Write down the Kanji physically on paper about 3-5 times. Write down the story/mnemonic in Notepad, if I have trouble thinking up a story, I use this site to get some ideas, but I mostly write my own stories.

After that, I copy-paste the stories from the Notepad to the sample deck in Anki. Do about 35-60 a day (used to do 70-90 until the atomic 240 review bomb hit x_x).

I've chosen a method of study which I apply to any new information not just kanji. I've read lots and lots of research on memory and tried everything, then kept what works best for me.

First of all I'll read through my new kanji for the day in RTK (50 kanji), creating stories or chained images vivdly in my mind. That means picturing the things the elements describe, closing my eyes and really imagining them, all together in a linked image. I probably spend ~30 seconds on each one at this point, but when you first start it takes longer to get good vivid images.

Now I take a ten minute break from the learning and do something totally different (like water my tomatoes)

Then I'll read through the list again, writing out each kanji once to get a feel for the balance of the image, again calling up that visual image holding it in my imagination for a while, being careful to make sure the meaning is engrained with the image as obviously as possible. I do this for all the kanji in the list.

Another ten minute break

Then I go through a third time, only looking at the keyword and trying to call up that image again. If I get it a bit wrong, or get primitives in the wrong places, this is my chance to tweak the image.

Once I've done the three-step process I leave it a few hours before I use Anki to test the new cards (after doing my reviews). I use the RTK 1+3 deck that comes installed. The rest of the process is left to Anki. Oh, also I have chosen intial sheduling times of: 0 & 1 = 10 mins, 2 = 13-37 hours, 3 = 2-6 days, 4 = 6-13 days.

The three step process I use at the beginning is based on some classic art of memory ideas like visual chaining, but the most important part of this is the triple repetition in quick succession, with ten minute breaks. There has been research by cambridge neuroscientists showing that learning the same things 3 times in a row with a ten minute break helps longer term retention. Then I trust the intervals to the SRS algorithym.

I never use stories like the ones people write on this site unless the primitives and the kanji suggest an easy rhyme or a well known phrase.

Anyone interested in the spaced learning research needs an athens account to access the actual paper, but can read a summary at wikipedia (search 'spaced learning') or at Monkseaton College website (a school where they're putting it into practise)

edit: missed out a main point!

Last edited by Blahah (2008 September 08, 2:57 am)

Compared with everyone else here, I'm pretty primitive.

I bought a set of the Heisig "Kanji Study Cards" (mainly because my calligraphy is so awful, it hurt to look at my homemade cards).  I use them for learning and review.

As I got further and further into RtK1 -- into the part where you have to do your own stories -- I'd do about 25 to 30 frames at a time, breaking at a section or chapter break or stretching out trying to make it to the next round number.

I'd first go through and pencil my stories into the frames.  When my brain got filled up, I'd stop and work my way backwards through the new frames, looking only at the keyword and drawing the kanji on my desk with my finger when I felt I needed to.

Finally, I'd put the book away, pull out the cards for the frames I'd learned, and go through them one at a time, looking at the keywords and remembering the stories I'd made up as I mentally reconstructed the kanji.  I'd draw on the desktop again if I needed to.  If I missed a card, I'd stick it a few cards back so it would come up again quickly, and I'd make sure I did that no less than three times.

I'd have two decks on my desk: new kanji (intensive review) and old kanji (review as often as possible).

Now that I've finished the book and am immersed in reviewing, I pull out 100 study cards at a time and go through them keyword-to-kanji and then kanji-to-keyword.  The ones that I miss get slipped back into the bunch so that they come up again.  Again, three times.  Last night I was doing the 800 series, and I had several that just wouldn't come, and they wound up in a little mini-deck by themselves that I just went over and over until the recognition was instinctive.

Yup: I'm a dinosaur.

I sometimes use Kanji Gold for a change, and for vocabulary, I use Flash Card Manager by Vendant Software.

Kyorei

After beeing very confortable with anki for some time, I have the impression that you are carrying your boat on your back, not floating.
But, hey, way to go!