I got the RTK 1 book. I really love it's approach. One thing about me, I really LOVE kanji, so I dont mind learning them. It's like, I must be around them all the time xD

What methods do you employ to study from Heisig? flashcards? Anki? (what exactly is Anki?). Do I begin with 20 kanji a day and write them over and over again till I memorize them?

Just follow the book for the first 12 chapters.
After that use kanji.koohii.com to review your
flashcards and add stories.

You love kanji now...soon you will hate them

Then, eventually, you will learn to love them again.

Enjoy the ride!

Also this is anki: http://ankisrs.net/

The idea with this approach is that you should NOT have to write them out over and over again until you memorize them by brute force It's great if you write them out as you review them though!

Use either Anki or this site's reviewing system (personally I suggest Anki, especially if you're gonna use it for learning other parts of the Japanese language since it's comfortable to have that and your kanji deck in the same place). You can either use prepared RTK decks that are downloadable through the program or you can make your own deck from scratch.
http://ankisrs.net/docs/manual.html
http://ankisrs.net/docs/AddItems.html

Lardycake,

OMG you are soooooooooo right! Im also studying Chinese. Writing sentences in Chinese sometimes gets frustrating. On top of that, Im learning the traditional script with so many strokes >_< but at the end, I love them again.

Thanks chamcham!!

Oh and I forgot to add one more thing (you just reminded me of it, TwoMoreCharacters).

Should I still bother to go over the basic kanji that I already know? (like numbers, or other kanji) ^_^

GottaLearnThemAll Wrote:Oh and I forgot to add one more thing (you just reminded me of it, TwoMoreCharacters).

Should I still bother to go over the basic kanji that I already know? (like numbers, or other kanji) ^_^

That's up to you. If you feel that it's possible that you could forget them then it could be nice to have them in your reviewing cycle, if you know them really well and rate them as "very easy" a few times they'll get large intervals quickly anyway.

Oh, and I think it's the general advice to review keyword to kanji, that is, having the keyword and maybe some additional information on the front of the card and having the kanji on the back, so that you practice recall instead of recognition. You'll have to do that if you want to practice writing them as you review anyway.

So is Anki like a flashcard system? I put in the stuff I learn from Heisig and use it to review?

Anki already has Heisig flashcard sets. one of the most popular ones should suit you fine.
just set the number of cards you'd like to be added in each review, and you're ready to go

GottaLearnThemAll Wrote:So is Anki like a flashcard system? I put in the stuff I learn from Heisig and use it to review?

Yes, but the point is that it's a Spaced Repetition System (SRS) that spaces out the reviews by assigning each card with an interval that's based on how you score the card as you review. For each review of a card you select Soon if you failed to pass it (which resets the card's interval and has it show up soon again until you do pass it) or you select any of the three hard, easy or very easy depending on how difficult it was. Those three options will give the card different intervals for when it appears next, and as you repeatedly pass a card, the intervals become larger.

This means that all your reviews are scheduled and you don't have to manage when and what you should review, unlike a basic flashcard or quiz system (quite useful when you've got over 2000 cards in your deck).