I'm just getting started with RtK2. The pure groups seemed like they were really useful. As I understood it, if a kanji had the signal primitive in them, then I knew their "on" reading.

Then I realized that the kanji 情 is actually pronounced ジョウ in most words and yet is part of the セイ "pure" group. I verified in some dictionaries and the セイ reading is actually very uncommon.

So what's the point of identifying that kanji as part of a "pure" group if that doesn't give you the most likely "on" reading?

If by using RtK2, I'm learning to associate kanji with uncommon readings first then that seems really counterproductive. This is giving me some serious doubts on the usefulness of RtK2 itself.

The number above the English definition tells you another frame number. So, in this case, frame 1530 has 情 again but with the reading ジョウ. 青　 is a phonetic group with several readings(セイ　ショウ　シン　ジョウ）. If you're worried about learning uncommon things before the most common, then why use RTK at all?

From what I remember, "pure group" doesn't mean that the reading is the only one or even the most common one. It only means that the reading is as expected from the radical. From a radical standpoint, 情 should be pronounced "sei". And it is. Just not all, or even most, of the time.

RTK2 is good in that it familiarizes you to the major readings in as logical of groups as maybe possible given the evolution of kanji and their readings in Japan. It is also nice that at least one compound example is given for each of the kanji from RTK1 that has a common Chinese reading. Learning the readings feels like a much more of daunting task than completing RTK1.

yukamina Wrote:If you're worried about learning uncommon things before the most common, then why use RTK at all?

That's the question. Is doing RtK2 really worth it?

Codexus Wrote:That's the question. Is doing RtK2 really worth it?

That is an age old question, but in my opinion, it is not worth it. I would rather learn from actual words than isolated readings. Guessing at a word's pronunciation can feel great, but in the end, you usually have to check it.

Codexus Wrote:

yukamina Wrote:If you're worried about learning uncommon things before the most common, then why use RTK at all?

That's the question. Is doing RtK2 really worth it?

I meant RTK in general, not just RTK2. In RTK1, you're learning kanji completely out of any order of frequency, just as in RTK2. I think RTK2 is worth it if you have trouble with on-yomi, and you can learn words in isolation. On-yomi used to be hell for me before...

Smacke Wrote:That is an age old question, but in my opinion, it is not worth it. I would rather learn from actual words than isolated readings.

People say this a lot and it confuses me. RTK2 does teach the readings with actual words. If the problem was learning isolated words instead of sentences, then I'd understand that.

Until you learn all of the major kanji, you are still illiterate. Learning in order of frequency does not help much in reaching the goal of literacy. An order that allows you to learn and retain in long term memory all the common use kanji quickly will.

yukamina Wrote:I meant RTK in general, not just RTK2. In RTK1, you're learning kanji completely out of any order of frequency, just as in RTK2.

I see. But I think that's different. The order in which the kanji are learned has no impact on the final result. I don't think it's the same with kanji reading.

To keep using my example, if I first learn that 情 is セイ. I will make that association in my mind. Every time I'll see that kanji I'll think セイ and then later I'll have to "unlearn" that and realize that's only an uncommon reading. I'm afraid it's going to be hard to let go of that "情 is セイ" association.

On the other hand, if I learn 情 is ジョウ, and then later I add "by the way there are a few cases where it's セイ". I'll make the right association in my mind from the beginning.

I don't know, maybe that's just worrying over nothing. But it seems to me it would be easier to learn the most common on readings first.

I wouldn't touch RTK2 with someone else's brain these days. I ran across too many examples like that, where readings were the 1 in 100 type, and just got irritated with it. I was excited at first, and thought it would be great, but when I got down to brass tacks, I got disillusioned pretty fast.

Add to it vocab that I couldn't even find in dictionaries, and, well, I dumped it for KO, where I learned that 情 is ジョウ first and foremost, because that's how it's used most often. I don't get it confused for other, totally uncommon readings now. (Which was always my fear with RTK2.)

The other main problem is that if you have some random as hell Buddhist term for your example vocab word (which he does quite a bit, or so it seemed to me), it's *really* hard to find a good example sentence that isn't an 1級 sentence, let alone find one in a dictionary. (Because most of those words don't hang out in modern online dictionaries... or at least that was my experience.)

The other alternative is to try to find alternative words with the same reading that he gives you... good luck with that. Rather than spend my valuable study time rewriting the book, I just grabbed another book.

Codexus Wrote:

yukamina Wrote:I meant RTK in general, not just RTK2. In RTK1, you're learning kanji completely out of any order of frequency, just as in RTK2.

I see. But I think that's different. The order in which the kanji are learned has no impact on the final result. I don't think it's the same with kanji reading.

To keep using my example, if I first learn that 情 is セイ. I will make that association in my mind. Every time I'll see that kanji I'll think セイ and then later I'll have to "unlearn" that and realize that's only an uncommon reading. I'm afraid it's going to be hard to let go of that "情 is セイ" association.

On the other hand, if I learn 情 is ジョウ, and then later I add "by the way there are a few cases where it's セイ". I'll make the right association in my mind from the beginning.

I don't know, maybe that's just worrying over nothing. But it seems to me it would be easier to learn the most common on readings first.

Which is why I learn all my readings from context. If I learn a lot of words with a kanji and it's always pronounced a certain way, why would I care that it can in theory also be pronounced some other way in another compound? I don't know that compound, it makes no difference to me. In due time, when I learn that compound, it won't be a problem. The tactic of learning readings in context makes you comfortable with the fact that the readings you know aren't exhaustive so it's not a big deal when you run into a new reading for a kanji.

[Katsuo]

This spreadsheet identifies rare Joyo readings. It also has look-up data for primitives (which you could duplicate to do multi-primitive look-up).

yukamina Wrote:I meant RTK in general, not just RTK2. In RTK1, you're learning kanji completely out of any order of frequency, just as in RTK2. I think RTK2 is worth it if you have trouble with on-yomi, and you can learn words in isolation. On-yomi used to be hell for me before...

Learning how to write kanji is much different to learning readings. Just because one way works for learning subject A, doesn't mean you should use that same method to learn subject B.


That is the reason RTK2 is not popular.