To answer some of your guys' questions, it's been 16 days since finishing and I have a ~92% retention rate in Anki. By "finished," I meant that I went through all the kanji and memorized stories for each one, committing them to visual + imaginative memory and adding them to my SRS. I figured that's what most people mean when they say they've "finished RTK"... sorry if my title was misleading.

I'm still just as committed to studying Japanese as I was when cramming the kanji; I spend at least 3 hours a day doing Anki reviews and studying grammar from Japanese the Manga Way (I'm 75% through). A good chunk of my free time is spent watching dorama and anime and reading manga, and I pretty much always have some sort of Japanese audio playing. The kanji reviews have finally started to die down a bit (they're down to ~80 a day, from 150-200 just a few days ago), so I'm going to start mining sentences once I've finished The Manga Way.

I feel pretty good about my studies so far. It's been a lot of fun, and I'm starting to understand simple phrases from spoken Japanese (comprehension seems to be linear with how much grammar I know). I don't see myself burning out any time soon.

As for my intentions in writing this post, I'm not going to lie, one reason is that I'm a big fat braggart . My other reason is that I've read a few discussions on this forum about whether or not one should "pace themselves," and I just wanted to share my experience to show you the answer is "no." As long as you create/adopt a vivid story for each kanji, and keep up with SRS reviews, you can go as fast as you like.

twofoe Wrote:I figured that's what most people mean when they say they've "finished RTK"... sorry if my title was misleading.

It's not. It's nonsensical to define it any other way. Again, well done, especially on maintaining the retention

Wow, so you say 92%... good luck man. I was sceptical on the retention rate but I don't disagree with your methods, that statistic is impressive. Shame I just can't get fully motivated, I need to work harder.

Great! I want to finish it fast like you!!!

frony0 Wrote:

twofoe Wrote:I figured that's what most people mean when they say they've "finished RTK"... sorry if my title was misleading.

It's not. It's nonsensical to define it any other way. Again, well done, especially on maintaining the retention

Congratulations twofoe!

Just as frony0, I also understand "finishing" RTK as finishing studying all the kanji for the first time and adding them to your SRS. Don't take seriously the trolls.

twofoe Wrote:A good chunk of my free time is spent watching dorama and anime and reading manga, and I pretty much always have some sort of Japanese audio playing. The kanji reviews have finally started to die down a bit (they're down to ~80 a day, from 150-200 just a few days ago), so I'm going to start mining sentences once I've finished The Manga Way.

A question: what impact do you feel your listening is having on your ability at the moment? What are you focusing on when you listen? Just curious, as I found it was really hard to glean anything other than basic sentence structure and pronunication until I had a few thousand vocab under my belt.

And congratulations. A damn fine achievement. You've inspired me to get off my duff and crack down on my remaining L1 kanji.

It's definitely making a difference. Sometimes I'll learn a new word from something I read, and I'll hear it spoken 10 minutes later. Or I'll learn some new grammar and hear people use it. Or I'll hear a word being used a lot and I'll look it up in the dictionary / glean what it means from context.

After listening to Japanese all this time, I feel like I have a basic intuitive sense of the sentence structure. The structure is more-or-less obvious while reading Japanese, but it took me a while to gain an "ear" for it in spoken. I can often distinguish what word's doing what, even if I don't know what they mean, and I don't think that comes without spending some time listening to the language being spoken.

I'm continually improving my ability to comprehend the words and grammar I already know. Sometimes I know every word in a sentence but I miss it entirely until listening a second time.

Congrats, I'm sure it will make an interesting story in Japan. "Yeah.. kanji, I learned those in 15 days", Japanese person: "...?"

wow impressive. really. I started in the last week of July and plan to finish by the end of August I'm at 896 right now. But you've motivated me to finish faster. I'll try to do the next 1000 in 10 days!

Well done! However, you follow a long line of lightning achievers, who disappeared as quickly as they gained attention (blackmacros come to mind, anyone?). I urge you to update us periodically. If you can beat the record holders (Zorlee and haabaato passed N1 and JLPT 1, respectively, after 2.5 yrs), you'll secure your status as a legend. I wish you the best of luck and a swift victory.

I found this older posting after trying to do a search about something else, but I am curious about what happened to this guy, and all those others who have completed RTK with lightning speed.

Norman Wrote:I found this older posting after trying to do a search about something else, but I am curious about what happened to this guy, and all those others who have completed RTK with lightning speed.

There might be several conclusions available:

1) They continue learning Japanese and getting better everyday and fast.
2) They find out that they remembered everything in the short term (15 days) but not in the long term. The reviews came thick and fast. They have since given up learning Japanese.
3) It was an elaborate lie in the first place. The reason? Who knows.

Has any fast learner ever provided followups?

That going through RTK fast would prevent the knowledge from sticking in your long term memory is something I don't buy at all. The main difference is just how much you have to study each day, and as long as you keep doing your reviews it's no problem doing it fast.

It it's really the case that most fast RTK:ers don't stick around, my guess is that many people want to brag about/share their achievement with other people but find out they don't have much interest posting on the site except for that.

AlgoRhythmic Wrote:That going through RTK fast would prevent the knowledge from sticking in your long term memory is something I don't buy at all.

It won't prevent it. Anyone can learn 2000 Kanji, using any method, if they have the will. But it will make it much more difficult.

If you do RtK in 15 days, that means you haven't been using the Heisig method to remember them, you have been relying on the far superior ability that is short term memory.

Furthermore, your reviews will pile up so high for the next month, that you would be forced to continue working at least as hard as you have been while "learning". In the end, you'd have to do several times more work than someone who just takes Mr. Heisig at his word, and spends the six weeks it takes to imagine all the stories, and allow his mind to do its job with the rest.

Odds are, people who pat themselves on the back after two weeks as having achieved the same results the rest of us need a minimum of six weeks for, aren't going to then be psychologically prepared to continue working at it at the same pace, for an extra month (and even after that, they would have to work much harder than those of us using the Heisig method to its full potential, just to preserve what they learned). Hence, all the mysterious disappearances.

AlgoRhythmic Wrote:It it's really the case that most fast RTK:ers don't stick around, my guess is that many people want to brag about/share their achievement with other people but find out they don't have much interest posting on the site except for that.

Why wouldn't they continue bragging, about things like becoming fluent in Japanese? I know that if I miraculously manage to become fluent in the next six months, you're gonna be hearing about it regularly until at least Christmas, all over the 日本語中級会話 thread. It's gonna be post after post of wall to wall Kanji, about anything I can possibly think of.

Stansfield123 Wrote:If you do RtK in 15 days, that means you haven't been using the Heisig method to remember them, you have been relying on the far superior ability that is short term memory.

What, claiming that is ridiculous. As long as you are doing stories and imagining them you are doing Heisig, nothing about his method claims you have to spend a minimum of 6+ weeks. Heisig himself even recommends his own method for a 4-week period if you can study full-time, and guess what some people are capable of spending more than full time or simply learn faster.

Stansfield123 Wrote:Furthermore, your reviews will pile up so high for the next month, that you would be forced to continue working at least as hard as you have been while "learning". In the end, you'd have to do several times more work than someone who just takes Mr. Heisig at his word, and spends the six weeks it takes to imagine all the stories, and allow his mind to do its job with the rest.

While it's true that you will do more reviews in a shorter amount of time, that doesn't necessarily mean you have to do more work, that completely depends on your success rate which you are now assuming is going to be low. And even if you are correct, if you do that extra work you will probably still be finished with RTK and ready to learn actual Japanese faster, which would be the optimal target for someone who has the time.

And I have no idea why you're assuming that you have to spend six weeks minimum. While not being as fast as this guy I spent 3.5 weeks (10-12 hours each day, did the supplement), which is still almost twice as fast as your recommended six weeks, and my success rate the last two weeks has constantly been between 90-97%, with no indications of lowering.

Stansfield123 Wrote:Odds are, people who pat themselves on the back after two weeks as having achieved the same results the rest of us need a minimum of six weeks for, aren't going to then be psychologically prepared to continue working at it at the same pace, for an extra month (and even after that, they would have to work much harder than those of us using the Heisig method to its full potential, just to preserve what they learned). Hence, all the mysterious disappearances.

Or, you know, they just spent more time every day and actually learned it just as good as you did but in shorter amount of time with no problems. I don't understand why you can't see that possibility. And what "full potential"? There is nothing stopping you from studying more each day and learning more at a shorter period of time, as long as you have the willpower and time. Just because you are slower doesn't mean you are utilizing some "full potential".

Stansfield123 Wrote:Why wouldn't they continue bragging, about things like becoming fluent in Japanese? I know that if I miraculously manage to become fluent in the next six months, you're gonna be hearing about it regularly until at least Christmas, all over the 日本語中級会話 thread. It's gonna be post after post of wall to wall Kanji, about anything I can possibly think of.

Your fluent in six months comparison is just stupid and I won't even answer that. The reason I stated was just a guess, but obviously RTK is a big milestone on the way and progress that is very easily measurable, and thus easily braggable. But that's just me guessing. My main point though is that I don't believe for a second that doing it fast will hinder your long term memory.

Stansfield123 Wrote:...Odds are, people who pat themselves on the back after two weeks as having achieved the same results the rest of us need a minimum of six weeks for, aren't going to then be psychologically prepared to continue working at it at the same pace, for an extra month (and even after that, they would have to work much harder than those of us using the Heisig method to its full potential, just to preserve what they learned)...

It's nearly impossible for a sprinter to win a marathon. Going through a large number of kanji quickly is possible. I have done it in a few long sit downs, but most often I will have to pace myself and spend time reviewing everything before moving on to the next batch. The 15 day RTK claim might be true for some, but I think the stagnant review time just kills interest in those with that 'speedy' mentality.

Norman Wrote:but I think the stagnant review time just kills interest in those with that 'speedy' mentality.

A speedy mentality does not necessarily have be "I want to do it fast or not at all", it could just as well be "it's going to take a long time either way, but I want to do it as fast as possible at least". The first one is obviously a problem, but the second one not so much.

Good point. I shouldn't clump everyone into one complete "mentality" or the other. Despite the speed of completing RTK, all of us can't avoid the long and gruesome reviewing process.

I found out about RTK really early on in my studies and it was the first serious study project I set out on after Tae Kim's Grammar Guide. It was the first month of summer break and I didn't really have any pressing engagements or the like, so I pretty much devoted most of my day to studying RTK. I mean, 6 hours or more some days (looking back on it, I don't know how I kept that up.) I finished the whole thing in a little over 3 weeks, adding the cards to anki as soon as I learned them and reviewing them every day. Some days, I'd have over 1000 reviews but somehow I kept going. Its probably not a "speed run" because I spent so many hours on it, but all the same, its definitely possible to do it in a few weeks. That is, if you don't burn out on the way.

I stopped reviewing RTK in Anki when I went on vacation in August due to some technical problems (not being at my computer and such) but continued to read and listen to Japanese the whole time. It's been about 6 months since that time, and I can't say I'm anywhere near fluent, but, at the same time, I'd have been amazed if I'd known how much I'd learned in those few months. I can read light novels with little trouble, play those coveted VNs and ADV games, and peruse many basic manga.

I don't think stopping the reviews have been a problem: although I've lost the ability to write the kanji, I almost never mistake two kanji or anything like that when I'm reading. I find that I can still remember most of the keywords rather effortlessly, and many of the kanji evolve to form even more complete meanings as I aquire more vocabulary. For me, quitting those RTK reviews helped free up alot of time for other things that I found more enjoyable and more useful, such as vocab review, reading and just enjoying the language. I think that RTK was an invaluable foundation that started my understanding of kanji; however, it wasn't the end all, be all method. I am improving all the more everyday, and even if the road is long, I don't care: its a lot of fun just learning more about a language so different from my mother tounge.

waaa 15 days damn. Today i just finished learning my 1026 kanji and i was thinking of taking it slow but reading this has got me motivated to just go hard and finish RTK.

The way i go about studying RTK is, going by lesson see what primitives the kanji is made of then go to the kanji page on koohi see if there is a good story there if i can't find one i like i would make one up. Then i write each kanji in one line of my notebook and then when i'm done with the lesson i review all the kanji in that lesson by looking at the keyword only and then writing down the kanji 5 times if i can remember it if i can't get the kanji right i write it 10 times.Writing every kanji is very time consuming but i don't have too many issues remembering the kanji and stories.I don't use anki much but i think i will now and also cut down on writing.I'm think about finishing the rest of the book in a week and just spend a couple weeks reviewing so the kanji will stay in long term memory.This has got me feeling really lazy (lol) but has motivated me. Thanks twofoe

I'm an RTK 21 day finisher and I guess I'll post a bit of follow-up here, since it seems to be wanted around here. I started learning Japanese 4 months ago, starting out doing RTK, then doing the Tae Kim cloze deletion Anki deck and after that I just started being lazy and reading manga and watching anime and dramas and playing video games.

My retention rate isn't anywhere near this guy. My young cards are at 90%, mature at 86%, but I'm happy with that and still reviewing steadily. The heavy load from the beginning is pretty much gone and I started slowly (maybe 1 card per day) adding cards from RTK3, taking my ever-so-sweet time with that.

As for my progress in Japanese ability... I watch things without subs, I guess? I really have no measurement for this, since I'm not as systematic as all of you seem to be. I'm not counting my sentences in Anki (nor, in fact, do I have more than maybe 50 cloze deletions of my own in there, or thereabouts), nor am I planning to take any kind of JLPT exam anywhere before N2 or even N1, since all those others seem to be pointless.

Being a quick RTK finisher to me doesn't mean I also want to rush for those "milestones", though I am "doing" a lot of Japanese every day. I'm sloppy, I was sloppy with RTK, simply reading the primitives, coming up with a quick and dirty story and moving on, nowhere near the amount of work that the guy who made this topic seems to have done went into it for me - so obviously my retention rates were abysmal and could only be called average at best at this point, but I don't mind about any of that.

For me, RTK was just something I rushed through to get to the meat and potatoes. You know, the good stuff. Nasty kanji vegetables just taste a lot better if you just stir fry them quickly instead of letting them simmer in the pot for days.

I got till 800 kanji before quitting once, I'm currently adding 100 new cards per day and the rate works great for my new new cards too. Its not as fast as 15 days.. but 20 ain't bad~!
4 hours train time every day do that to you..

Norman Wrote:I found this older posting after trying to do a search about something else, but I am curious about what happened to this guy, and all those others who have completed RTK with lightning speed.

I "finished" RTK in about 14 days. For what it's worth, it wasn't a bad way to spend two weeks, and it certainly made recognizing kanji as 漢字 and not かんじ, or just confusing blobs of ink and print. As for the actual impact it makes on one with their self-learning, only time will tell. Though it isn't really a "big" part of learning Japanese, as some people tend to make it.

If I were doing RTK for anymore than two months, without doing anything else related to learning Japanese, I'd say you may as well start learning Japanese already and get used to the kanji by a lot of reading and writing, because you're pretty much going to have to do that anyway, RTK just gives you a bit of a running start -which is pretty much made ineffective, in my opinion, if your going to take your sweet time with it. Considering the author himself managed to create and develop the entire system from scratch in less than half the time most people take to get through RTK. It's a little like warming up and stretching, so the marathon that is learning Japanese, is less ridden with cramps along the way.

I'd be bored to tears if I were to go back to relating 漢字 with English keywords. *shrugs* Though I didn't really do it long enough to get past first base. Maybe if one stays with RTK long enough, she might turn out to be a contortionist without a gag reflex, or something. Who knows.

uisukii Wrote:I "finished" RTK in about 14 days. For what it's worth, it wasn't a bad way to spend two weeks, and it certainly made recognizing kanji as 漢字 and not かんじ, or just confusing blobs of ink and print.

So you just spent two weeks going over RtK, and then stopped? How would you describe what you actually accomplished by doing this, using as accurate a language as possible? (I'll provide an example of what I mean later in this post)

uisukii Wrote:As for the actual impact it makes on one with their self-learning, only time will tell. Though it isn't really a "big" part of learning Japanese, as some people tend to make it.

What are you basing this on? Are you claiming that you actually learned RtK in two weeks, and you are now drawing conclusions about its effectiveness from personal experience? You must be Superman.

I have spent about 5 weeks exclusively on RtK (adding about 60 Kanji a day, and keeping up with reviews). It took me around 5-6 hours/day (I took my sweet time, never rushed through any reviews). Then I spent about another 10 weeks reviewing my Rtk deck every morning. This took me about an hour/day the first week, and then 20-30 minutes from that point on. I also added a few RtK3 Kanji to my deck, as I encountered them elsewhere.

Here's how I would describe what I accomplished:

1. I learned to correctly write around 90% of the 2042 Kanji. (by correctly I mean stroke order, and ease of writing, without much effort trying to recall each element; but I do not mean that my handwriting looks natural in any way, or has any kind of consistent style; it doesn't, and it never will)
2. I learned a rough primary meaning for about 40% of the Kanji (meaning that I can now spot those Kanji when used in this primary meaning, and know what they mean in the text)
3. I learned to associate about 65% of the Kanji with an English keyword. This allows me to more easily remember the writing of about 2/3 of the words I learn. It also allows me to identify connections between words that I would otherwise struggle to identify, and thus helps me remember them (not just their writing,but also their reading).

I would consider these three accomplishments a big deal (a BIG part of learning Japanese), and something I would not have accomplished if I hadn't given RtK the attention it deserves.

However, I have now stopped reviewing Kanji. As far as point nr. 2, I feel that very little more could be accomplished (because the rest of the Kanji don't really have keywords that would allow such easy understanding). With point nr. 3, I could of course continue and learn 90% of the keywords just to help me "handle" another 5-600 Kanji more easily, but since it would do little to also further benefit me when it comes to understanding them on first sight as they show up in Japanese text, and since I can already write them, I feel that spending that 20 minutes daily on this would no longer be the best use of my time. But, again: this is after four months spent on carefully reviewing and writing the Kanji. Not after two weeks.

I imagine that spending just two weeks trying to learn Kanji would indeed have very little benefit. I'm not surprised that you think RtK is not a big part of learning Japanese. If you only spend two weeks on it, it's not.

P.S. I keep saying RtK, but, of course, RtK is not the only method for studying the Kanji. There are plenty of others, no doubt also useful (I wouldn't even claim that RtK is the best method - but I would claim that it is better than skipping studying the Kanji, and just jumping into vocab and grammar - which is what you have essentially done).

AlgoRhythmic Wrote:Your fluent in six months comparison is just stupid

That's a great approach to making a point. Everyone should use it. Far too many people walk away from online conversations without being called stupid, and it's a real shame.

Oh well, I guess I'm one of the lucky ones. Thanks, buddy, I don't know what I would've done without you.