For your language learning once you get to the point of "I can write sentences reasonably well and can fill most gaps using a dictionary" I'd recommend keeping

For your language learning once you get to the point of "I can write sentences reasonably well and can fill most gaps using a dictionary" I'd recommend keeping a little blog or diary and writing to it every other day. It would be even better if you had a Japanese friend who could do a little spelling/grammar checking for you. I've been doing this for a while over email/text with Czech, but have started putting it on a blog - im only three posts in but it's already very satisfying to look back at what I've got. And they can be SUPER mundane and simple too, mine look like they could be written by a child (without the alcohol) - http://czech.mclemon.io http://czech.mclemon.io