[timr]

> Right now, I'm using Anki to learn Japanese vocabulary from N5 to N3[1]. I know the words and the example sentences well enough to read N3-level text, provided I know the grammar. But when it comes to listening, I struggle to understand even N4-level spoken Japanese.

You need to listen to people, ideally in actual conversations (I am conversational in Japanese, somewhere around N2).

Spaced repetition won’t help you here. The fundamental problem is that you can’t hear the words, which is not a matter of memorization. The only thing that will fix it is exposure to lots and lots of native input.

Fortunately, it is easy to find native listening input today! If you’re a beginner and not in a classroom setting, you should be spending at least half your time listening to native material. The best option is a native tutor and/or friend(s), but failing that, get thee to Youtube and Netflix or even Instagram. There are tons of good teachers on those platforms, posting content for free. Nihongo no mori, Takoyaki_senseiyade, nihongo_camp, and miyu_to_nihongo are just a few I follow on instagram who tend to post serious learning content, mainly in Japanese.

Also, spaced repetition is more valuable at the higher levels, not less. You do need to spend more time reading and listening to native input, but the volume of things to learn grows exponentially, so efficiency is essential. At N5/N4, I could have used paper flashcards and been fine.

[hintymad]

Yeah, large volume of comprehensible input is the key. It's just that the frequency of words is of Zipfian distribution, so I thought maybe flash cards could give me more frequent exposure of the important words in less time.

[timr]

It's maybe more interesting if you understand the input, but it's really not that important at the very beginning. Hearing the language being spoken will train your ears to hear the sounds and the words, even if you only understand a fraction of the content. Later on, it's probably more important that you actually understand the majority of what you're hearing, but even at a high level, it can be valuable to zone out on a stream of incomprehensible audio content. I like to do this with news podcasts while cooking.

I got from zero to low N3 via a year of immersion, and I still remember the moment when I started to "hear words" in real-world conversation for the first time. It was very much a 0->1 transition, and happened almost entirely without my active participation.

Don't sweat it too much, is my point. Just listen to stuff.