Hello, everyone:

After learning about 600 kanji, I decided to take a break from RTK in order to learn the Japanese syllabaries. I considered purchasing Remembering the Kana, but, as there are much fewer kana than kanji, decided against it. I have now memorized hiragana, and I am about to start katakana. Before I start, however, I would like some advice about how to retain what I have learned.

The most obvious method of retaining this knowledge would be to read and write in Japanese. However, I do not really know any Japanese, yet, so this method does not seem like it would be very effective. Does anyone have any suggestions for practicing the kana, other than using flash cards?

mnemonics is the only other option i can think of

Song lyrics with rikaichan. U learned it to use it right? Don't write it over and over that's a waste of time unless you're really obsessed with your handwrting

Traditional paper flashcards. Just go through them every week or so to be sure you remember them.

You could start a collection of simple words that don't really need an understanding of the language to learn, simple nouns for everyday concrete objects (book, grapes, monkey, etc.) and adjectives (especially colors). If you are partial to trees, flowers, animals, or whatever, you could simply do a list of those. In any case, once you have enough to use all the kana you can practice with them. (You may have to write normally katakana words in hiragana or vice versa, which isn't bad practice anyway; you can simply do loan words from English in both scripts if you're not ready to face learning Japanese words.).

Anyway, write them out periodically, whether you just do a bunch of words once a week, a few words every day, or use anki or flashcards to schedule them. The essential point is you're less likely to be bored senseless if you're writing or recognizing words compared to arbitrary sounds.

Looking back, I printed out a chart from google and "retained" the kana by writing them out repeatedly. If I recall correctly, I wrote out every kana I had trouble reading and I used paper flashcards to review them.

Why did you decide to interrupt RtK and start learning the Kana? The most sensible advice I can think of is to just un-decide that and get back to learning the Kanji.

Then, when you're done (in about a month, if you're willing to put in the work - you can even cheat and only learn the RtK Light Kanji), you should learn the Kana and start using it, along with Kanji, right away, in any number of ways (SRS-ing sentences, studying grammar, reading basic materials, extensive reading, parallel reading, doing any Japanese beginner's course, etc.)

The alternative, to that, would be to just give up on Kanji altogether, and try to take your Japanese listening skills to an advanced level without the use of Kanji (and therefor without the use of native written materials, such as the Internet, manga, books, etc.). You could still use study materials written in Kana, of course, mainly to learn vocab and SRS simple sentences (grammar would be pretty difficult, without Kanji, so you would probably have to only do very basic grammar), but as far as native materials, you'd be stuck with music, radio and television.

And then, later on, once you understand everyday spoken Japanese, you can get back to learning the Kanji (probably not with RtK), learning how to write all that Japanese you already speak, and then use native written materials to progress from advanced to proficient.

I can't recommend this alternative route. I would never do it, because written materials are much too valuable a resource to just pass on, when learning a language. But, if you think you would enjoy spoken materials enough to spend thousands of hours listening and watching them, it's obviously possible to learn Japanese that way. After all, that's how everyone learns their native language, including the Japanese (up to the level of a six yo child, obviously; you can't learn a language up to the level of an educated adult, without becoming a proficient reader).

@o.p.

review whenever you want, eventually it just sinks in.

Writing out both syllabaries on paper in dictionary order once every day was very effective for me, with the added bonus of getting to know the proper order by heart. I would also recommend reading a hiragana text regularly (just for the sounds, 0% comprehension is ok), because the earlier you get used to reading it the better. I remember my crappy kana reading speed and accuracy were really holding me back in the very beginning.

Use Anki.

Clyde1992,

just out of curiosity. Do you pronounce kana? In what language?

How about some kana games?

My personal favorite:
http://learnjapanesepod.com/kana-invaders/

This is ok but too short per one game. I think it is set to 500 points/game.
http://kanarecog.heroku.com/

Similar to Kana Invaders, I haven't tried it yet:
http://gamejolt.com/games/arcade/kana-drop/12325/

SomeCallMeChris Wrote:You could start a collection of simple words that don't really need an understanding of the language to learn, simple nouns for everyday concrete objects (book, grapes, monkey, etc.) and adjectives (especially colors). If you are partial to trees, flowers, animals, or whatever, you could simply do a list of those. In any case, once you have enough to use all the kana you can practice with them.

If you are trying this approach and have an android, I've seen some games that you can grab in the market for free.

Brute force writing.
Change your PC/mobile phone's language into Japanese.
Read any material with kana.
Whenever you take down notes, throw in some kana and kanji.

Whatever you do, immerse yourself in kana and kanji. In time, it will surely stick. I am no expert but I believe that will happen.

[RawToast]

Clyde, you really have many options going forward from this point.

Stansfield123 Wrote:Why did you decide to interrupt RtK and start learning the Kana? The most sensible advice I can think of is to just un-decide that and get back to learning the Kanji.

As the Kana don't take long to get down, this is certainly a valid option. You won't have lost much time with the Kana and maybe the break from Kanji was beneficial.

Quote:Use Anki.

I'd do this if you're already doing RTK in Anki. but you could just grab a kana deck and do either recognition or production of the kana. I'd do this if you're doing RTK in Anki.

Quote:You could start a collection of simple words that don't really need an understanding of the language to learn, simple nouns for everyday concrete objects (book, grapes, monkey, etc.) and adjectives (especially colors).

If you're not interested in writing the kana and are already using RTK, this is a good idea. You could easily cover all the kana with 20 simple words.

Quote:My personal favorite:
http://learnjapanesepod.com/kana-invaders/

If you're not using Anki (so this site) I like this option

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If you're finding you want to get into learning vocab -- hence learning the kana -- you could look into RTK lite (1100 kanji) to finish them earlier.

[Zgarbas]

Do you use Anki for RTK?
How about you add a field with readings for kanjis which you know well and are common words which can stand alone, reading wise (一、二、三、本、木）?Not saying you should change all the keywords in Japanese, just a few here and there. This way, you also get to learn a bit of vocab, while practicing kana, and not affecting your RTK progress. (You can also do this in revTK)

I just did the "write the kana tables on paper whenever I get bored in class" thing. Then again, I soon started using a textbook so that also helped.

Before I had any serious interest in learning Japanese, I had two sheets, one with each kana set on them and I looked up on the internet how they were pronounced. When I got used to how they are supposed to sound, I started flicking through a basic learners Japanese-English dictionary and started writing out (for the hell of it) the kana for words I had heard in movies and whatnot. It provided a sense of satisfaction in being able to "write Japanese" so for a while I found myself doing this, and writing out other words I found interesting, or kana combinations I found interesting (without caring about the actual words all that much), while bored at home, etc.

It wasn't really an intentional means of memorization (though a lot later on- years later, I actually used production based flash-cards) but during this phase I found myself being able to write and remember the kana (admittedly I didn't even bother with katakana at the time, which I regret a little to this day) without having to drill them as such.


TL;DR: maybe find some form of production which you enjoy and just keep doing it here and there, keeping it as simply a fun thing, aside from actual study, you do while bored, or whatever.

Lots of other ways but everyone has already pretty much touched on most of them more than well enough.

A good way to retain kana knowledge is to use kana flashcards, then when you think you have a good handle on them, start reading. Just simple things at first. Me, i started with manga like Crayon Shinchan, that use furigana.

If you want to do a traditional-approach, non-SRS flashcard review, I recommend this site: http://www.realkana.com/
You can easily set up which kana you want to review, and you can also pick the fonts you want to see! I found that checking all of the fonts was particularly helpful to get a good grasp on a lot of different variations kana could appear in.

Although, there are a lot of apps on Google Play (and I assume the app store) that do the same basic thing. Some have audio, so browsing for one there might be better. Just be sure to check the reviews to make sure there are no errors (like some I came across had.)

Clyde1992 Wrote:The most obvious method of retaining this knowledge would be to read and write in Japanese. However, I do not really know any Japanese, yet, so this method does not seem like it would be very effective. Does anyone have any suggestions for practicing the kana, other than using flash cards?

I've found this http://www.tanoshiijapanese.com/practice/ website to be pretty helpful. It helps you to speed up your recognition of Kana characters. The more you do it, the better you get, and it helps you to instantly recognize the characters.

Go on and click Hiragana or Katakana. After that, I recommend doing Character Recognition (but you could do whatever you want). Then choose the characters (they're grouped by their sound, so theres a group for A I U E O... KA KI KU KE KO... so on and so forth. It's easier to explain if you just look at the website) that you know , and click the number of questions you want. Then what happens is, you are timed, and it shows you a character and you type in the sound.

Forgive me if this is too similar to flashcards, but I personally feel it's much different as since it is being timed, you force yourself to remember it as soon as possible and hence speed up your reading.

The site also has other games/practices to help with stuff like pronunciation, stroke order, and it also has stuff on kanji and speech if you feel like it.

This may be a bit childish, but I guarantee it helps. It helped (and is currently helping) me to become more fluent in Hiragana (haven't yet learned Katakana) reading, rather than having to think about what the character is.

I just added kana Anki cards with the kanji ones while I was doing Heisig. So in addition to having to write "legitimate wife" or "raccoon dog", I might also have to write "hiragana sa".

I'm not reviewing that deck anymore, but in the course of doing grammar and vocab I see the kana often enough not to be in danger of forgetting them.

RawToast Wrote:As the Kana don't take long to get down, this is certainly a valid option.

The Kana do take long to learn how to read well. Months, at the least, spent practicing. That's why it makes sense to learn them just before you can start spending months practicing them on text you actually understand.

If someone is planning on learning Japanese along with Kanji, via the RtK method, then that time should be after RtK, obviously.

Otherwise, if they plan on studying Japanese extensively without Kanji, then it should be learned first. But then RtK should never be used. RtK is a method to help English speakers break into Japanese more easily, not a method to help Japanese speakers learn the Kanji.

Learning the Kana just to forget them while studying RtK, or learning the Kana and spending time practicing it on gibberish text, while studying RtK, makes no sense.

Tzadeck Wrote:Traditional paper flashcards. Just go through them every week or so to be sure you remember them.

I like this one. But yeah, you'll get plenty of practice when you will read/study Clyde.

I recommend you use this tool in terms of practice. It is very effective.
http://www.nihongoresources.com/language...ctice.html

The thing is it shows you a kana, and then you type the romanization of that kana in a text box, press enter and it instantly goes to another kana, also showing if you wrote the last one correct or not. There are a lot of options to what group of kana you want to be tested in. If you want to be tested only in the a ka sa ta na ha ma ya ra wa n group, or only test ka ki ku ke ko, you may specify so.

Clyde1992 Wrote:Hello, everyone:

After learning about 600 kanji, I decided to take a break from RTK in order to learn the Japanese syllabaries. I considered purchasing Remembering the Kana, but, as there are much fewer kana than kanji, decided against it. I have now memorized hiragana, and I am about to start katakana. Before I start, however, I would like some advice about how to retain what I have learned.

The most obvious method of retaining this knowledge would be to read and write in Japanese. However, I do not really know any Japanese, yet, so this method does not seem like it would be very effective. Does anyone have any suggestions for practicing the kana, other than using flash cards?

You already have had memorized 600 kanjis? If so, you won't get any difficulties memorizing the kanas... It will take you a day to memorize and retain it as those characters were easier compared to those kanji characters that changes its usage depending on the word which it is used... To sum it up, kanas had fixed usage depending on the sound of the word on which it is used, the only difference is that the Katakana were used for foreign borrowed words, whereas hiragana are for Japanese words.. Hope this helps..

[RawToast]

Stansfield123 Wrote:

RawToast Wrote:As the Kana don't take long to get down, this is certainly a valid option.

The Kana do take long to learn how to read well. Months, at the least, spent practicing. That's why it makes sense to learn them just before you can start spending months practicing them on text you actually understand.

Yes that is true. I should have been more clear, I meant they don't take long to get to a very basic level of slow recognition -- ready for review via SRS, basic content, kana games, etc.

Thank you, everyone, for your advice. I have spent the last few days reviewing my Kana, and I feel that I now have a basic understanding of them. I am still failry slow at reading them, but I suppose I will improve with practice. In the meantime, I will just practice my kana with flash cards.

I will now return to studying the kanji.