I passed level one of JLPT about 7 years ago, but I haven't used Japanese at all for the past four years. I can relate to what you are saying. I can read newspapers pretty well, but when I go to write the kanji, I can't remember what the strokes are. For example, what could be easier than reading "tegami," but when I try to write the "gami" part, I have only a vague sense of what is in it. Same with 頑張ります.

I actually did use Heisig back in the 90s, and it helped me pass level two of JLPT. I think I got to about 1200 or so, but at some point I forgot most of my stories and started just recognizing the kanji for reading purposes.

Anyway, when I stumbled on this site, I figured it was a good chance to go through and really master them this time. I'm at a bit over 500 and am thinking of going for 3k. I'm working full time, so I don't have a lot of time to study, but I think progress has been pretty good all things considered.

I definitely think it's easier if you've been exposed to the kanji, and I'm not finding it boring at all. I'm excited about the chance to REALLY know them this time!

Last edited by howdycowdy (2008 March 14, 11:29 am)

> is there anyone else here who started Heisig from scratch after having learned a lot of kanji (1000+) previously by other methods? 

Yes, I studied Japanese at an intensive full-year program where we focused on grammar and comprehension in Romaji (the Jorden method), accompanied by kanji proficiency through reading. At my peak about 8 years ago I was about where you are, but I was never able to really retain it after my full-time study was complete.

> How was your experience? 

Incredible - at about 2/3 through RtK1 I'm returning to texts and finding it easier to not only re-recognize kanji that I had learned in the past, but also to infer the meanings even when I don't know the exact reading.

> Was it boring relearning old kanji or was it no problem? 

You're not relearning anything here - for each kanji you have to create a story, and so you're doing something new. Don't skip the ones you know, that way leads madness.

> Did you feel knowing a lot of kanji beforehand gave you an advantage? 

Hard to say, probably yes in terms of comfort level with stroke order, radicals, etc.

> Did you finish Heisig?  Did you plow through it? 

2/3 done. When I have the time for daily practice, with all of the expired cards from the stack cleared off, it moves rather quickly. But if you stop for whatever reason, it takes a bit of work to restart.

> Was it worth going back to zero? 

Yes.

> Do you have any advice?

Start, don't stop - and try reading something once in a while to see if it's working.

Best of luck!

-Ivan

The # of distinct kanji in memorized cards is misleading.  You're not memorizing the kanji, you're memorizing the shapes of words.  That's useful itself:  fluent readers (of Japanese OR English) hardly ever stop to focus on individual words, they just know the word on site.  It's a totally different task than knowing the kanji, though.  You can easily memorize the SHAPE of the word 警察 if it's on enough of your cards.  But GOOD LUCK writing THAT from visual memory

I have fun with Heisig, it's a way to relax.  The trick is really go balls to the walls with the stories.  Like I just did #350 談 "discuss".  I imagined a Republican and a Democrat "discussing" something on the floor of the senate, their words shooting out at eachother as flaming shreds of paper, igniting the entire chamber, whole capital building a blazing inferno from the words of the discussion and the senators are still there in the middle of the hellfire continuing to shoot burning words back and forth.

Hi, this is my first post here in the  forum ^_^

I started learnig japanese a few years agoo, but did it the wrong way.

All these years and I only managed to memorize about 400 kanji. And could not write them. I learned them in the tradicional frequency order presented in text books.

Last month, I guess it makes a month today, I started to review the kanji here in this site.  I really liked the forum, as everyone here is cheerful. And the heisig method works quite well. I'm with 577 kanjis , with about ~100 failed, and all my other stacks are green.

These failed ones are there because I again used the wrong method. I started reviewing the kanjis before time. The trick here is only review when the kanjis are in the yellow stacks. Then your recall rate raises a lot.

From those 400 kanjis, I did not went throught them all yet. Maybe about 25% of them.
So I did not gain much from them, but they sure helped a bit.

With my curret pace, I intend to learn all the kanjis in 4 months. I'll keep posting the results scatered trought the forum.