gyouza Wrote:And me too: Half way!!
I just finished lesson 27 and somehow I feel a bit relieved that I've made it this far.
However, I'm finding that lately in the review sessions I'm struggeling. With the first ~500 kanji, I came up with above 95% correct, after that it dropped to 90%-95%, but the rate is still declining...
Also I often am able to remember the kanji from the keyword, but only after thinking about it real hard for a minute or two. Is that normal? Or do I have to work harder on those kanji? Should I count them as 'not remembered' after all?

Anyway, I have to state: This site is amazing!

congratulations of making it half way XD! As for your declining retention, thats very normal. When I was around 11ooish kanji I had a retention rate of about 35% . Yeah, thinking about a kanji hard for about a minute or 2 is fine. I find a ten minute timebox for 10 cards is the optimal time for remebering.

good luck reaching the 3/4ths thread!

Sometimes I rewrite my stories if it constantly takes too long to recall the story from the keyword. Recently, with every new keyword, I jot down the first few things that it makes me think of... like how "cash" makes me instantly think of a stack of bundled $100 bills (presumably a value of $10,000) being riffled with a loud dollop by some ne'er-do-well. The story I made is built on that basic image, which worked well as the most popular stories for "cash" involve counterfeiting.

The idea is that the keyword will trigger the connotations of cash being riffled by a criminal, which is an easy leap to "counterfeiter", which then pops my story. This type of story is quickly cemented if I write the kanji a few times while imagining the scene.

Once you've reviewed the kanji through Anki or whatever SRS, and you imagine the story (even just quickly), your visual memory will just automatically produce the kanji, as if you were really seeing it with your eyes. Imagine the kanji for "ten", and you can definitely see the plus symbol just pop out at you.

So if your retention rates are lower than what you'd like, try adjusting your stories to match your existing connotations with the English keyword.

WOOT HALFWAY (Umbrella). I can't believe I'm already halfway done! I've failed at doing RTK 2 times in the past but I never got past 500. This time I've taken a nice steady pace of 25 new Kanji a day instead of racing to do as many as I can. Feels great to know that to finish I just have to do as many as it took to get me here (which is something I've already done) so this is great for motivation. Heisig says its all downhill from here I'm hoping he's right.

great work dragonslayer! I'd say by the time you hit about 1300, that's the true downhill. I did cards 1 to 829 over 1.5 years. cards 830 to 2042 I managed to do in about a month. When you get close to that finish line, it just drives you to go crazy and reach it. You'll get there!

Ok, just completed lesson 27, ad I have something like 900 cards in the 4+ stack!
It took me more than one year. Since I add new cards only when I have less than 30 to review, no wonder. Good thing is that with this slow pace I don't forget kanji easily.
Planning to learn 2-300 more within December and take the N3 test.

Finally, after about a good month of this I've reached 1050 so I guess it's a little passed the halfway mark. Anyways though, I can honestly say that I have no idea how I have kept up the motivation to keep doing this. Maybe it's due to just wanting to become fluent or because of the articles on AJATT.

Either way though, 4 more weeks of doing 35 a day and I should be finished.

I reached the half way mark a couple of days ago and couldn't believe it. I'm currently on lesson 34 and moving along fine. If I keep it up the next stop is the "I just finished RTK1" thread.

MAN! Just ended lesson 27. Took me two weeks to do the last 500. If only I wasn't so lazy... Anyway I want to thank you guys again, this site is REALLY great. Also, a word on burning out. It happened to me a couple of days ago, and I was like, really low. Then I slept on it, did nothing the next day, and now I can do a hundred a day almost easily. As Khatsumoto wrote somewhere, you really can burn through it (as long as you're relaxed): it's just your limits readjusting.
See you on the other side everyone.

HALF WAY!!!!i just hope it gets better because the person primitive lesson was not very easy:S,good site btw.next stop at the 3/4 thread

Today I made it to the halfway point! This is also my first post here. I found this website at around frame 500 (I'd been using Heisig's stories prior to that, well technically I found the website before then, but I didn't really explore it and find the user stories until that point) and I must say it has been a huge help. I kind of suck at coming up with stories on my own and it's way faster just to use the ones on here. I've found that actually writing the story makes no difference in how well I remember it...mostly concrete primitives make the stories easier, especially the ones with characters or animals such as data, mr. T, insect, cow, sheep, snake, pig, etc. I did sort of struggle with the short "column" lesson and I'm expecting to forget a few of those. It also throws me off when one primitive has 3+ meanings. I started out doing 50/day but after a couple of weeks my daily reviews started getting to the 250-300 point so I cut back to 35/day, which seems like a good pace for me.

Sorry, that was longer than I intended it to be.

Congratulations to everyone else who's made it here.

I hit the halway mark this day! It wasn't that hard at least since I was on a vacation the whole time. My speed was a steady 25 new kanji per day. We'll see if I can keep up since my other studies are beginning. It took me ~3-4 hours each day.

Funny part is that me over a month ago would not have believed me if I came and said him that you'll be at 1000 kanji mark on 4th September.

So maybe I have the reason to believe that the 2000 kanji mark me would do the same to me now.

Congrats to everybody else who have reached this far. We're going to make it!

See you soon on the '3/4 of the way done' thread!

Congrats to you all!

arrogantape, you're going at about the same speed as I am, I'm at frame 661 right now, it helps me to know you got that far. 25 seems like a reasonable speed.

I'll be there soon.

yay, finally HALFWAY !! contrary to phantombk201, Mr. T really speeds me up. Thanks to Mr. T!! 笑 *keep encountering that HALF WAY MARK mnemonics as top stories.

Woohoo! Finally finished lesson 27. I started in March this year, but got out of rhythm with my reviews and before I knew it I had 750 reviews to do, most of which were I failed. That was about two weeks ago, hopefully I can keep up my 50/day and get this finished before the end of the month!

Big thanks to everyone who shared their stories, couldn't have got this far without them.

I got to 999 last night.

Adhere is now being entered...

BAM!

Half is at 1021.

Woops.

*Adds 20 more*

EDIT: HALF WAY!

BAM!
Congratulations for reaching your first thousand kanji.

Reached 1021 on the 18th - but felt like I should nod to the new supplement, so I celebrated my second half-way today when I finished 1100. =)

(And I just might post here when I'm half-way through the supplement as well ...time will tell!!)

Great work, stilted!

50 to halfway for me...

YESSSSS!!!!

Umbrella!

Coincidently, the weather has been beautiful and sunny for 2 weeks in a row, but right when I got to umbrella, it started to rain! It's raining cats and dogs as I write this.

So, I'm slightly further than half way, because I took a few Kanji from RTK3 with me on the way - my count is 1034.

Hardest part for me was between 700-900, and I almost quit. Thanks to the forum I was able to get my act together and continue.

Thanks! Thanks Fabrice, wouldn't have been able to do this without your awesome site!

And now off to the second half!

First, congrats! Second - ugh, 700-900 were super hard for me too! I think part of that is because keywords are finally starting to resemble each other... I have a cheat sheet of the ones that confuse me, actually (current v. tide, pleasure v. rejoice, lament v. mourning etc). So I've been refining stories to be more specific.

Well, onward and upward.

Yea! Crossed the half way point this past weekend, still easily on schedule to finish by the end of the year. I'm quite impressed with how effective RTK is; a year ago I would have laughed at the idea I'd be able to memorize a couple thousand squiggly symbols.

Just passed the half way point, but my feelings are mixed. Being able to write more than a thousand kanji feels good, but the fact that there are still just as many kanji left in the book (and that is without counting the supplement and RTK3) actually kinda depresses me. Sure, making up stories and memorising them has become much easier, but I do not have nearly as much free time as I had back when I started this in late July. If I continue with the same pace I had for the last three weeks I will only be done by New Year's Eve.

On an unrelated note, tonight I chose to pass the half way point instead of starting to work on a 15-page paper that has to be handed in on Wednesday. Well, at least now I know where my priorities lie . Seriously though, I better write at least five pages now. All-nighter time!

vonPeterhof Wrote:Just passed the half way point, but my feelings are mixed. Being able to write more than a thousand kanji feels good, but the fact that there are still just as many kanji left in the book (and that is without counting the supplement and RTK3) actually kinda depresses me. Sure, making up stories and memorising them has become much easier, but I do not have nearly as much free time as I had back when I started this in late July. If I continue with the same pace I had for the last three weeks I will only be done by New Year's Eve.

I guess it's not that bad. You'll have plenty of time to review, consolidate one's knowledge is important too.

Quote:On an unrelated note, tonight I chose to pass the half way point instead of starting to work on a 15-page paper that has to be handed in on Wednesday. Well, at least now I know where my priorities lie . Seriously though, I better write at least five pages now. All-nighter time!

Yes, seriously. Good luck though.