Hey, it's been a while. Long time, actually.

Anyway...So I finished RtK1 quite a while back. I figured since I'm studying in Japan for a year, I would just pick up on the readings (through exposure, classes, etc). And I am, more or less, but I've decided to do a version of KanjiTown/Movie Method/Chains...whatever.

We all know that　コウ　and ショウ　are the main beasts, with 65 and 67 kanji, respectively.
So I decided to figure out just what those numbers were for all of them, and made a list that shows how many kanji correspond to each Onyomi.

I made this for myself to be like a "Chapter" guide, where, let's say I were doing 50 per day, then I could do ロウ、ジン、エイ、ハイ、and ドウ, because they each have 10 characters.

I put this together just for me to use, but if anyone else is interested, feel free.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=JQUAORXU

Kinda just easier to learn readings through actually reading and aquiring vocab tbh. It develops real usable reading skills at the same time as learning to read Kanji and growing the most important thing: vocab.

Only things I think are useful to know to give you a quick leg up for practically nothing is taking a look at pure and semi-pure groups (not SRS'ing though).

If u learned to read 2000 kanji without doing vocab then you might be able to read the words when u come across them but u still wouldn't know what they meant (can guess but still have to check)... at which point you look it up in the dictionary and that tells you the meaning and how to read it.

Seems logical to skip "learning the readings" and just look words up from the start that way you learn how to read the kanji and vocab too. I've learned 2K vocab over the last 2 months all from reading a few articles a day on a few sites and I've noticed a big improvement in real world reading ability (plus I've learned to read 700 new kanji during that time). It's win-win. I just think "learning the readings" is extra work you don't really needa do.

Yes, I would agree with you if my reading and vocab was increasing by doing that. Unfortunately, I don't feel like it is. I've been here for a while now, and I feel like my progress is abysmal.
I'm not going to focus only on this, but there's only 300ish onyomi.
250ish of these have 10 or less kanji to them.

It's definitely not going to hurt my studies to do something like this on the side.

Learning anything is a good thing because it's at least a step foward in some direction. The main benefit I can see to it is being able to look stuff up in a dictionary that you otherwise wouldn't have been able to. Though that's mostly not a problem, there are times when it can be.

What do you estimate your vocab is at? It's honestly the big killer to reading ability. I'm only just past 4K vocab and I feel my reading ability still sucks but the last 2 months have seen definiiiiiiiiiite improvements. One thing i've noticed big time is that all the kanji that are super common are super common because they appear in a big number of words.

Somewhere between "nonexistent" and "fluent"
In class, I'm learning the differences between 変える　替える　代える　換える, and 引退、辞職、退職、and other words that mean the same thing...except not.
But at the same time, I don't even know what you call those spoons that you eat ramen with. There's a word for them, but I don't know what it is...

I get by just fine day-to-day, and watching TV is no problem. But when it comes to speaking, there's an overload of saying things like "i want that big thing that goes into the littler thing, so then you can use the whole thing."

edit:

mezbup Wrote:One thing i've noticed big time is that all the kanji that are super common are super common because they appear in a big number of words.

Isn't that what the definition of "super common" is?

Asriel Wrote:edit:

mezbup Wrote:One thing i've noticed big time is that all the kanji that are super common are super common because they appear in a big number of words.

Isn't that what the definition of "super common" is?

The point there being it's far far more important to nail down all that vocab than to learn a 些細な違い between 変える　and 代える... almost a pointless exercise if you can't read a text the words are in to appreciate the difference. Not trying to troll, just saying reading is tough until you know freakin insane amount of words so the only thing to do is just get cracking.

mezbup Wrote:The point there being it's far far more important to nail down all that vocab than to learn a 些細な違い between 変える　and 代える... almost a pointless exercise if you can't read a text the words are in to appreciate the difference. Not trying to troll, just saying reading is tough until you know freakin insane amount of words so the only thing to do is just get cracking.

I was just making fun of your use of English, I knew exactly what you meant. And yes, I realize how stupid it is to learn the subtleties between words, whereas there are thousands upon thousands of way more useful words to learn.
Which is why I'm glad Spring Break just started and I can use some of this time to NOT study for class, and do something useful.

But no, there is definitely TV, friends I talk to, books and things I read. I'm not just devoting my time to a kanjichain...
I feel like I've reached a point where I kind of know..."how I learn" and "what I need to learn" and stuff...at least a little bit.

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=r...vy9p3_RAFA

This was a spreadsheet I threw together. There should be an onyomi count for the RTK kanji. I think I have a better list based off of Khatsuo's Kanken spreadsheet but it may not be posted.

Reference this thread: http://forum.koohii.com/showthread.php?tid=3250

Well I like your thinking Asriel as I'm currently doing the same thing myself.

I became a bit disheartened with my studies and didn't really do anything Japanese in December and January. However I've got the fire back in my belly and for the last couple of weeks I've been doing a combined kanjitown/movie method on the side so to speak.

Seems to be working quite well so far and I'm also adding in Japanese keywords here and there.

One tip that has worked nicely for me is using "Country/Agricultural Show" for ショウ. Can make lots of nice little stories about the rides, characters, animals etc.