ファブリス
Administrator
From: Belgium
Registered: 2006-06-14
Posts: 3704
Website
THIS THREAD IS FOR FEEDBACK AND DISCUSSION ABOUT THE IMPLEMENTATION OF ONYOMI REVIEW AND "KANJI CHAIN" INTERFACE ON ReviewingTheKanji WEBSITE.
I am working on a new section for covering RTK II, for reviewing Onyomi and exemplary compounds.
This new area is based on the kanji chain method.
If you are interested, please try it out, and tell me what you think.
I have quicly slapped together a very beta version to test out the idea:
- the main page shows a grid with all the unique readings covered in RTK I (RTK III for later, to keep things simple)
- each reading shows a count of the number of kanji from RTK I which use this reading as "principal" reading (the data will have to be checked..) The current database is based on an index I generated, which was later reviewed by John Vold aka "kurojohn" who also checked the index against RTK II and III.
- click on a reading to go to the "kanji chain" page
- on the kanji chain page, you can enter a "tag" and a short description. The "tag" is a mnemonic aid to remember the reading, example "MAC DONALD" for マク (or "MAKUdonarudo"). "description" is where yo ucan enter some notes to remember what your story/kanji chain was about.
- click update to store the info, now the ON group is "learned", see on the main page
- click "review" on the main page, currently there is no database updates, all the kanji which is part of the ON groups you have "learned" are shuffled and you can test your memory of the readings
- YOU CAN NOT remove an on group as of yet, when you click "update" in the kanji chain page, it is assumed you have learned all the kanji from that group
TO DO :
- probably change "short description" into space large enough to save story
- add columns in the kanji list on the kanji chain page, with "exemplary" compound, and the english equivalent. This is where you enter your custom exemplary compounds to be reviewed as well. You may enter those from RTK II, but they are private. I will NOT provide the data from RTK II, due to copyright reasons (I hear there are many obscure compounds so you might as well search for useful ones)
- review compounds yes/no
- store review status
- view tags used by other members, for any ON group
I dont think I will use the leitner view for this, since reviews are faster, but in the database the same information is kept. For simplicity I will probbaly allow reviewing cards expired 1 week ago, 1 month ago, 3 month ago, etc, or all.
/time to sleep
ps: last but not least this is purely for testing so I will very likely reset the data or alter it at one point or other.
astridtops
Member
From: Netherlands
Registered: 2006-06-07
Posts: 110
Despite the fact that I hadn't finished all of RTK1 yet, I'd made a few chains of kanji I had actually all learned to try it out, and I tested those. I like being able to review these. However, a few points:
- When I look at the failed kanji list after review, I get to see how many times I got it right and I got it wrong. However, those numbers were not (only?) from the reading section, but (also?) from the RTK1 section. I think those numbers should be separate from each other. I'd want different numbers for those, because I use the numbers in determining how much attention I pay to a kanji in study. If the numbers add up, that will be utterly confusing.
- On the same note, the 1 kanji I failed in reading now turned up in my study section for RTK1! I reaaaallly want to keep those 2 study lists for writing and reading separate. Because now that particular kanji has moved out of position for my writing study as well 
- I think it's obvious that if the kanji from book III are added, a mechanism should be in place for choosing between review for book I only or for book I and III both.
- Personally, I'd love to add second or third readings from kanji to the lists. Because I took the kanji town list from the yahoo forum, I had already added 行 to my アン list, but in this mode I cannot see that kanji nor review that particular reading. I understand if this is technically impossible, but I would so love to be able to have a button under the kanji list to make personalised list, and add a kanji number of one that also happens to have that particular reading. In such a case, the review would list all the readings I have actually learned, not just one. But, that would mean the review cards would become personalised too, and that sounds like a lot more work, so I see this might not work.
Last edited by astridtops (2006 July 11, 8:58 am)
For reviewing kanjichains I believe you must sit down with pen and paper, then recite the story out aloud while you write down the kanjis on the paper. When you are done, you compare with the actual story you typed down. If you notice that you left out some kanjis from your rehearsal, I think it means you must work harder on that particular element
By harder I mean:
Make the kanji stand out more in the story
Make sure the kanji is not repeated in the same space. It is sometimes tempting to chain a few or more kanjis to the same person or place in the story, to get them sorted out. This can cheat your mind. It is lazy and would rather have one kanji per person/location. So move along, and place the offending element somewhere else, or with somebody else.
ファブリス
Administrator
From: Belgium
Registered: 2006-06-14
Posts: 3704
Website
The method I have used so far is to write down the keyword for each kanji in the group, without looking at the kanji.
Sit in a quiet place with that piece of paper and a pen.
- First do a quick recall of all the kanji in the group, write the characters down from memory. This is to make sure you know the kanji well before linking them. And to spot those thay will need some reinforcement (it's ok to rework a troublesome kanji as you add it to a chain).
- Look if there are "sub chains" : kanji which share similar primitives (these would be PURE GROUPS from RTK II), grouping kanji inside the chain, around common primitives help to remember them.
- Come up with an idea for a location, that is interesting enough. Look at the keywords and see what you could make with them. Then find a mnemonic association for the reading, so if you are working on MAKU it could be MacDonalds in Japan (makudonarudo).
- Now close your eyes and start building your imaginary location, adding kanji one by one. Each time you add a kanji see how it could relate to the other ones around. You can come up with a minimal plot, but you can also link the kanji purely by location, which is more visual-based (i.e. you can clearly place a kanji in the north-west corner of a room, then in the south-east, then one near the door which is west, etc. If you can see it in the mind's eye, and navigate the room, they are linked).
- When you're done you can try and recall the whole chain from memory. Worked 95% for me every time. Count as you recall and verify, if you skipped some kanji, close your eyes and spend more time linking them to the other kanji in the chain.
The longest chain I did so far was 31 kanji. It took approx 45 mins to build it. The length does not make it harder, but if the chain is longer, you may need to spend more time going back and forth making sure the kanji are linked well enough.
ファブリス
Administrator
From: Belgium
Registered: 2006-06-14
Posts: 3704
Website
I am starting to think about adding mutliple readings.
The vague idea I have at the moment would be to distiguish between a most common reading, and "secondary" readings. The most common reading is the one that is given first in Kodansha's Kanji Learner Dictionary (for example).
Thus for 回 we have KAI as main reading, and E as secondary reading.
In the kanji chain page, the kanji list would display first the kanji with the ON reading as main reading. Then it would list additional kanji, that are already present in other groups with a main reading, but appear here with the reading as a "secondary" reading. This leaves the user with the choice of memorising all the kanji in the chain or just the ones that use the reading as principal reading. Kanji chains can always be completed at a later time if the user wants. If kanji with the reading as "primary" and "secondary" are clear cut, it is easy to come back later and add the "secondary" readings to the kanji chains if they were not learned before.
ファブリス
Administrator
From: Belgium
Registered: 2006-06-14
Posts: 3704
Website
The Onyomi Study & Review area is shaping up:
onyomi > kanji chain page
I can't wait getting started reviewing compounds.
What's interesting is that you can create chains in any order you like. So you can learn the ~274 ON groups in the order that suits the vocabulary you want to learn!
You can order your study of the ON chains, AND vocabulary, based on the material you read. If you see a compound that appears a lot and that you want to learn, it can motivate you in learning the chains for the corresponding ON readings you need !
The chains are learned in one swoop, once learned all the kanji from the chain shows up in the ON yomi flashcard review.
But the compounds will be flashcards with their own reviewing status, separate from the readings. So when you don't have many readings yet, you don't have to fill in all the compounds for a chain. You can add compounds at any time, in any ON group, and their flashcard will add to the compound flashcards.
This means you dont need to review compounds with kanji for which you don't know the reading yet! You can wait to learn a few common readings, then add compounds for just those readings. And as you learn more readings, more words that can be built with these readings open up, that you can add in the compound flashcards.
In the picture I am editing JOU-KEN, I chose this one because I already learned the chain for KEN.
Please note that compounds from RTK II will NOT be provided, for copyright reasons.
I'm sorry, I thought I had commented out all the database updates, thanks for pointing this out.
