I have a friend taking a Japanese class right now and it frustrates me to see how quickly she's able to pick up kanji. She'll be reading over some Japanese and say, "Oh, I know this one. It means...". Sure, I know the word when she says it, but I could never pull the character out of a sentence.
My problem:
Learning kanji is boring and putting it in use is a challenge.
I find the traditional way of learning kanji, a massive stack a flash cards with a single kanji on each, to be daunting at the very least. This seems strange to me because a single kanji has numerous readings and a multitude of related meanings.
My solution:
Learn kanji, not by the character itself, but by the words that they are used in. To see this in action, view Wired Kanji - Lesson 1.
I am able to have a basic conversation in Japanese and have a large enough vocabulary (with the help of a dictionary) to convey my thoughts through writing (with the help of a computer). I know all these words, their sounds and their meanings, yet I don't know the kanji that represents them.
Working with the words I already know, I can learn their kanji how they appear in a sentence.
For example:
私は新しい雑誌を読んでいます。
わたし は あたらしい ざっし を よんでいます。
I am reading a new magazine.
I would learn the kanji for:
私 - わたし (I)
新しい - あたらしい (new)
雑誌 - ざっし (magazine)
読んでいます - よんでいます (reading)
Notice that each vocabulary item has a specific meaning. Some might be a single kanji, others might be multi-kanji pairs or a mix of kanji and hiragana. Yet, this is exactly how I would see them while reading.
I don't think there is a specific tool for learning kanji this way but I could use a list of the most common words used in Japanese writing. I also started a list of all the words I knew in Japanese, when I first began learning and it contains many basic words and phrases (when I went to Japan, I couldn't keep up). And as another tool, I purchased a handful of children's books written in Japanese from Book Off, that are written in kanji with furigana (notation in hiragana).
This is the best strategy, for me. This time, I will learn kanji.
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Becca · 753 weeks ago
A bit late getting here, but would this help you at all? Click compounds and choose your preferred conversion. The levels go roughly by the grade level learned in Japanese schools.
ryanthewired 43p · 752 weeks ago
It has a bit of web design nostalgia, but its still effective for learning. With the little practice I have, I was excited to find out that I actually knew enough to pass level 1.
On to level 2!
Mark · 752 weeks ago
Retention is something achieved through repetition. People starting to study in their 20s are facing an uphill battle.
ryanthewired 43p · 752 weeks ago
Tommie · 630 weeks ago
ryanthewired 43p · 630 weeks ago