I have tried rtk, its great but I feel I have a long way to go before I can read kanji with that method and I don't have the luxury of time right now.

I've been looking for a way to learn kanji radicals, and I found this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Lets-Learn-Kanji-I...gy_b_img_a

anyone tried it?

i found a review:

http://www.kanjiclinic.com/reviewlets.htm

I really don't see why you should buy a book for learning the radicals. Since you are familiar with the Heisig method, you should have no problem, to learn the radicals with this .pdf file. *direct link* It contains all 214 radicals with their Japanese reading and english translation.

Well, here's the deal. Learning is going to take time no matter what, and it doesn't much matter that you don't have the luxury of it. There are good ways and better ways for learning, but not really a ton of bad ways aside from brute force.

I believe that RTK does the best job in terms of bootstrapping Japanese language learners with an understanding of kanji. The understanding of kanji you will have through RTK is equivalent to what many Japanese language learners many years ago had to get through with years upon years of brute force. RTK primes your brain with kanji first, and in itself makes learning Japanese more efficient for users of it.

You also don't necessarily have to ever finish RTK for it to beneficial. It can be combined with traditional instruction very easily, and after a short while they'll start coinciding very helpfully. At first it's going to be annoying because a lot of the kanji coming from RTK won't show up in a regular textbook until much much later, but there comes a time at about the end of the first volume of whichever textbook series you're using where about 50% of what you've been studying using RTK will overlap with about 50% of what you're learning in the traditional order.

You'll also shock and delight any Japanese teacher you have with your understanding of complex kanji and knowledge of radicals. Not all of the elements Heisig uses are radicals, but enough of them are that Heisig is very beneficial even if you never learn all the official radicals. If anything, Heisig tends to manufacture too many of his own radicals. So all the usual radical suspects should be represented very well through Heisig.

The "divide and conquer" learning method for kanji will also help you in traditional kanji study so you'll be able to learn new kanji in a more traditional setting more easily than you otherwise would have if you hadn't done Heisig.

I had that book.
I actually posted a review on that amazon page as well.

If you are already doing remembering the kanji, I really can't recommend that book at all, because you aren't going to get anything additional from it, except maybe a few pages detailing about how to do stroke order correctly.
It only covers 250 kanji. You can easily learn that many in a week with RTK.
And, the book doesn't really give you any method for learning the characters, other than the traditional way of writing them over and over, and maybe a few exercises.

Its a fine resource if you only want to get your feet wet, but what are you going to do after you learn those 250 kanji?

erlog Wrote:Well, here's the deal. Learning is going to take time no matter what, and it doesn't much matter that you don't have the luxury of it. There are good ways and better ways for learning, but not really a ton of bad ways aside from brute force.

I like this comment. And even then, brute force will still get the job done.

There's no point in hurrying the learning process unless you have an exam or something.

What's the rush?

Before buying that book or starting rtk, I'd recommend taking a look at kanjidamage: http://kanjidamage.com/ It's free alternative that will teach you kanji and their most used onyomis with easy to remember(and often funny) mnemonics, and it lists some of their jukugo(which is very helpful and probably unique method). You can read author's reasoning and explanations on introduction page if you aren't sure about it.

It's the method I(and many other people of course) used to learn majority of kanjis I know and I can't recommend it enough

Nagareboshi Wrote:I really don't see why you should buy a book for learning the radicals. Since you are familiar with the Heisig method, you should have no problem, to learn the radicals with this .pdf file. *direct link* It contains all 214 radicals with their Japanese reading and english translation.

Thanks for link.
I love the Heisig method but I can only do 5 kanji a day and at that rate, it will be a while before I could start reading kanji. And also after 500 kanjis, I would need to make up my own stories which would take more time. With the radicals, after I learn just 214 of them, I could move on to learning kanji with the readings.

Zarxrax Wrote:Its a fine resource if you only want to get your feet wet, but what are you going to do after you learn those 250 kanji?

Im not really after the kanjis, Im more interested in the radicals.

erlog Wrote:Well, here's the deal. Learning is going to take time no matter what, and it doesn't much matter that you don't have the luxury of it. There are good ways and better ways for learning, but not really a ton of bad ways aside from brute force.

I believe that RTK does the best job in terms of bootstrapping Japanese language learners with an understanding of kanji. The understanding of kanji you will have through RTK is equivalent to what many Japanese language learners many years ago had to get through with years upon years of brute force. RTK primes your brain with kanji first, and in itself makes learning Japanese more efficient for users of it.

You also don't necessarily have to ever finish RTK for it to beneficial. It can be combined with traditional instruction very easily, and after a short while they'll start coinciding very helpfully. At first it's going to be annoying because a lot of the kanji coming from RTK won't show up in a regular textbook until much much later, but there comes a time at about the end of the first volume of whichever textbook series you're using where about 50% of what you've been studying using RTK will overlap with about 50% of what you're learning in the traditional order.

You'll also shock and delight any Japanese teacher you have with your understanding of complex kanji and knowledge of radicals. Not all of the elements Heisig uses are radicals, but enough of them are that Heisig is very beneficial even if you never learn all the official radicals. If anything, Heisig tends to manufacture too many of his own radicals. So all the usual radical suspects should be represented very well through Heisig.

The "divide and conquer" learning method for kanji will also help you in traditional kanji study so you'll be able to learn new kanji in a more traditional setting more easily than you otherwise would have if you hadn't done Heisig.

I agree but I'm planning on taking 2kyuu this december. Would heisig method be a good preparation for 2kyuu?

Learning radicals is also a divide and conquer learning method for kanji

Reg777 Wrote:

erlog Wrote:Well, here's the deal. Learning is going to take time no matter what, and it doesn't much matter that you don't have the luxury of it. There are good ways and better ways for learning, but not really a ton of bad ways aside from brute force.

I believe that RTK does the best job in terms of bootstrapping Japanese language learners with an understanding of kanji. The understanding of kanji you will have through RTK is equivalent to what many Japanese language learners many years ago had to get through with years upon years of brute force. RTK primes your brain with kanji first, and in itself makes learning Japanese more efficient for users of it.

You also don't necessarily have to ever finish RTK for it to beneficial. It can be combined with traditional instruction very easily, and after a short while they'll start coinciding very helpfully. At first it's going to be annoying because a lot of the kanji coming from RTK won't show up in a regular textbook until much much later, but there comes a time at about the end of the first volume of whichever textbook series you're using where about 50% of what you've been studying using RTK will overlap with about 50% of what you're learning in the traditional order.

You'll also shock and delight any Japanese teacher you have with your understanding of complex kanji and knowledge of radicals. Not all of the elements Heisig uses are radicals, but enough of them are that Heisig is very beneficial even if you never learn all the official radicals. If anything, Heisig tends to manufacture too many of his own radicals. So all the usual radical suspects should be represented very well through Heisig.

The "divide and conquer" learning method for kanji will also help you in traditional kanji study so you'll be able to learn new kanji in a more traditional setting more easily than you otherwise would have if you hadn't done Heisig.

I agree but I'm planning on taking 2kyuu this december. Would heisig method be a good preparation for 2kyuu?

Learning radicals is also a divide and conquer learning method for kanji

Yes, heisig is more than adequate for 2kyuu. I would credit my heisig studies as being part of why I was able to pass 2kyuu.

I passed 2kyuu with Heisig as my only real studying of the kanji. In fact, I found the kanji questions to be the second easiest part of the test, the listening being the easiest. Taking N1 in July (although I think I'll fail because my vocabulary is too low). I mean, if you're doing 2kyuu, you need to know a shit-ton of kanji, so it's not like you can learn them overnight anyway. Isn't the reason people do Heisig speed of learning? It takes forever to learn 1,000 kanji by most methods.

erlog Wrote:Yes, heisig is more than adequate for 2kyuu. I would credit my heisig studies as being part of why I was able to pass 2kyuu.

Tzadeck Wrote:I passed 2kyuu with Heisig as my only real studying of the kanji. In fact, I found the kanji questions to be the second easiest part of the test, the listening being the easiest. Taking N1 in July (although I think I'll fail because my vocabulary is too low). I mean, if you're doing 2kyuu, you need to know a shit-ton of kanji, so it's not like you can learn them overnight anyway. Isn't the reason people do Heisig speed of learning? It takes forever to learn 1,000 kanji by most methods.

Thats good to know guys. But if I can only do 5 kanji a day, that would take me like a year or so and the exam is on dec. But I only need a thousand or so kanjis for N2.

My idea is to learn these radicals and then after, learn kanji using 2001 kanji odyssey. Since I know the radicals, I can also make up stories for the kanji like the Heisig method if needed but I would be learning kanji with the readings and in the order of frequency.

Reg777 Wrote:Thats good to know guys. But if I can only do 5 kanji a day, that would take me like a year or so and the exam is on dec. But I only need a thousand or so kanjis for N2.

Who said you can only do 5 a day?

JimmySeal Wrote:

Reg777 Wrote:Thats good to know guys. But if I can only do 5 kanji a day, that would take me like a year or so and the exam is on dec. But I only need a thousand or so kanjis for N2.

Who said you can only do 5 a day?

I can only do 5 a day by my schedule but I can do 10-20 on weekends

Out of curiosity, how long does adding five kanji take you?

about 30 minutes. I also practice writing it over and over again. I want to be able to not just read but also write kanji.

The main purpose of the RTK method is to remember how to write the characters. And one of its benefits is that you don't have to copy them over and over to remember them.

I found the Let's Learn Kanji: An Introduction to Radicals, Components book in the library and I think I'll try this one out. I'll learn the radicals first, then I can learn the Kanji by combining the radicals. Through the radicals, I can also make stories for the kanji using the Heisig method.

But I will be learning the kanji with the readings and in the order of frequency of usage.

From the first few introductory pages, the book is showing some samples:
晴(cloudless)、清(pure)、精(spirit) - since they have the same component on the right, all three have same ON reading (SEI)

反(opposite) - ON reading (HAN)
坂(slope), 飯(meal), 板(board) - same component on the right, can you guess the ON reading for all 3?
answer: HAN

You should do whatever you feel works best, I'm just curious about how this would be more efficient for you than RTK though. Learning the radicals and then combining them with stories/mnemonics for learning kanji is basically what the RTK method is, but you're emphasizing the writing and meanings for the radicals and you're not learning them in an order that makes them easier to learn. How would this be quicker than RTK straight up if you only can spend half an hour a day anyway?

I guess I'll just have to try it and see for myself

Reg777 Wrote:I guess I'll just have to try it and see for myself

Also, don't bother rote copying kanji. The Heisig method exists to avoid the trouble of rote copying the kanji in order to brute force memorization. You should be able to do more new kanji than 5 a day if you do Heisig the way it's outlined in the introduction to the book. A conservative number to do would be about 10 new kanji per day. That would give you about 20-30 reviews per day on average. That's literally only like 30 minutes a day of studying kanji. It also tends to get slightly easier as you move along. The first 250 kanji are difficult. The next 250 after that are less difficult, and so on and so forth. Kanji knowledge begets more kanji knowledge.

I don't understand why you're being so cautious about using the Heisig method the way it's outlined in the book. You don't seem to actually want to follow the advice in the book or the advice advanced learners here are giving you. You're so worried about whether or not you could possibly have enough time, but you don't seem willing to change your study regimen in a way that will allow you to study more efficiently. You're setting yourself for the failure you're worried most about.

It's fine if you want to use that other book, but just know that from everything you've said about your timeline Heisig is your best bet. Also, 1000 kanji is the low water mark for 2-kyuu in the ordinary kanji compound vocab sections. Some of the reading comprehension sections will contain vocab that require you to have some familiarity with about 500 more kanji in addition to the 1000 that are explicitly tested for. This same thing goes for 1-kyuu. The 2000 kanji limit there is just a low water mark for the vocab, and in actuality a lot of learners would be better off continuing their kanji study to include the extra 1000 characters in RTK3 in order to best prepare themselves to be familiar with material that could appear in different places on the 1-kyuu exam.

There's still quite a lot of time between now and the exam. If you study using the methods outlined in RTK and you follow the advice of some of the people on this forum then there's no reason you shouldn't be able to completely finish RTK(all 2000 kanji) and prepare yourself for the other aspects of 2-kyuu by the time you take the test. I prepared for and passed 2-kyuu with far less time than you have right now. I know what it takes to do it. You're wasting your time by copying the characters by rote, and it's going to force you to fail in the exact way you're fearing.

Reg777 Wrote:I guess I'll just have to try it and see for myself

Good luck

I didnt say anything about rote memorization, I'm trying the radical approach. Breaking down the kanji into smaller pieces. Heisig does the same thing but he calls them primitives and distributes them throughout the book.
But I'll try learning all the radicals first using the book about radicals.
I'll try this approach, different things work for different people.

http://www.tofugu.com/2010/03/25/the-5-b...ing-kanji/

I don't quite get what you are doing here. For some reason you can only do about 5 kanji a day with RTK, and thats not fast enough... but by learning all the radicals up front, you will somehow be able to meet your goal?
If you learn 5 radicals per day, that's at least 40 days until you learn them all, and then you still haven't learned a single kanji by that point!