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Sorry to be inquisitive rather than helpful, but what would be the point of doing RTK in JLPT order? I mean the question in earnest by the way, I'm curious about how that would be helpful.
Joined: Dec 2013
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It seems fundamentally impossible to do what you'd like to do--Heisig's method works on the premise of building up from absolute basics, slowly adding more and more elements, reinforcing older elements/kanji with new elements, until, finally, you claw your way to the top. What makes Heisig's reliance on primitives/elements work is that you build off what is already familiar to you, which means less work in the long run.
If you go in JLPT order you'd only see new elements/primitives once or twice each time you learn one, making every single one as difficult as learning a new kanji--without the benefit of actually learning a kanji. The kanji themselves would also be more difficult without a store of prior kanji/elements/primitives/stories to fall back on.
If you want to learn in JLPT order, that's fine. If you want to try Heisig's order, also fine. But the two are essentially mutually exclusive.
Joined: Dec 2011
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Thanks for the feedback!
I have thought a lot about whether what I want to do is possible or not, and I'm glad to hear the opinions of other Heisig users to double check my thinking.
I recognize that Heisig's method works best when applied in his order (I got to around 650 kanji by fully applying his method as is, and it worked wonders at first but eventually I fizzled out). Especially when learning to draw kanji, his order is most sensible. But in terms of learning the meanings/readings of kanji, it makes sense to me to learn in the same order as children do, so I can learn simple vocabulary first and build on it.
This is one of the biggest contradictions in kanji learning: when you learn anything, you should move from simple to complex. But, simpler kanji don't necessarily have simpler meanings. So you have to choose one - will I learn simpler meanings first, or simpler shapes first? My thought was, by separating the stages, maybe I can do both!
My idea was this:
Phase 1: Learn to Draw. Work through Heisig's book in order, and draw each kanji a couple times, while thinking of the primitive meanings for each part (but not adding keywords yet). By the end of the book, I will know stroke order for 2200 kanji, and my brain will process the shapes more smoothly.
Phase 2: Learn to Apply. Go in JLPT order, and learn the kanji with their meanings and readings. Apply to verbs, compound words, etc.
My thinking was that, by the end of Phase 1, I should be able to instantly recall any primitive meaning, because I have repeated them so many times in Heisig's order. The mnemonics might be more awkward in JLPT order, but the benefit is being able to learn in the order I really want to go in, without having nothing to go on + few memory aides like most JLPT learners.
Does that thinking make sense to you? I appreciate the cautions that it may not work, and would like to hear your thoughts!
Edited: 2014-01-10, 1:47 am
Joined: Dec 2013
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For a minimum of additional work you could also learn the keywords in your 'Phase 1' and be done with the book entirely. Learning the stroke order and elements is essentially the same as learning the keyword, so why not go for both at once?
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If you have 8 hours to spend on learning Japanese a day, and even if you spend 5 minutes making a story for each kanji, it'd only take just over 3 weeks for you to get through RTK1. Since you've already done the first 650, it'd be even less time. Of course, I'm making assumptions about how long you can spend studying per day, how long do you actually have available?
Anyway, that seems such a short time to take to go through it, that I think it would be extremely beneficial to do so.
If your goal is to be sitting the N1 exam, I'd recommend pmnox's 10k deck over nukemarine's for several reasons, but mainly because pmnox has included all the kanji for words normally written in hiragana. It doesn't test you on them, just shows them with the readings in the example sentences, but I've been told that the kanji are often used for emphasis/making words stand out in newspapers, and also that they are used in the N1 test also.
I think it's a good idea to think about your end point first. Where do you want to be in terms of your Japanese ability? Then design your course/ study methods so that they will allow you to reach that goal as efficiently as possible.
For example, if your goal is to start being able to read basic texts, gradually working your way up to newspaper/academic fluency, then I'd recommend benkyo.co/iikanji because their introduction of the readings and vocab for each kanji is arranged in just such a manner, from commonest reading and word with that reading per kanji to least common.
If your goal is to gain lots of vocab for conversation, study, tests, etc, then I think an anki deck would be the way to go.
If your goal is to learn all the onyomis and kunyomis quickly, and the onyomis in such a way that you will expend the least effort, then I'd go for RTK2.
Maybe your goals/end points are different to my suggestions above, but hopefully you can understand what I mean, and think about the best study methods to allow you to reach your goals efficiently ^_^
Joined: Dec 2011
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Thank you everyone for your resources and advice! ^_^
My goal right now is simply to be able to write/recognize shapes for 2200 kanji. I have found I can draw 100+ a day and finish it in a month if I spend most of my time invested in just the look and feel of the characters. (much faster than my previous pace)
I am perhaps impatient to get to applying of the kanji to reading materials. If it doesn't work out as I am thinking, then I will likely take the majority of the advice written here and revisit RTK to go through all the stories again.
ktcgx, iiKanji looks like an excellent resource! That's exactly the order in which I would like to learn readings in, thank you! (It says free account - is it just a free trial, or can I use all its features without paying?)
And again, thank you all for taking time to respond!
Answers to some other questions brought up:
*I thought JLPT + Grade School kids went in about the same order of learning the kanji? I suppose I would choose JLPT order to learn in, then, since it is designed for my demographic.
*The amount of time I have to study is somewhere near several hours a day, on good days. But Kanji is not my top priority, just one of my learning goals for this year. So I am budgeting time according to my long term schedule + my personal motivation levels.
Edited: 2014-01-11, 5:37 pm
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It never makes sense for an adult to learn in the Japanese elementary school order. That order is designed to teach simple concrete concepts first and leave most abstract ideas until middle school. Aside from that there is absolutely no logic or order to it.
Since you are already an adult and can understand complex and ambiguous concepts there's no reason to skip around like they do for children.
