Not as terrible as you think, but also not very productive. I actually did something very similar before I did RtK. At the time I didn't want to put the time in for RtK, but I still wanted to learn all the kanji for vocab I was learning, so I would look up the English keyword in a kanji dictionary and just try to remember it by image/brute force/srs.

It's not like such effort will hurt, so in the end I still had a better grasp on kanji, but RtK proved to have much, much, better results.

I'd also be careful with how long you think you will be able kanji with such a method. You say you can easily recall them, but for how long? I quit reviewing a month after finishing RtK (doing it the way Heisig says too) and it took me about 6 months to actually start completely losing many of the associations between keyword and kanji. I don't think those associations could have lasted so long without properly trying to use imaginative memory to strengthen them.

I've only just started learning the kanji, but I think this would be a bad idea.  You'd basically be reverting to a regular style of learning kanji, which many have shown to be far less effective.  Although you would be learning them in a well thought out order, I don't think the order will make up for lack of mnemonics.  As far as I'm aware you were never supposed to retain the story for each kanji.  I thought they were to remain with you in the beginning stages of learning, but once the kanji has been more solidly memorized they would fade away.

For me I find that I don't remember the stories well when I just follow someone else's story without adding any details of my own (whatever comes to mind, sometimes includes personal memories) and when I don't actually close my eyes and try to get as clear a picture in my mind of the story as I can.  These two things have really helped the last few kanji I've been learning stick.  If you're not doing either of these things then I highly suggest that you try this before trying rote memorization.

But if you're going to try to learn through rote memorization anyway, I don't see the harm in atleast taking a quick glance at the top favorite story for each kanji.  Maybe a few of them will stick and atleast those kanji will get learned quickly.

Although imagining stories and such may work for some people, for others, it is simply enough to be able to break down kanji into different parts. I don't really see the harm in maybe deviating from the story route as long as you have the ability to remember the components for whatever reason. I can remember new kanji pretty easily by breaking them up into parts in my mind without necessarily creating a new story or image for that kanji. My retention rate is pretty high, but it varies among people how theirs will be. No one method will fit all.

Last edited by Smackle (2009 January 20, 10:01 pm)

Embrace high failure rates.  That's the only way that I got as far as I am right now.  Failing kanji is good.  GOOD. G. O. O. D.  Learn to love it.  Revel in it. 

IMO, most people have probably gone through that phase where you question the whole "making stories" thing b/c they're not sticking.  I did.  It sucked.  I was failing kanji left and right.  Like, none of the kanji were getting remembered at all the next review.  Seriously.  It wasn't even a "oh, okay. that's right."  No.  It was like "wow, I don't even remember seeing this story/kanji before..."  Almost every time in the beginning. 

So I threw a hissy fit and said, whatever, I'm just gonna go the rote memorization route and be done with the stories.  I might as well.

But boy am I glad I didn't do that.  I'm at the stage now where I'm getting kanji all the time that I haven't seen in a few months.  And you know what?  Even when I get them right, it's not one of those "aha, I knew this kanji looks familiar."  I mean, sometimes they do.  But the only reason I got it right is because of the story, not because I'm familiar with the Kanji itself.  You know?  It's hard to explain.  Rote memorization will work for the first few weeks and get you to the stage where you think you've got the kanji down and it's scheduled for a month or two ahead.  That's where the rote memorization fails.  Two months later, there's no way you're gonna remember that sucker.  Trust me on this one.  I'm really glad I didn't do it that way. 

So, *failure* is *good*.  It's the best thing out there.  Failing a bunch of kanji doesn't mean you suck.  It means that pretty soon you're going to be anything BUT sucky.  The more you fail a Kanji, the more you see it and think about its story.  After seeing a kanji and its story every other day for two weeks (at the very, very most), your brain will catch on and remember it.

But, but, then that's just rote memorization, you say.  Yeah?  So?  This memorization of stories in the short run from seeing them over and over in your SRS is much more useful than rote memorization of kanji in the short run.  You're doing a bit of short term memorization of stories so that in the long run (2 or 3 months down the road) you are able to use the story to recall the kanji.  I don't know why the stories stick for months at a time after this "short term rote memorization", but kanji do not.  Trust me on this one.  I know from experience.  That's just the way it is. 

So, in conclusion, just keep failing them suckers.  You'll get 'em eventually.  And for some reason, you'll probably grow out of the "failing everything 12 times in a row" stage.  I did.  It's almost like my brain grew and adapted to the process.  You'll get used to it.

Remember that there's a significant difference between remembering a few hundred and remembering a couple thousand kanji.

I've also met people who say that all their kanji memorization was through rote. And sure enough, their reading ability was pretty good.

But then, I've met very few non-Japanese whose ability to write in Japanese is terribly reliable.

When I started studying Japanese in college, I had never heard of Heisig. I learned the traditional way (although, I think my university had a very strong program), and yet, like you, I found no problem remembering the kanji I had learned (even to the point of being able to write them from memory).

But, as I advanced into the intermediate and advanced levels, and my mind was being crammed full with not only 2000+ kanji, but also thousands of words and who knows how many different grammatical patterns, I started to find that my writing ability was not advancing at the same rate as my reading ability.

Which is why I found myself looking for alternative ways to study kanji (all over again) - and thus stumbled upon Heisig.

It would be my personal advice to stick to the method, because when it really pays off is in the long run.

I should add... I learned the first 100 or so by rote memory the first time I tried remembering kanji (not the book). Those first few kanji stick because they are simple. When I actually used Heisig I got to around 400-500 and then quit (overload plus the feeling of not remembering anything). A few months later I tried Heisig again, and, strangely, those first  400-500 stories I thought I wasn't remembering all came too me.

It seemed like I didn't really notice the impact or start actively remembering stories until a while after Heisig stopped hand feeding them (1200 for me). You're learning a new skill studying this book. It's only normal that you'll need a bit a time to get the hang of it.

I wonder if I'm the only one who never tried the traditional method?

Also, if the OP doesn't like stories because they're hard to remember, he could try the Movie Method. It doesn't use stories, gives you the onyomi at the same time, and has an above average retention rate.

kaoskastle wrote:

I'm having a thought right now... I'm considering just dumping the remainder of the 2042 kanji into Anki and just learning a set however many a day -- minus the story-creation.

Do not do this. Trust me. I have been studying Japanese for many years, having used the rote memorization method for kanji.  I started Heisig a couple weeks ago.

Here is what will happen if you ditch Heisig (of course, there are some exceptional people who don't experience these negative effects, but these people are very rare):

1) You will confuse kanji with similar kanji when trying to write kanji.
Example: 債権 versus 責権; which is right?

2) You will confuse kanji with similar kanji when reading. 
Example: You see 債務 (assume this is a word you don't know), and you can't remember whether the 債 that you see is actually the 債 in 債権 or if it's the 責 in 責任.

3) You will try to write kanji and come up blank.  This happens much, much more rarely with people who have completed Heisig.

4) You will forget the meanings of kanji much, much faster than you will if you go through with Heisig.

5) You will be unable to learn new vocabulary as fast as you could if you had completed Heisig because you will not be able to pair up kanji to new words and learn the pronunciations of those words as quickly.  Of course, this assumes that you will not be able to successfully complete a rote memorization of all joyo kanji in a reasonable time frame.  If you succeed with that, then I guess this won't be a problem.
Example: By the time you've seen the words 常識、常連客、非常、and 常会, you've got a pretty good idea that the on-yomi of 「usual」 is 「じょう」, even if you didn't devote any effort at all to trying to learn that bit of information.  If you don't do Heisig, it will take much longer for these connections to form because you won't have that rock-solid, hard-to-forget image-meaning association that you get from Heisig.

Believe me, as someone who has obtained a high level of proficiency in Japanese, I really wish I had known about Heisig and completed it before I began studying Japanese.  Unless you are one of those rare folks who naturally develops a Heisig-like method or who just has an incredible memory, lots and lots of problems with your kanji recognition and writing will start to surface if you're separated from Japanese for even a month or two.

Last edited by jerkweed (2009 January 21, 4:40 am)

There is a very good 10 minute youtube video that I saw posted on this site a while back by Prof. Ray (?) Winston on the power of visual memory. The theory is that by employing visual memory to learn a fact the brain creates many more pathways to the fact than if it was just rote memorized. As such it should be (and I think is) much easier to access the fact after learning it. Although those stories will appear to fade after a while, the pathways they create in the mind remain.

If you are trying to do 50 - 100 kanji per day then maybe you are going too fast, why not slow down a bit? I started with about 30 per day and making stories up for that many was really difficult at the begining, but after a while it really got a lot easier and I was able to get up to 50 and then 70 per day. However, I think I went through those at 70 per day a bit fast and it took me a week or two to unscramble the confusion I'd created.

Why not try scaling your learning rate down to a level where you are having no problem with the stories for a week, and then picking the pace up if you want to?

For what it's worth, I've had excellent results in abandoning story-creation for kanji composed primarily from familiar components and which I have had high passive exposure to. I wouldn't recommend it outside of that group, though.

Examples include 何, 行, 貪, most of the stuff I've bothered to learn with 非, 姦, and probably a few others. Not something I'd like to try becoming literate by doing.

~J

Last edited by woodwojr (2009 January 21, 1:10 pm)