In linguistics, there is a theory called "Critical Period". It says language is less easily acquired when one ages. It cites as prime evidence the accent. It is debated and controversial though.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_Period_Hypothesis

27 years old, just hit frame 500 this evening. Woohoo!

Started the book with my wife about 2 years ago, went for ~6 mo. and then fizzled out. Life happens. Restarted seriously around the new year, with this site, which makes all the difference. That and some structured paper to write on. (http://incompetech.com/graphpaper/genkoyoushi/)

I started learning 日本語 because of a free class offered at work. It is quite possibly the mother of all perks. It can't last forever, of course, but I don't know what I'm going to do when it goes away. Besides that, I have the usual passing interests in anime and manga, though I've found they are wearing a bit thin lately. My ultimate goal is to get good enough to go to Japan for grad school.

Just turned 23.
14 months (2nd try)
Finished RTK1 a year ago.

My first attempt failed at 350 due to not using an SRS. Succeeded on second try, but only made real progress during the summers. Thinking about doing RTK3 this year.

edit: Based my time on when I joined RevTK in 2005, but misread the date as mm-dd-yyyy, which would have been before the website even existed.

I'm 30 and started about a year ago. I stopped last summer when life (=constant partying ) got in the way at frame #1153. I restarted at the beginning of this year, reviewed a huge expired stack, failed most of them and relearned up to where I stopped. Now at frame #1566, cruising at 25/30 new kanji a day and I hope to be done by 春分.

I've been away with no access to the internet for some time now and am catching up on the current and past forum posts...

Thora Wrote:Chadokoro: I believe we are in a similar situation.....which I find motivating. I also went through RTK awhile back ('86), didn't use Japanese for 8 years, and now trying to make my way through Kanji in Context. I'm still waiting for the day when it will all come back.... hoping? Without this site, I doubt I would have persisted on my own.

We really are in a similar situation. I first went to Japan back in '86. And although I've been back from Japan for almost 11 years now I really didn't use Japanese at all for at least 8 of those years. There are times when a lot comes back to me at once but it all still seems to have thick layer or dust (or is that rust?) on it. Good luck to both of us on getting through Kanji in Context and reviving our Japanese abilities.

Thora Wrote:To those under 21: Try to pack in as much language and analytical stuff as you can. I read somewhere that a certain part of our brain capacity expands until age 21, after which we're basically stuck with what we've got. Lucky you!

While I mostly agree with the above, I still think it is worth it to pack in as much as we can at any age. The brain seems to be a "muscle" that gets better the more we ask it to do. I knew a Japanese woman (in Japan) who first began to study French in her mid (late?) 50s. She basically did the AFATT approach. Surrounding herself with French input (listening to shows while doing the dishes, etc). After a couple of years of this she went on a one-month trip to France where she met and fell in love with a Frenchman. They got married, moved to Japan, and she had even more reason to actively use her French everyday. After a few years of being married, she basically got herself to near fluency. Of course, it wasn't just having a native French speaker as a partner that got her to this level, but the fact that she continued to surround herself with the French language and push herself to continue to improve.

I'm 19 and halfway through a year teaching in Japan. I learned a tiny bit of Japanese in school in my lunchtimes, and studied bits and bobs for my first six months here in Japan. Gone into overdrive recently as I really enjoy RTK atm, its a real motivational boost when you come across a character you previously couldn't understand but now suddenly can. Always a good conversation bit as well - people are impressed no end if you can do anything to do with Kanji.

78
Finished RTK I
Wondering if next step is RTK II or something else

I am 50 years old. Bought the book 3rd edition used in a used book store on the long weekend in July of '06 while visiting Berkely CA. (revisiting my mis-spent youth ) Started RTK on August 10, 2006, but I was not using an SRS (after studying kana and basic Japanese on my own and even a few times with a tutor in spurts and stops with many gaps for several years without much success). I discovered the RevTK website and registered on 3/23/07. In 4 months, by 7/29 I had added 395 cards. Unfortunately, after adding about 100 cards/mo., I was unable to maintain a regular review schedule while my home was under renovation and was also travelling on business almost constantly. Cards needing review bagan to pile up. Also, I think I had not spent enough time on getting the stories fixed into my imaginative memory and had fallen into relying on "visual memory" (My visual memory has always been very good but apparently not good enough for remembering Kanjis!). By late November I had bogged down completely and almost gave up. I was beginning to think my age was the problem, obviously now a lame excuse. Seeing all the posts from the 50+ learners has inspired me. (Special hats off to richcoop 78 yo!) I am reviewing regularly again, and I just added a bunch of new cards from lesson 18 and now part 3 of the book where you have to make up your own stories is just over the horizon! I have read and re-read the RTK intrduction, and the chapter 11 instructions (very important information). I am even using the "click here to enter your story" feature. My imaginative memory is slowly coming to life and there is no doubt it works so much better than just visual memory. Thanks for all your posts on this.

36
Been studying conversational Japanese for 2 years.
Started learning because I plan to be able to speak to my Japanese speaking niece when she grows up... she's now 2.

Started RTK last July (07) after deciding that I really loved the Japanese language (enough to want to be literate). Quit after a month or so... Started up again in January this year.
I'm at 900, but I've been neglecting my expired kanji lately so I need to spend a bunch of time reviewing before I can add any more.

This site makes the process so much cooler than doing it on your own.
Congrats to everyone who is taking this on.

Recently turned 16. Female.
I believe I'm on frame 1450 now. Can't wait till I'm finished.
The All Japanese All The Time website directed me here, and since I found this, I've been determined to learn these 2043 kanji. It is currently spring break, however, and I believe I shall finish RTK by the end of it.
But really, it surprises me that there aren't more younger students on this site. It seems to me there is a wide variety of Japanese-interested individuals at my high school. A lot of them claim to know Japanese, but I think they are idiots for saying that, as they probably don't know more than a few words. So I think I'm gonna learn this stuff for real, and actually say that I DO know some Japanese.
RTK is not a challenge to me. It is a bit time-consuming, however, I will admit. Perhaps my memory is slightly better because I am still at a young age, but I would think that some of older people have a more difficult time memorizing large amounts of information. Or am I wrong? Anyway, I find this a very interesting topic, as I have been wondering since I first stumbled upon this website how I compare in age to the other individuals here.

AryllWind Wrote:Perhaps my memory is slightly better because I am still at a young age, but I would think that some of older people have a more difficult time memorizing large amounts of information.

Hehe.. Little punk.

I wish I found out about Heisig when I was your age, because applying RTK techniques has helped me immensely in learning everything... Probably would've done a lot better in high school too .

I'm 26 and have been studying RTK for about a month now on about fram 430.
Although I lived in Japan for 9 months last year and got my reading ability for Kanji to about 400 too. So, not sure where I fall. I'll just continue with the book til I finish.
Its fun!

I'm 23.
I've studied Heisig on and off for about 3 years, often with far too long breaks (and consequently, backtracking) due to other aspects of life.
I've "finished" both volume 1 and 3 of RtK once. However, I plan to do the third volume over again due to my abysmal retention percentage (about 20%). My (non-Japanese) education currently takes up far too much of my time and energy, so I won't bother with RtK 3 again until after I graduate.

I'm 20 (but only for about a week now lol)

I've started RTK for the first time somewhere around October/November I guess... Only managed to get to 100~150 or so that time (using Anki)... Now I'm up to 381 in... ehm a month or so? I can't really remember when I started, and I actually don't want to find out because it's most likely been 2~3 months.

Still! I think I'm doing ok now... Whenever I fail a lot of kanji, I don't add new ones that day... Most days I manage to add 5, on good days 10-or-so. I'm having a bit of trouble with the whole stories-keyword-connections-thing. But my reading (now *actually* reading as opposed to recognizing 'characters' and guessing which word it was) has already improved loads... So I'll definitely keep going this time...

I started really studying Japanese last June ^^ (before that learned hiragana at one time; forgot everything besides 4~5 and a few random words)

Well, I'm 19, so another youngin' here.

I've been studying Heisig for a while now, first using his book to remember all the kana (which I did on the plane to and from Italy (hiragana to and katakana from ). Then I picked up his kanji book and began that.

I found out about this website about 300 kanji into the book, so I guess it wasn't all that bad. However, I did shell out the money for the printed flash cards before hand. But, I don't consider it a total waste since they have readings printed on them and all.

Either way, like many others here, I have tried to get through the book 3 different times, this being the third, and now I am currently a little past frame 400. Both other times I made it right to the beginning of part three. However, this time I swear it'll be different. I'll definitely finish this time.

My goal is to finish before the end of this coming summer. So, I figure that gives me about 4 months; so I don't think I'll have a problem. Plus, the summer will be quite a lot easier for me to consentrate on kanji since I won't have any of my friends or girlfriend anywhere closer than 200 miles from me during the week.

18. The number of people here over 30ish really surprises me!

A bit of Smalltalk, eh?

I'm 21 and got free time till Octobre, where I'll start studying at university. (Just finished military service, which is obligatory here, just in case anyone wonders). Trying to learn Japanese has been kind of an "supressed" obsession for many years - and for many years I pushed it back. But since I got 7 months of free time and literally nothing else to do, I started in early February.

I didn't know about Heisig before mid February, but after reading through some explanations, it was rather obvious for me that I'd try that method. At least this seems the most promising (and has proven to be for me so far). I couldn't stand studying Kanji for years with just very slow progress.

I got my copy of RTK on February the 27th (I think I registered here the very same day) and started working. I'm currently on frame 1426 and I plan to finish RKT1 around the 21st of April. Which would make it less than two months in overall studying time. I'm really excited about it too. At first I thought it might be too much, and I proceeded rather carefully through the first 200 frames, but then I thought I'd give it a try and started doing around 40-50 sometimes even 60 Kanji per day. And it still works.

I've slowed myself down a bit in the past week, it just isn't necessary to go that fast to finish one or two days earlier, so I'm doing only around 40 per day right now. I think that's quite managable, even if I got the occasional busy day in between. The only thing constantly growing are my reviews: 140-180 per day (including newly added frames each day) but very managable too.

After finishing RTK1 I'm going to do Hiragana, Katana with Heisigs book - I think that shouldn't take longer than 4 days, pessimistically. (I should know them anyway, hiragana better than katana, I just want to see what the book offers, really.)

Still unsure what I'll do after finishing RTK1 - besides from continuing my daily reviews. I think I'll try and go on without looking into RTK2 - means I'll try to get the readings down "on the move". Well, since AJATT got me into RTK I'll try the sentence method with Anki - but I'm not sure where to start exactly. I'm also using Tae Kim's Guide as additional resource. (Considering AJATT: I got tons of stuff in japanese to work with - in fact I already got tons of stuff before starting to get into the method, but I also bought some new imports - like the 涼宮ハルヒ light novels. I guess it's still too much for the start, but I set it as an early goal. I've long been interested in reading them anyway.)

So much for now,

皆さん頑張って！

Well I was looking for the introduce yourself thread, and this looks like the closest thing.

33 years old
6 days
frame 195

I started off with Pimsleur lessons back in December 2007, and I'm on lesson 45 of that. I've been putting the vocab from them into Anki. Last week I started doing the RTK as well and found this site.

I got interested in learning Japanese through 囲碁. If you play on http://www.gokgs.com send me a message, I'm yoyoma there. It would be nice to meet someone who shares these two interests with me. (I'm 1d and I would be happy to help people learn the game as well).

I played go for 15 years, and around 2 years ago I watch the fan-subs of Hikaru No Go, but I'm not really an anime fan. Really the thing that got me thinking about seriously learning Japanese was reading FredK's Go Book reviews: http://senseis.xmp.net/?JapaneseBookReviews. It made me realize it was possible to learn through self-study.

32
Frame 700
2.5 months.

It honestly baffles me that people manage to learn like 50+ kanji a day. I feel like I'm working flat out and I can't do more than 20 in a day.

Maybe I need a brain scan.

Or mebbe it's like the young whippersnappers say and I'm just too old...

Hey Killerducky,
Being a go fan as well, I've started a thread at 囲碁 for us to congregate and chat.
See you there.

I'm 21
I've been studying Japanese for about 2 years now at my University, and I found this site and this book a little less than a year ago. I started it and got through the first couple of chapters, but I decided to devote more time to my Japanese language classes and gave it up. I can't seem to find the time to go through it all right now with classes and full time work, but hopefully this summer will be good for it. I can write easily from memory about 300 kanji with many compounds, and I know around 400 more by sight only when I read them. I can't wait for summer, and I always float around this forum to see new information, even though I'm not doing Heisig right now, so thanks to everyone for their wonderful posts!

I find it interesting that so many kanji learners who choose to use RTK are adult learners rather than teenagers. Perhaps this is because RTK requires such a large commitment of time up front that some young people are hesitant to make?

I think I may actually be one of the younger people to post here so far, though. I'm 18, and I just completed frame 2042 today. It took me around five months, which was much longer than I had planned to take initially, but during exams and times when I had a heavier workload, I ended up only reviewing expired cards rather than adding new ones due to lack of time. I'm somewhat disappointed with myself, given that I can manage 50+ kanji per day, but I'm going to move on with my Japanese studies on my own and keep progressing as best I can. Hopefully I can attain some degree of proficiency in the language by the time I'm 20.

As a side note, I have found myself using RTK-style memory techniques for studying things other than kanji, and have found it to be a very effective learning tool.

20
I'm on frame 2032 (10 to go, so I'm finishing it up tonight)
Strangely, it's been 4 months exactly. I found out about Heisig on Dec 18

18 years old. 2 weeks. I'm on 1100 or so...

26
3 months
Currently on frame 1935.