Hey all,

I recently started using the Movie Method/Kanji Chains (or, really, a mixture of both), and started a blog to keep track of my mnemonics. It can be found here:

http://meremm.blogspot.com

It's not "pure" Movie Method, as I'll probably be using a mixture of movies, TV shows, and stories-entirely-made-up-by-me, but in any case I think it's important to share mnemonics and I'm hoping that someone else learning onyomi might be able to benefit from this. Also, it'd be great if anyone who has a similar blog could post theirs - in my opinion, the more mnemonics there are to use, the easier this method becomes.

In any case, happy reviewing

These are good for comparing and editing my own. Thanks.

haha I used "icky" for いき too!

I can't stress enough how great it feels after doing this method. Though I don't really like the "chain" part since a weak link can kind of ruin the whole thing... especially in large groups with the same readings.

I think its best for each kanji to live in its own little world with the on yomi to be like an invisible primitive... if that makes sence... anyway, thats just my opinion. Do what works for ya

I've never heard of either of those method before looking at your blog. After a bit of googling I still fail to see the benefit of such a method over learning pronunciation in context.

mikankun Wrote:I've never heard of either of those method before looking at your blog. After a bit of googling I still fail to see the benefit of such a method over learning pronunciation in context.

Like Kanji the Onyomi has systematic features, so learning it in a systematic fashion is not a bad idea. You'll still need to learn words later, but with the pronunciation and meanings under your belt you have less to contend with.

You can learn only in context, but that adds a lot of time to the equation. As there are 2000 kanji, and two to three words make for good context learning, that's a lot of words that may not be common words anyway. Then there's the 1000+ kanji that pop up later with RTK3 or Kanken levels. That's a lot of rare words to learn from context just to learn onyomi for rare kanji when there are better words to learn using more common kanji.

Here's some rough numbers: Of the 2000+ Jouyou kanji, 1800 or so have an common onyomi pronunciation. Of those 1800, only 200 or so have two common onyomi pronunciations. Assuming 50 kanji an hour (longer if you're doing Movie Method to also learn the writings of kanji), you can cover 95% of possible kanji pronunciation use in writing with 40 to 50 hours of systematic study and additional review.

Now the benefit: You'll learn common words there kanji onyomi through context no problem. These come up often enough in reading to further reinforce learning. What you'll find having not so common kanji meanings and their onyomi at the ready is when you see a common word with an additional not so common kanji is you can pronounce and understand the meaning of that new word. This is nothing to sneeze at when you're reading through novels and don't wish to run to a dictionary everytime a new word pops up. If you know the meaning, and how to pronounce then you know the word even if its new.

Thanks for the explanation, Nukemarine

The way I see it, I've already spent several hundred hours systematically learning to write kanji through Heisig, so why not spend a few more systematically learning the onyomi? I started reading ハリー・ポッター, and got through a few chapters before I realized that reading it (and learning new vocabulary from it) would be a lot easier if I learned the onyomi first. I'm not at all trashing learning through vocab; I think it's a very valid way to learn, and different methods work for different people. But even with the small amount of kanji I've gone through thus far, I feel like it's working very well for me personally, and that's really all I could ask for

I'm confused... the gist I was getting on here was that it's better to learn the readings in context, and that it's best to skip something like RTK2 which teaches readings "out of context". Why does everyone hate RTK2 anyway? I never understood that. Can't it be used with this "movie method"?

Another thing - if I went through all of Core, would I be good with readings of the jouyou by the end? or would it be better to first do RTK2?

Problem is that even if you know the readings you still don't know which ones are going to be used in a word. For instance the reading of 大 in 大小 being 「だい」 and 「たい」 in 大変. Not to mention words like 美味しい where the readings don't even correspond to how the word is pronounced. So basically you spend a bunch of time learning readings, don't get any vocab out of it, and in the end still can't read with certainty. If my goal were to "learn kanji readings" I would totally use this method right away. However the goal for most people is probably to be able to read kanji within vocab (and being familiar with those words is also a plus ). Just my 2c anyway.

interesting blog

@Vinneram, many words in Japanese you MUST learn individually w/ or w/o context. The kunyomi words, those that use kanji with different onyomi, the ateji words, etc. You'll either not have a full meaning or pronunciation (kunyomi), or incorrect pronunciation (ateji and multi-onyomi) or no meaning (the ateji). With Ateji and Kunyomi, you run into some problems when using RTK in that the meanings of the kanji sometimes have nothing to do with the word.

Many knock RTK2 (including myself) in that we find it a poor method. Yes, where it works it works well. However, you go from the cool visual memory of RTK to the rote memory of RTK2. However, Memory Palace and it's variant for kanji called Movie Method uses the visual memory for getting onyomi attached to kanji.

@Icecream, it's one of those "Don't knock it until you try it" things. It's also like RTK in that you don't have to do it to learn Japanese, but those that have done it found it very useful in the long run.

As for Movie Method being complicated, perhaps approach it like this: Pick an onyomi that has listed as common onyomi upto 5 kanji (maybe ri). Now, put those kanji and their primitives inside a skating rink (RI nk). That's a memory palace method. You see a kanji, and its primitives and their visual interaction brings up the skating rink which brings up RI.

The movie method just extends that to fictional settings inside a movie. So maybe for KOU you use Lord of the Rings. You see many of the KOU kanji that have the "elbow" primitive so you imagine Legolas for those. You also put him in the Dwarven cave scenes to play with other primitives to isolate it further.

I wouldn't call it anymore complicated than RTK. The hard part is picking a movie or commercial or room in your house to attach to an Onyomi which is then populate with kanji and primitives.

lol I didn't know this would start such a big debate

While it is true that there are lots of kunyomi compounds and (using Schultz's term) f***ed pronunciations, that doesn't mean we should throw the baby out with the bathwater and disregard the onyomi completely. Actually, after doing Movie Method I plan on going through kanjidamage.com or something similar to learn the most common kunyomi words and FP's individually.

As for RTK2, it's the method that is flawed, not the goal. It is still worth it to learn the onyomi, it's just that Heisig doesn't do it in the way that's most conducive to learning.

hello again meredithcat. =D Funny, I actually know the guy who runs kanjidamage, real wild Californian dude with a multicolored beard and a deep-entrenched love for punk rock. I haven't actually looked at his methods much though, so this part post is pretty irrelevant. =P

Relevant part: I was doing my movie method blog (shameless plug: http://tmmia.blogspot.com/ ) for a year or so and although I found doing this unorthodox method was fun and a nice break from traditional study, it was no substitute, only a buffer, a supplement. Doing readings like しょう and せい with Indiana Jones and Star Wars respectively helped me a ton, as those are two of the much more ubiquitous readings. As for smaller groups I've done, any onyomi group below 15 or 20 kanji doesn't seem to be worth doing in my personal experience. Doesn't stick the same way, and you won't see the kanji as often. And again, it's a buffer, so in practice, when you are looking at a string of 8 kanji you can see "Ah, this was in the Indiana Jones group, so it's (probably) pronounced しょう" and just give you a bit of context. Like Heisig stories, the mnemonic device itself should eventually fade away and you'll be left with a natural neuro-pathway link between the kanji and the reading. This has been the case sometimes for some of mine, others not.

So again, supplemental to studying vocab rote (RTK2 for example) I think movie methods and kanji chains can be a huge help. Probably very subjective and success varies from person to person though.

Thanks for your perspective! You've been using the method longer, so I'm sure you know better than I do. Are you doing any sort of reviewing with an SRS? I've been putting the individual kanji in a leitner-based system, with kanji + meaning on the front and reading on the back, and reviews have been going really fast. Also, I think this method is good for not just reading in context, but for memorizing new vocabulary, so even if your mnemonic is a bit fuzzy from disuse it can still help you out.

It also might be good to limit myself to groups with >10 kanji or so, as you're right, the movie method is more effective for larger groups. I think I'll do a few more groups first and see what's sticking and what isn't.

meredithcat Wrote:It also might be good to limit myself to groups with >10 kanji or so, as you're right, the movie method is more effective for larger groups. I think I'll do a few more groups first and see what's sticking and what isn't.

Does anyone know how many groups there are with >10 kanji/onyomi? A descending list, of most common to least common onyomi would be even better! I think focusing on these would make the movie method far less tedious and time consuming. The sheer volume of onyomi out there is what dissuaded me from trying out the method. However, studying big groups seems likely to immediately and significantly improve one's reading ability. If someone can provide me with the list I'm looking for, then I'll give a try and provide feedback on how useful it was.

@vileru, I don't know about such a list per se, but in that movie methods materials thing I downloaded from megauplaod there's the .xls file containing a vast data chart of onyomi. You can flip through it to find the most ubiquitous readings.... also my blog has some of them, しょう、せい、ちょう、けい

@mcat Probably part of my downfall with the movie method is that I didn't ever formally review them. At first when learning most of the compounds was so new (And again, it was easier to apply the method) if I struggled to remember an onyomi and had done a movie for it, I would go back and review the group as needed. However these days such events rarely turn up. Again, I think it's best for when you're fresh off of RTK1, and esp. for those of you who haven't learned many compounds in Japanese yet. The farther you go, the more you pretty much have to stick it to wrote, since there's only one or two compounds to know for X kanji. =) But I'm glad to see you've made use of my templates! Put a lot of blood and sweat into those lol

@vileru : Here's the lists you requested.

Onyomi --> Number of Kanji (aka, most common readings)
Onyomi --> Included Kanji (aka, all the kanji for the reading you want to go through)



edit: keep in mind that with these lists, uncommon readings show up.
eg. 行 is included under the アン group as well as コウ and ギョウ

Cool, I was looking for something like that. That gives me a rough idea of how many groups there are: if I do groups with at least 10 kanji, that gives 64; doing groups with at least 5 gives 143 o_______o; Maybe I should just stick with the bigger groups for now...

I also have a spreadsheet somewhere with sub lists for KO2001. Well, I think I posted it.