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I decided to do my own Kanji deck originated in a spread sheet. I added colors and hint words which help me remember the readings and also put the Kanji in a context to help me remember. From this basis I’m able to ask all sort of questions to answer.
The Kanjis in Kanji and Kanji Vocab are not helpful for my way to learn things. I hardly ever get them right, since I have no clue which of those choices is asked. I need context and hints to connect my knowledge to new things. They become leeches on a regular basis.I was wondering, if I know the correct reading of a word, is it also important, to know if that is the on-, the kun- or whatever exception-reading?
Doing my own Kanji deck is quite some work, but I got to know lots of new words, some even without learning, only using the stuff, I already know. Basically it was looking up words in dictionaries which have the reading I’m looking for.
Once in a while I have aha moments like when I couldn’t remember one of the readings of the Soil-Kanji. Until I found out that Saturday uses the same Kanji and this word I already know. The same I experienced with Wednesday and the Kanji for water. But since I learn in Kana I wasn’t aware of the Kanji used for Wednesday.
Well, once I wrote down the Kanji-meanings of the days of the week, but since I used my native language, the connection to English was missing I found out eventually.Dylan, if you use Anki 1.2.8 on your PC, you can choose
->File ->Download ->Personal Deck.
There you can choose from the decks which are stored online in your personal account at http://ankiweb.net/account/loginOne more thing about studying:
Have you ever dipped candles? Lots of people are doing it over here during November.
There is candlewick, a pipe containing hot wax, a water buket and some drying cloth.
The way you do it is dip the wick in the hot wax and then in the water bucket (at some places you go outside) to cool the heat down and dry off the water before you dip it again in the wax, then in the water, etc. The candle grows very slowly this way. Maybe, if you want to dip a really thick candle you let it cool off some longer and start to dip another candle in the meantime.
But, some people tend to dip the wick again and again in the hot wax, without cooling it down properly. The candle grows quite fast up to some point, seems to be very flexible, but suddenly, the candle is slipping off the wick very slowly. Inside at the wick it was just too hot to be able to hold the weight of the wax.What is the correlation between dipping candles and studying?
Well, the candle needs to cool off in the cold water to grow without slipping off the wick. Our brain needs some rest too, to “cool off” or to “digest” the studied subject and to make those connections to be able to grow.
Thus, if you study one particular thing only for 20-30 minutes at a time, it gives your brain the needed rest. Change the subject of your studies or do something else for the next 30 minutes. Thus, after studying Japanese words, study your math formulas, do some grammar stuff, add some words or sentences to your decks, do some housework, watch TV, go out and get those groceries, practice some yoga, read the newspaper, etc.When you change the subject of your studies after 20-30 minutes, the brain has the chance to “digest” the studied subject. Even if you watch TV the brain continues to work on the subject studied previously. It prepares the newly aquired connections to be able to grow better and apply reinforcements for the future, when you study the same subject again. If you don’t allow the brain to “digest” the studied subject, the connections stays hot and slippery, as the hot wax at the wick of dipped candles. In this state the harder you study the less you’ll remember, the studies just slip off like the hot candle wax from the wick when it’s not cooled properly.
Give it a try for at least two weeks. Use a timer to stop studying Japanese words after 20 minutes or half an hour and do something else in between.
@huw
How do you learn your words? Do you add things to your decks? Are you doing it while jogging?You know, there was once this woman in a class I attended who told me, that she was learning the easiest way by dancing. I needed quite some time to understand her, since just the idea, to learn by dancing, seemed to be so unthinkable to me. I’m a very analytic learning person and there is no definition for learning by dancing in my learning concept.
I tend to add similar words or sentences to learning cards, sometimes even sound or pictures. Or I produce sentences decks using word to word translation. That consumes time, lot’s of time, but it’s helpful for me and less frustrating than stupid repetition.
I remember learning すいようび (wednesday, just like this). That was ok, I hand no problems. But when I was trying to learn water = 水 [すい] the Anki card became a leech first. Until I found out by chance, that the すい of wednesday and water were actually the same Kanji. Suddenly I could remember.The trick of “easy” learning is, that your brain can connect the new stuff somehow to the things you already know. Japanese is really hard for the brain, because the words are so different from everything else you’ve ever learnt, thus, those connections necessary for the brain to remember have to be built up first. You can reach that usually through repeating words until you’re sick and tired of it. Or you have the mnemonics way making up those stories, to connect the Kanjis and the sound of the Kanji to something, you already know.
You probably have to experiment with your words by adding stuff (other words, pictures, sound, writing it on cards, looking it up in a dictionary, etc.), to find your way of learning them more easily. Maybe you even need some movement to speed up the studying process?
You also might look at some other word decks like Japanese corePlus, to get an idea, what I’m talking about.
Some other ideas about Anki decks you might find by reading http://www.textfugu.com/bb/topic/anki-deck-treasure-exchange/Believe me, I have a hard time too, learning those words. English was way easier ;-)
Good luck!
P.S.
I know how to learn a 100 words a day:
I write down the numbers from 1 to 100 the first day, the second, I write down the words from 101 to 200, on the third day, my day off, I can write down the words for 201-500 – yeah, I made those 300 words a day! ;->>>Thanks for your update Koichi and Hashi!
It looks neat so far.Then I saw, the new downloadpage – it’s exactly what I dreamt of :-D
I’m working at season 2 now, but I was kind of ahead learning Radicals and Kanji.
What’s your recommendation on the Anki decks for Radicals, Kanji and Kanji Vocab?a) dump the old decks, starting new ones TextFugu all new super easy peasy Kanji 2012, etc.
b) get rid of the old cards and replace it by the new packages
c) just import the new downloads in the existing decksUnfortunately I didn’t find really a hint on
http://www.textfugu.com/2012/01/under-construction/Do you also plan to change the Voca- and the Sentences-decks?
Thanks
P.S.
I prefer your new purple pink alert ;-)Thanks to all to share your thoughts on how you learned the Kanji.
I probably will add the necessary vocab myself, to make life easier :-)Well, Yggbert, I revived this thread
Before I’m writing, I usually rummage through Google to find an answer to my question on TextFugu.
If I find it, well, I don’t need to write. Sometimes there are threads really similar to my questions, that’s why I choose this one, even though if started a couple of months ago. If I don’t find anything, I start a new thread.
Until now, this was the way I used other forums.
Well, if that is not the way TextFugu forum works, I can adjust.Thanks for your helpful answer.
Sorry if I got the wrong place!
I’m also learning Kanji and Kanji Vocab.
It confuses me quite a lot, when the pronunciations for the same Kanji are different depending on the deck I’m using. I haven’t yet found a rule I am able to stick to. Not even onyomi and kunyomi are used predictably, I found out, when I checked the Kanji on Textfugu. Or is there a greater meaning of this, I haven’t understood yet?For me it would be beneficial to have sample words for the all the different readings of a Kanji which are taught at TextFugu. That would be very useful probably not only for me to remember the readings in a context more easily and learn some vocabulary at the same time ;-)
Anyway, I tend to forget why there is onyomi and kunyomi, thus it’s tough.At the moment, I’m guessing for every single Kanjis, ehh, which deck I am in, and ahhh, what was the pronunciation of that Kanji in that specific deck.
Sounds weird to me.Examples are
Kanji Vocab
七[しち / なな] seven
力[ちから] power
刀[かたな] sword (katana)
十[じゅう] tenexcept for 七, it’s kunyomi in the examples
http://www.textfugu.com/kanji/1-2-stroke/七/Kanji (reading)
七 – しち seven
力 – りょく、りき power
刀 – とう sword
十 – じゅう tenexcept for the 十, it’s onyomi
http://www.textfugu.com/kanji/1-2-stroke/%E5%8D%81/P.S.
Bounty found in Kanji vocab
一{いち} one
now I understand why it’s shown differently than all others: the {} does not show furigana as [] does ;-)Edit: minor correction
Well Pencil, this problem you usually have whatever language you learn. When I leant English I was living with a relative. At first, I was impressed about her English knowledge. About three months later,I realized that she pronunced English the typical way as she pronunced her dialect. Thus, I could hear the dialect of the villiage she was raised when she spoke English. That was so funny to realize. But then, the same happend to me. I go to a store, say a few words and clerks just used to ask: are you from Germany?
To get rid of that kind of effect you need to find a teacher who is able to tell you exactly, which part of your pronunciation sounds funny to Japanese and what to do, to change it. Usually, people speaking the same language have the same pronunciation schemes. That’s why you can tell, from which region some comes when speaking a foreign language. Thus, if you speak English, there might be special teaching material available how to speak Japanese properly.
Or you might want to consider a program like Rosetta Stone who offers speaking to the computer producing those zigzag speaking charts out of which you see what is correct compared to a native speaker and what needs more attention.
You probably also could use a tool like audacity, if you have sound files as well as the text to practice for a beginning.
Kind of the same way deaf people learn to voice a language.Good luck finding a method that suits you
Hiroshi and Sakura used to have this wonderful learning sheets they made for their kids.
The stroke order set for hiragana and katakana are no longer available on the happyfu-fu.com page, but you still can get them through google cache ;-)
Hiragana
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Kizru96iYtwJ:happyfu-fu.com/hiroshiandsakura/ls_hiragana_stroke.html
Katakana
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:pVrmLpxXBJcJ:happyfu-fu.com/hiroshiandsakura/ls_katakana_stroke.htmlI was searching for the words “hiroshi and sakura stroke order” and picked the cached part.
They also have a blog with some stuff on it
http://oyabakaseikatsujutsu.blog76.fc2.com/
Unfortunately, I don’t understand anything except for the pictures…@ カロッタ
Do you have sound with the new words?
If you miss it, well that happend to me, when I created the cards, I also had to add the audio-part. I just copied audio with all the curly brackets from the recognition part to the recall part in the answer section.@ Quufer
What is the step “Edit –> Select Facts” for? I’ve never done that. I choose the cards and generate new ones. And it worked so far.
Or does this step make the newly generated cards to have sound?Oh, holy moly! I hope, I don’t get excommunicated for blasphemy!
Maybe I better should get that huge dinosaur-name-deck as a compensation.
I will backup it together with all my other decks ;-)Thanks for your suggestions.
I think, I just add the words which help me remember the radicals easier.
Yep, it was Triceratops and since I’m not into dinosaur stuff, those names sound like Greek to me.
I like bloody messes…. ;-)
No, I butcher them and thranslate them to get an idea how Japanese sentences are put together. Well I found out that I better also get a grammar book in my language to have words for certain grammatical happenings.
In my Japanese book there are two more lessons to go which are still written mostly in Romanji. The Kana part is at the end of the book along with the translation (the nice sentenes). Kana is written the Japanese way, thus sometimes it is hard for me to recognize the words in this snake like writing.
Since I butcher those sentences, I also recognized that in conversations they just use some expressions which are not properly explained.
To have my language written the Japanese way helps me to put together the sentences into Japanese at the moment.Well, the weather report at http://www.coscom.co.jp/newsweather/weather/index-j.html is already kind of pre-butchered. I just add the word by word translation. Since the words in weather reports tend to repeat once in a while, I decided to do it. The text is nicely short, contains Kana as well as Kanji, vocabulary in both writing systems is available as well as sound. Thus doing this doesn’t consume too much time.
At the moment I’m studying Japanese -> English. In a separate deck I add the vocabulary which I study JP-EN and EN-JP.
Here my goal is to get more fluent reading out loud. After a couple of weeks, I might even be able to understand the idea before translating word by word.
I’ll see.
