How do I use RTK2? Do I need to remember in which compound which reading is used? Or remember the whole compound focusing on knowing the first and the second compound's kanji readings? Or learn the compound just as normal vocabulary? If I focus on one reading of the compound and ignore the other, will the other reading appear somewhere else in the book? No, I'm not gonna listen to your brags about other methods. Thanks.

RTK2 is basically just a reference text as is. But the people over in this thread made an RTK2 deck that looks pretty good. You should have a look.

http://forum.koohii.com/showthread.php?p...#pid195594

There is a deck on Anki I used for RTK2, it follows the 5th edition book though. If you're working from the 6th edition, just update it as you go along I guess.

You should focus primarily on the signal primitives to remember the reading of the kanji. So look at the compound, look at the kanji you're meant to be learning the reading for (highlighted in red in that deck), find the signal primitive and remember it's reading.

I added notes in the signal primitive space. If the primitive wasn't a kanji on it's own (and therefore, with my extremely limited knowledge of where or how to go about finding out the pieces of kanji), I substituted a kanji with the same signal. In the semi pure and mixed groups I added something like a + to say it was part of that group, and a -to say it wasn't, or a 1 to say it was part of the first lot of readings, a 2 for the second etc...

I also added in a category for the RTK1 reading of the compound, because I tend to forget the keywords easily (related to problems I have in English, not the method). I found this helped, because it made it easy to imagine a quick story if the meaning or reading of compounds was giving me trouble.

Hope that helps!

Haych Wrote:RTK2 is basically just a reference text as is. But the people over in this thread made an RTK2 deck that looks pretty good. You should have a look.

http://forum.koohii.com/showthread.php?p...#pid195594

That deck is pretty impressive, but I think that RTK2 the book is more helpful, because you will be learning vocab along with your kanji readings, so personally, I think that going through the book is more helpful.

But if I focus on the kanji I'm supposed to be learning and not know the compound, how am I supposed to know in which compound which reading is used? Or should I just guess? And what about the one time chinese readings, I think I am meant to focus on the whole compound then, right?

kuljd Wrote:But if I focus on the kanji I'm supposed to be learning and not know the compound, how am I supposed to know in which compound which reading is used? Or should I just guess? And what about the one time chinese readings, I think I am meant to focus on the whole compound then, right?

Most kanji actually have only one or two readings, and you only learn them one at a time, so I didn't have any trouble with it...

But did you focus only on the kanji you're supposed to be learning or did you force yourself to remember the whole compound? Cause for example if I don't know the compound I'm seeing in the "wild", but I know the two or three readings that the compound can use, how can I know which reading is going to be used?

kuljd Wrote:But did you focus only on the kanji you're supposed to be learning or did you force yourself to remember the whole compound? Cause for example if I don't know the compound I'm seeing in the "wild", but I know the two or three readings that the compound can use, how can I know which reading is going to be used?

You're supposed to learn the reading through the compounds also, so remember the compound... If you dl the deck I mentioned, you'll see that there's a prompt underneath the main word, where the kana reading of the kanji you're not focussed on is given...

Well, thank you a lot for answering my stupid questions, the explanations were really neat and comprehensive. I'll try not to bother you again . Thanks again.

kuljd Wrote:Well, thank you a lot for answering my stupid questions, the explanations were really neat and comprehensive. I'll try not to bother you again . Thanks again.

It's ok. If you have any more questions, just ask.

If you say so. I see you're living in Japan and from your comments that you have completed both volumes of RTK. So you must be atleast a pinch from being "fluent" or better. How long did it take you to get to this point? Do you fell that learning how to write the kanji was useful? What other methods have you used, did they work as good as Heisig's or better?

kuljd Wrote:If you say so. I see you're living in Japan and from your comments that you have completed both volumes of RTK. So you must be atleast a pinch from being "fluent" or better. How long did it take you to get to this point? Do you fell that learning how to write the kanji was useful? What other methods have you used, did they work as good as Heisig's or better?

I tried to learn them in uni, but couldn't make them stick, until I found Heisig. Book 1 took me nearly 2 years of procrastination. Book 2 I tried to finish over the summer break, but it ended up taking 7 weeks, but I think that's still good... I'm working on getting all the cards to mature now. I'm very far from fluent. You're better off asking almost anyone else on this forum about anything Japanese than me...

Still, I found your answers very useful. So thank you for your time