I've just done my first review of 90 kanji and I got to say it's intense. Some of the ones I thought I would know for sure just killed me. Like for example, I was doing the kanji for Riot it contains the kanjis Tongue and Fish guts/second. I knew it had Fishguts/second for sure but recalling the kanji for Tongue was surprisingly hard until I remembered my story. 1000 mouthes speak the same tongue or something similar to that.

What do you guys do while reviewing so you don't draw a blank? I've heard some people take supplements and immerse themselves. What else?

[ファブリス]

Schedule your review at a time when your mind is fresh. Sleep/rest is paramount. Say you didn't review yet and it's getting late? Leave it for the next morning. Even if it pushes your review by another half day.

My advice is to not worry about it too much. If you're dead tired, reviewing can be futile, but if you only do it when you're in peak condition, you may have difficulty finding a convenient time to review. Inevitably you'll draw some blanks, whether it's because of fatigue or you don't know the kanji very well or it's just not clicking or the keyword is really abstract (I've missed "from" and "of" so many times). If you worry about it, though, you're only going to wear yourself out and make it harder.

Oh okay, sounds good. One more question, what are you guys doing to while you do RTK to supplement it or learning something along side it? This is my first time doing RTK, I know 90 right now and I have 30 new ones. So I should 120 and at the end of the day. It doesn't take up the whole day to do 30 kanji, I'd like to study more on something else afterward.

Jenkoi Wrote:1000 mouthes speak the same tongue or something similar to that.

It sounds like you need to use stories that actually mean something! If you're only at the beginning of the book, you'll probably feel you have to use Heisig's stories to do things "properly", but that isn't entirely true. If you're not remembering what he says, make up something meaningful to you.

If I was learning that kanji now, I'd imagine the tuition-fees rioters in London ripping out each other's tongues with fishhooks. No matter how stupid it seems, if you remember it then it's gold. Don't put some badly worded story between you and the character. Use whatever comes to your mind when you hear the word 'riot', and you're more than likely to remember it when you're reviewing. The important thing, as with all your study methods, is to experiment

After you start the book you have no experience with creating your own stories and you tend to go with Heisig's stories (I think a lots of them are terrible). If you choose to stick to Heisig's stories and you have a hard time memorizing them just don't worry about it. Eventually you will remember them. Actually, never ever worry about failing a card. You can't remember everything right away that's why you use an SRS. I had quite a few cards I failed 4-5 times in 3 weeks and now they are easy like a breeze.