The way I understand it, reviewing from keyword to kanji rather than the other way around gives you an active command of the character (able to produce it in writing) rather than a passive one (able to recognize, but not necessarily produce as well). Definitely always review keyword to kanji. Eventually you will be able to remember the keyword/meaning for the kanji without even trying just from normal reviews, so I really don't think there's any reason to review from kanji to keyword.

Also, once you finish RTK and start learning the readings for the characters, you want to be able to look at a character and have the Japanese reading for it instantly appear in your head, not the Heisig keyword.

Last edited by Arkhe (2008 August 03, 2:36 am)

Benzhi wrote:

If the goal is to be able to read Japanese

If you only want to be able to read, I don't think you necessarily need Heisig -- the traditional methods work adequately enough, I think. What Heisig does make easier is writing, in which context reviewing keyword to kanji makes sense.

For most characters I can remember the keyword from the kanji, or actually frequently enough not the keyword but the general feeling of it. However, it really doesn't matter at all. Except while trying to guess at what signs on the street mean or whatever, there is no actual situation in which you need or want to be able to recognize an English keyword from the sight of a kanji. When you learn actual Japanese words that use the kanji, recognition of the keywords is a non-issue. When you see 未来, you just think 'みらい,' not 'not yet come.' Now, you'll (at first) need to remember which kanji, and thus keywords,  are used with this word so that you can write it, but this remains an issue of production, which is what you're practicing. Nothing's wrong with the system.

Edit: For the record, though, this process does also make the keyword easier to remember. I'm not sure that's actually a GOOD thing, however.

Last edited by QuackingShoe (2008 August 04, 9:17 am)

When I look through Japanese text, I recognize some of the kanji, but can't remember the meaning. How can I remember the meaning if I don't remember the keyword, or even look it up? Or will just just take care of itself when I start working on sentences?

stshores24 wrote:

Or will just just take care of itself when I start working on sentences?

I guess what Heisig meant by that is that the information is in your memory and it is linked one way (kanji -> keyword). Linking it the other way doesn't happen on its own but as you learn kanji in context afterwards my experience was that it's fairly easy to remember the other side of the connection after that, you're essentially updating a memory link between things you already memorized (kanji writings and meaning).