Comprehensible Input for Japanese
Comprehensible input for Japanese is language you can mostly understand, with a little stretch (i+1). For reading, that means short passages near your edge—not only native news, and not only flashcards. Yomigi approximates that with graded AI passages, lookups, and quizzes. Calibration is still improving, and AI Japanese can be wrong.
What Comprehensible Input Means
Comprehensible input is language you can follow well enough to build a scene in your head, even if a few words are new.
Stephen Krashen’s i+1 idea is the same edge: mostly known language plus a little unknown. It is a reading (and listening) condition, not a promise that any Japanese content will teach you.
For Japanese reading, the bottleneck is often kanji plus omitted subjects—not only vocabulary lists.
i+1 in Japanese Reading
A useful Japanese passage is one you can finish. If you look up every clause, the text is too hard to count as input.
If nothing is new, you are rereading comfort, not stretching. Aim for a short text where one or two forms are the stretch.
Graded readers, JLPT-banded samples, and short generated passages are tools for staying near that edge. Native novels are input only when they are already mostly readable.
N4 Example
帰り道、空が暗くなってきました。傘を家に忘れていたので、コンビニで傘を買いました。
帰り道、空が暗くなってきました。傘を家に忘れていたので、コンビニで傘を買いました。Summary
On the way home the sky darkens. The narrator buys an umbrella, then steps outside to find the rain has already stopped.
What This Is Not
Not “watch native TV with no support and hope.” That is often incomprehensible input.
Not a claim that flashcards are useless. Isolated review still helps; it does not replace reading in context.
Not a guarantee that an app can measure your exact i+1. Yomigi uses lookups, quizzes, and ratings as evidence. Calibration is still improving.
How Yomigi Fits
Yomigi is a short-passage Japanese reading trainer. Fresh texts are AI-generated, checked automatically, and sometimes wrong.
The loop is: read a finishable passage, look up only what blocks you, check comprehension, then get another text near that edge.
Public JLPT samples on this site are fixed examples. The app is where new passages and lookup traces live.
Comprehensible Input Questions
- Is a JLPT label the same as i+1?
- No. N4 is a band, not your personal edge. Two N4 readers can need different support. Use the band to pick a starting lane, then judge whether you can finish the passage.
- Can I use a dictionary and still call it comprehensible input?
- Yes, if lookups stay rare enough that you still follow the scene. A gloss on every line turns reading into a word list.
- Does Yomigi use only human-edited Japanese?
- No. In-app passages are AI-generated. Public samples on this site are curated examples with a furigana toggle, not a claim of native editorial review.