Uhm... stop immediately, and consider the whole purpose of this form is ... the Remembering the Kanji method.

I'm not saying RtK is the -only- way to learn the Kanji, but I will say this: Nothing was more of a painful waste of time in my Japanese study than drilling the Jouyou Kanji and their readings.

I'm quite convinced that learning readings separate from vocabulary is -only- a waste of time. I also think the only two effective ways to learn the Kanji are 1) the RTK method, and 2) learn to write and the names of the 214 radicals and then learn the kanji.

You don't give a lot of details on your learning method, but it sounds like you're brute-force drilling the dullest and most useless set of information and I'm not surprised it's burning you out.

tashippy wrote:

Maybe you're not in a rut.
Usually in language learning, just when my head is about to explode with what are all these jumbled sounds or letters, the clouds part a little and I like I jumped up a step on this endless stairway.
Or maybe I just built a stair on a mountain that I'm climbing. The further up you climb the further you can see, but for some reason you must build steps and then step up that step instead of just running up the slope where you will just fall in a ravine or get poison ivy.
And there are no elevators on a mountain, see: http://forum.koohii.com/viewtopic.php?p … 51#p200851

I love your description <3

I'm not saying you have to do RTK, I'm saying that learning the Jouyou kanji in Jouyou order and readings separate from vocabulary is like working in the salt mines. When I was in that rut, I moved to RtK. If I had hated RtK that much I would have gone for a radicals-based method.

In any case, at least make sure you're learning a vocabulary word along with each reading that you learn. That'll give you something concrete to hang your memories on and something immediately useful from your efforts.

I second Tzadeck's advice - take a break from adding new cards for a little while and instead focus on enjoying Japanese media.  Read something simple and fun, watch some good movies or TV shows, play a video game - whatever it is that you enjoy doing in Japanese. 
Or hell, you could even take a bigger break and focus on a different aspect of Japanese. You could work through a new textbook, or focus on grammar for a little while.  Or maybe do an intensive read of a novel and focus on looking up and learning new vocabulary and grammar points.
The kanji will still be there waiting for you, and there's no rush to just power through them. Switch up what you're doing, and it might do the trick to get you back on track.

Stop adding. Keep reviewing. Come back later.

There is no reason not to... there is so much more of the language you need to learn, there is no need to burn yourself out by focusing on one aspect.

I don't recommend pummeling the kun and on yomis into your brain like that. They're jouyou kanji which means they're used everyday. Think abt that for a second. That means you get natural srs from immersion bc theyre so commonly used. There's other ways to learn on and kun yomi. For example readin especially with audio ie lingq, song lyrics, japanese talk variety etc etc. I honestly think that's more efficient and effective and... Fun. I tried what you did before in the past. It was painful and ineffective in the sense that I progressed learning those common readings much faster doing something enjoyable and constructive. Also memorizing the readings doesn't tell you how the onten works in the word. And japanese is mad irregular with readings sometimes so sometimes even if you know all the possible readings to the kanji you won't know which one it is or if there's onten somewhere. and the only you know it's read that way is bc u heard someone use that word or read it like that ( ie tv show) or rikaichan or dictionar etc

Oh I just remembered the movie method. Maybe look into that if you really absolutely want to continue this method.

Last edited by howtwosavealif3 (2013 April 18, 11:15 am)

I felt like this after I got halfway through RTK.

Stop adding, keep reviewing, immerse in the language.

I've been reading 5 pages of Japanese a day, reviewing my RTK, and listening for the past 2-3 weeks, without adding anything. It's kept me from quitting and has helped the reviews cement themselves in real media.

At first I thought that when I hit my bump, that everything I'd been doing for the past 3 months was pointless. Real media still seemed just as hard, my retention had dropped, and I was getting pissed. Finally caught up with all my reviews now, ready to start adding again, and the kanji feel more familiar to me, and reading 5 pages everyday doesn't take so long, I find myself skimming along at a much faster pace, actually picking up quite alot even if I don't know how to pronounce everything.

Regardless of the method you're using, you need to do this every now and then I feel. Or not, it's up to your method and reasons for learning I guess. I just know I feel a hell of alot better than I did 2 weeks ago.

I'd encourage people to seek motivation in other ways that make hard work mutually reinforcing.

I'm motivated to study 100-200 kanji/day because of the idea of faster learning. The process itself is enjoyable because of it. That and all of the upbeat playlists I've put together on Spotify while I'm on Anki. I do everything I can to maximise my productivity because the prospect of being a very productive person is the motivation.

Recently I've had a lot of disheartening setbacks, responsibilities at home etc. and in times like this, I compare the difference in character between someone who gives up in the face of difficulty (that includes emotional ones/incompatible mindsets), and one who’s even more motivated by these barriers. The former may end up with regret, while the other can only get happier and happier each time they surpass a milestone. I want to be the latter guy. This is exactly what I hope to reflect in my Japanese learning.

Tbf, upbeat playlists really do many a difference.

Another potent movitator is to get jealous of the braggers. See how fast they ploughed through RTK and try to beat them in terms of effort made rather than results produced. The end of every day should be a rewarding experience 8)

Onara wrote:

But I don't see why I shouldn't learn on and kun readings? I mean... Isn't it easier to know them instead of being limited to just ready-made words?

It's not that you shouldn't learn 音 and 訓 at all, but rather that you pick them up automatically as you learn vocabulary. Therefore, drilling them in isolation before you learn vocabulary can be seen as a waste of time (also, have fun with the readings for 生). And readings are more abstract than concrete words, so they'd be more difficult for me at least, if I did readings in isolation. The only benefit that you might gain from drilling the readings before learning vocab is that you can guess the reading of some words, but again, you're able to do that automatically while drilling vocab, since you pick up reading from other vocab words. And of course some words have irregular readings that don't use the readings you would've drilled anyway (芝生).

Maybe you know this already, but I'll mention it just in case: the general guideline is that 音 / Chinese reading is used in words that are kanji compounds, while 訓 / Japanese reading is used for words with that are a single kanji + okurigana. There are exceptions to the rule of course, but they're rare. Example: say you learn 感情／かんじょう／Emotion. Based on the above rule, you can guess from the reading that カン is the Chinese reading for 感 and ジョウ the Chinese reading for 情. Now look at the word 情熱／じょうねつ／Passion. Again you get ジョウ for 情 and ネツ for 熱. You've seen ジョウ for 情 twice now, which just reinforces it that much more. This is without drilling any readings in isolation, and you've learned two vocab words at the same time. Also, you can now guess the readings for 熱感 and 情感 and 熱情 based on this information alone.

The benefit of this approach is that it's self-reinforcing. Learn vocab and you'll learn readings whether you like it or not. And the more vocab you learn, the better you'll get at reading too.

Last edited by headphone_child (2013 April 30, 12:11 pm)

Onara wrote:

What helps? What can I do?

Slow down lol.  Idk how many you do a day, but cut it in half if you have to.  Also mix up your studies.  You're just getting burned out from pounding kanji like no tomorrow.  There's much more to Japanese than kanji, and contrary to consensus, you can learn it while doing everything else associated with Japanese (vocab, grammar, anime/manga, speaking, listening, etc). 

For example, I'm going through Minna no Nihongo.  So i'll do 20 vocab words and call it a day.  Then i'll pick up my kanji book and learn 20 of those, call it a day.  Then I take the audio from the Minna vocab and listen/repeat it for a few minutes.  That ends the study session.  After that I watch some anime, or play a visual novel to get in more listening.

Some days the vocab will be replaced with grammar and sentences depending on where i am in my course.  The point is to keep your studies as varied as possible.