nest0r wrote:

mentat_kgs, What I tried to explain before is that it's not an either/or equation, re: personal/strategic. The point (or *a* major point) of self-study is to adapt a learning structure to the individual. Design flexibility. If you're going to argue your points, you should make sure you're clear on these distinctions so that you're not 'talking at cross-purposes' or somesuch thing.

PS - Another suggestion, tone down saying things like "Faster is better", et cetera. You've not really made the case that this is so, and simply repeating it like it's gospel from the mouth of an authority figure isn't helping.

I'm don't quite understand how people can have a goal other than "learn Japanese" when they're studying Japanese.

Things that are more efficient are better. This translates to getting the most benefit for the least amount of work and time. You want somebody to make a case for it? Go take an ecomonics class.

Thread seems to have gone ever so slightly off topic, but just thought I'd let you guys know that I've already got the Kana down (can write them all out no problem, but damn, I slaved away for hours trying to get them to stick), and I've done a very brief portion of Tae Kim's site, which I found very helpful, and has shed a small amount of light into the beginnings of how particles and grammar work in Japanese.

I've gone ahead and started on RTK at 30 a day, so I've just finished learning my first 30. Although, I do feel that I could do more, so maybe I will.

I'm going to dedicate all my time to RTK right now, since I also have the Kanji Poster on its way to help me out. Eventually, I will read through UBJG when it arrives in the post and probably continue with Tae Kim's page.

Since I like buying books, I will probably end up buying most, if not all, the books recommended in this thread and give them a shot. That's if I have enough money to buy them at all.

Thanks to everyone for all the posts though. I'd still be lost and flustered wondering where to start without them!

thermal wrote:

Oh and my advice is use Anki for reviewing RTK1 rather than this site.

Also, what is wrong with using this sites review function? I quite like it actually, because I don't have to separately input each character in myself. I simply put in how many I've learned and it already knows which ones I mean.

Anki actually has a pre-loaded Heisig deck, so you don't have to deal with that there either. In addition, the cards in that Heisig deck link to the appropriate 'study' page on this website so you can check stories.

The advantage is that Anki involves a lot of customization on how the flashcard system actually works. It's worth a look, I suppose, but I personally just always used this website. It seemed more convenient and I didn't particularly need all the bells and whistles for simple kanji drilling.

Sounds like you're off to a great start, keep it up! It was true for me, at least, that I was so excited when I started that I was actually learning hundreds of characters every day and reviewing constantly, so you could potentially go ahead and go crazy while the enthusiasm lasts (it dies -.-). Just don't burn yourself out!

And don't be discouraged away from the forums by the rampant derailment. Everyone here just seems to think they're completely right. All... the time. About everything. But we can still be moderately helpful, like here

Last edited by QuackingShoe (2008 September 27, 4:28 pm)

QuackingShoe wrote:

It was true for me, at least, that I was so excited when I started that I was actually learning hundreds of characters every day and reviewing constantly, so you could potentially go ahead and go crazy while the enthusiasm lasts (it dies -.-).

If you're truly lucky, though, your lost enthusiasm will be replaced by pure, unadulterated spite by the time you near the end of RTK.  It is, I would say, almost exactly as motivating.

I went through RtK 3 on spite alone. Enthusiasm just doesn't cut it against those tree kanji.

Mcjon01 wrote:

... so I didn't have to deal with the soul-crushing "failed card" box.

I totaly agree with you.
Anki is easier to use. You can give yourself chance to do blunders using this site's SRS.
It is much harder to do that using anki.

Mcjon01 wrote:

PS - Another suggestion, tone down saying things like "Faster is better", et cetera. You've not really made the case that this is so, and simply repeating it like it's gospel from the mouth of an authority figure isn't helping.

Actualy I did toned down. Twice. My claims were very simple.
There are 2 points I wanted to show:
1) RTK works better the faster you do.
2) Traditional textbooks dont go well with RTK.

The only strong claim I did, about "faster is better" is backed up by Heisig himself in his book.

Notice I didn't say it is better for you.

It is better for the sake of the method on its own. The later kanjis reinforce the begginer ones. It is a matter of reducing reviews, not personal taste.

Tobberoth wrote:

One of the things I like on this site compared to Anki is that it keeps track of how many times you've failed a kanji. Since there's no failed pile in Anki, it's easy to simply fail kanji and not really notice it, it just goes back into the system. But if you fail a kanji on this site and you see you've failed it 3-4 times, you know it's time to fix/change your story so it starts to stick.

Well, it's certainly more visible on this site, but it's not really fair to say that Anki doesn't have that feature too.  You just have to go into the deck editor and choose to sort by difficulty, and it will order all your cards from most to least troublesome.  You can click on the card to see exactly how many times you've failed it, the number of times you've gotten it right consecutively, and how long it usually takes you to come up with an answer during reviews, too.

I remember when I started RTK, and I wanned to know if RTK could be done as fast as 1 month. There was this guy who was trying to do 100/day and got flamed.

It not only can be done, but it works best.

I'm not holding anyone back. It is the other way. I'm saying: Do it as fast as you can. The best way you can. Don't let other people hold your pace down.

hknamida wrote:

I went through RtK 3 on spite alone. Enthusiasm just doesn't cut it against those tree kanji.

Yeah, that's one of the reasons I'm not really into doing RTK3. I feel like all of the words (and their kanji) for all those sorts of things are easier learned spread out over time on a case by case basis. eg, of the nonjouyou fish, so far I've learned 虹鱒 (rainbow trout) and 鰯 (sardines)... and maybe something else that doesn't come to mind right now. Anyway, they're totally easy to remember and I know I won't confuse them with later fish because I learned them in context (fishing stories!) and distant from each other.
Of course, the exact same thing could be said of absolutely every other kanji, and I think it'd be true, heh. For me, it was just an issue of urgent necessity that made learning through the unnaturalness of Heisig worth it on those first 2000 characters - plus the FOUNDATIONAL elements (primitives and memory use) make acquiring new stuff now relatively simple where they wouldn't have been before. (Trout are revered, sardines are weak. Check, check). But now that that's taken care of, I feel like I can learn at my leisure. Plus, when you learn slowly and in conjunction with vocabulary, after having already learned 2000 characters, you (or at least I) don't really even need to create much in the way of mnemonics anymore, they just kindof slip into your brain naturally. 拗ねる and 蜂蜜 just feel right. I don't even create new kanji cards for any of this stuff; I just review them as part of the anki sentences they appear in.

Actually, I think Katsumoto mentioned something about how they became so easy you picked them up without really having to try later on. At the time I found that rather hard to believe, but I'm happy to see it proven true.

Before anyone pops up and starts arguing at me... I want to point out I fully understand the reasons for proceeding through RTK3, occasionally think about doing it still, and am not actually arguing against it, just trying to mention my observations and personal study style. If such a thing may exist. Hhuuh.

I agree with mentat_kgs for 2 reasons, although I don't think it makes a massive difference.

I think the best way to learn RTK1 is to learn it a chapter at a time. This way you get all the different forms a primitive can take in one go. It's also like one chunk of knowledge and once you have done the initial review it is efficient to keep reviewing until you know it all. This is kind of like how it is easier to learn a whole bunch of different food words at once, rather than 1 food word, 1 automobile, 1 bird, 1 fish, etc.

Secondly, the way RTK1 works as we all know, involves reviewing kanji and primitives that you have already come across in new kanji. Learning a new kanji involves reviewing some old kanji. However, if you are going at a really slow pace, then the benefit of this diminished. For example, say you learn 5 kanji a day. It just isn't that hard to remember this amount of stuff a day. You don't need many reviews and so the built in reviewing in RTK1 is not so useful. Further more most of the primitives/kanji that you come accross will be already completely learnt since you learnt it a week ago, so there isn't much need for further reviewing.

Re Anki vs this site:

This site as I understand it is not an SRS. The description from the about page:

Leitner's system consists of a cardboard box separated into a number of compartments. The compartments are filled with flashcards and the flashcards are moved from one compartment to another, according to the current level of knowledge. When a flashcard is answered correctly it is promoted to the next compartment. When a flashcard is answered incorrectly it is demoted to the first compartment.

It is a basic system from the days before computers. Anki won't demote a mature card to the "first box" if you fail it. Sometimes I just forget some small positioning thing so I fail a card but I don't need to reset all my progress with it. Also Anki has 5 options allowing it to be more accurate. Generally speaking you will be doing less reviews with Anki (or a different SRS).

Re Minna no Nihongo:

My main beef is with the translation book, which offers horrible English explanations. It fails to explain the basic meaning of the grammar and instead gives you all the different cases where it can be used.

In terms of a source of sentences I think it generally has quite unatural Japanese that is used to make using the grammar easy for learners. It tends not to remove what is already known from context or already stated in the conversation and is generally overly verbose. This is the equivilant of not using pronouns in English and helps create Japanese speakers who state everything they can in every sentence (KO also suffers from this IMO, but makes up for it in other areas).

To take an example from the book 「私は日本語が少し話せます。」, using 私は in this case is a rare case that is not explained. Most speakers will directly translate it and think it means "I can speak a little Japanese" (actually the translation book has it as "I can speak Japanese a little"). When it really sounds more like "I don't know about these other guys, but as for me, I can speak a little Japanese". "I can speak a little Japanese" is 「日本語が少し話せます」.

Last edited by thermal (2008 September 27, 9:08 pm)

Yeah I know what you mean. It's doubly frustrating for those of us that are right all the time.. about everything.