yet seen, seeing 50 new a day, I also have grammar cards, don't know many, that's why I say my vocab is around 4k).
The news I study I understand fully, because I study the vocab in it. But the news I study are easy and small. http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/videonews/
As for dramas, what can I say, I understand and when there's words I don't know I study them. The dramas I watch are easy though and I watch the same episode 2/3 times. |
You can estimate your vocab size here:
Estimating Japanese Vocabulary Size - Japan Forum There are three links to tests. They're put out by a Japanese university, IIRC, so they are not some weirdo Internet crap.
FWIW, the first two tests estimate my vocab as between 16000 and 25000 words. This is probably accurate. I'm translating a short story right now, and there are a number of kana words I don't know. When I come across a number of kanji words I don't know, I can at least read them since I know practically all the joyo kanji. But I still have to look them up.
For what it's worth, the most difficult level of the JLPT (N1) only tests knowledge of approximately 10000 words, so as you can see, the JLPT does not prove you are any better than about a third grader at speaking Japanese. (20000 words is about the cutoff for elementary school according to the previous link.)
Side note: when taking that test, knowing the joyo kanji really helps when you see a "more advanced" word like 陸半球 and can figure it out quickly by recognizing "continent" + "half" + "sphere/globe" = oh, HEMISPHERE.