Huh ... they all joined within a couple days of each other, too.  I'll bet you anything that you're right, Meolox -- it's a class, working together.

It's kind of nice to see a few "official" educators wisening up to the Heisig method.  Learning to write and recognize 2,042 kanji in three months or so is definitely more helpful than being able to "pronounce" and write 200 at the end of two years (which is where a lot of college-level courses will leave you in four semesters).

Good luck, folks.

Last edited by dukelexon (2008 February 03, 1:41 am)

I find such a large concentration of Alaskans on frame 160 oddly disconcerting.

(^_^;)

Last edited by johnzep (2008 February 01, 12:59 am)

Besides, that's about half of the population of Alaska
They'll be able to set Japanese as a second official language this way.

Hi all, I am one of the alaskan's mentioned above! We are a class at the University of Alaska Anchorage

We are totally plotting against you! No, not really, are instructor urged us ( with points ) to register and use these resources. I, for one, have no regrets. This site is a delicious labor of love.

We are expected to learn around 1500 kanji this semester and we are doing them at a rate of 80 per week.

As I suspected a class, good luck on your studies!

Welcome to the forum by the way, what does you instructor say of the wonderful Heisig method?

Welcome classfellows!

Welcome !

I'm not seeing you on the Google Analytics "Overlay Map" yet (it's like a simplified Google Maps with visits per country/city). It says 323 visits from Alaska (for January 2008), but by the time you get to a few hundred kanji, Anchorage will surely appear on there!

EDIT: My bad, you're in there! There's also 1 visit from "Fairbanks", 6 from "Juneau" and 25 from "Elmendorf Afb". Anchorage is the big spot, and "Elmendorf Afb" is the brighter spot in the middle of Anchorage :

fushiki wrote:

We are expected to learn around 1500 kanji this semester and we are doing them at a rate of 80 per week.

Great to hear of RtK being used in the classroom, kudos to your teacher, and to your class. 80 kanji a week is pretty good.

Let us know how well you are doing after the halfway mark. I would be interested to know of your experiences as a class, does everyone keep up to speed with everyone else, etc.

All the best!

Updated the picture, Google Analytics does indeed show cities regardless of number of visits. Although "cities" really mean the closest network center or something.

nac_est : I posted some stats and screenshots here.

Good luck to you and your instructor. It's good to see someone try something different in Japanese language education for a change.

Human memory is a funky black box, so whatever makes your funky black box work, go with it. Good-bad is only described in terms of "does it help me to remember this kanji?" More memorable > less memorable.

He might want to consider breaking that final up a bit... maybe just make it a mid-term+, and just test you guys a little more frequently. (Just think of it as another Leitner review.) You guys should have the early stuff down stone cold by then, anyway, so he won't need to test the first 400-500, at the very least.

Koun,

That's pretty awesome, I think your course offers much more than a normal university level intro course, especially in the long run.  These students are going to have an unfair advantage in their future Japanese studies!

Koun,

Is your class using Heisig's keywords as is or have you made any modifications? I, myself, had a lot of problems with Heisig's keywords sticking around long after their initial usefulness when I first went through RTK1 years ago. And so this time around I made modifications. However, I'm not 100% certain this is necessary provided that the student of Japanese make a concerted and systematic effort of some sort to move towards kanji-based vocabulary so that these become the "hooks" from which kanji hang in memory.

Just wondering about your experience, what you chose to do with your class regarding the keywords, if you are keeping Heisig's keywords as is for the story assignments and test but broadening students' understanding with additional meaning info during class lectures, etc.

Thanks for any more info you can share on how you are using RTK1 with your class.

It was minus 20 degrees today when I woke up to head to the university to study the kanji for this week. Frigid tempratures and freezing winds wont get in my way for the 1200 I need to know by May. Thank you Koun 先生, for making this class happen.

Last edited by Jared (2008 February 05, 1:00 pm)