In a previous update, I talked about how the big ’secret’ for learning Kanji is to write it out over and over. For those of you hoping that my 3 awesome tools would remove the need for that will be sadly let down – no matter how many clever gadgets and nifty books come out with claims like “This book will make learning Kanji easier than throwing a cat over a fence!” at the end of the day it’s all about the grind.
That said, there are things out there that can make it less of a nightmare. I’d say these tools are better used for remembering and internalizing Kanji. So here we go!
1. jMemorize
Even though I already posted about it I’m going to sing it’s praises once again. Once you’ve built up over 100 flashcards you’ll really start to love the way it organises your revision – if you keep getting a card wrong you’ll see it more and more often, whereas ones you find easy will appear much less. It makes it very easy to focus revision on your weak points.
For more info on jMemorize, check the update I wrote about it.
2. Basic Kanji Book
Everyone studying Japanese at Sheffield University who just read that suggestion groaned. But the truth is, this is an amazing book. It groups the Kanji into logical lessons, and Volume 1 and Volume 2 add up to 500 Kanji, which if you learn everything for is really good going. Click here for an example page.
As you can see, it gives you a chance to practice writing the Kanji out after checking the correct stroke order, plus it gives all the readings for the Kanji, and makes them immidiatly useful by providing a few example combinations to create more vocabulary. It’s a truly great book. It’s available on Amazon, although if you have a friend in Japan willing to go to a bookstore and pick it up for you it will be much, much cheaper.
3. Kanji Sonomama Rakubiki Jiten [Nintendo DS]
This is an amazing piece of software and really shows the versitility of the DS as much more than a gaming device. If you write a Kanji in the space in the bottom screen, you can then either get the Japanese meaning, English translation or various other meanings through the use of the four inbuilt dictionaries. This software is so much more than that, with lots of built in tests such as the TOIEC English test. To be honest, I’m not really very good at using it so I’m not the one to ask, so instead I took a photo of it in action.
You can get the game imported from Japan for $48.90 from Play-Asia here.
So there you are. I hope that helps in making Kanji a little easier to learn. That said, the only reason I’m writing this update is because I’m putting off learning them myself…
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I am going to have to dispute your theory of ‘the grind is the only way’ I recently found and subsequently bought the book “Remembering the Kanji I: A Complete Course on How Not to Forget the Meaning and Writing of Japanese Characters by James Heisig” and have completely fallen in love with it. I started three weeks ago and have got through 443 Kanji already. The book teaches you the English meaning and how to write the characters only, once you have learnt all 2042 the next volume goes for the readings and compounds in a similar logical way. Its all based on mnemonics for each character. Every character is broken down into primitives which you use to create a story. The book provides stories for the first 200 or so, then just the outlines of stories, then the majority it expects you to think of a story based on the primitives listed. Coupled with a website setup to accompany the book, which works in a similar way to jMemorize, called reviewing the Kanji, its an amazing system. At the moment it takes me three hours a day to learn 30 new Kanji and review any that are scheduled for review on the website. But it is quite possibly the most satisfying thing to start to be able to read the world around me, so I’ve become pretty obsessed. I cannot possibly recommend this book and system enough. You can get the first 200 or something characters as a free sample online if you are interested.
Tom Clayson: Ah, I have heard about this book and if my uni wasn’t so linked to the book above I’d definitly use it. Is it expensive?
I gotta agree that writing Kanji down is a great way to learn how to write them. For just reading, flashcards or even reading them in a book is easy. Recognition is easier than reproduction (reading/understanding a Kanji character is a lot easier than actually remembering/writing every stroke).
btw, does jMemorize work with English as well? Basically, can I use it for vocab as well as Kanji?
Nagix: Agreed – I use flashcards for reading purposes.
jMemorize works with any language that your computer can write in.
Cost me 3800Yen out here delivered. In the UK you can find it for about £35 I think. The method it invokes may be simple but it still requires a lot of work. On Kanji that I forget the story of I still have to go back to the grind writing it over and over whilst saying the story in my head. Have you tried any other Flashcard programs? I like jMemorize but have heard good things about mnemosyne and some others which use a more complex system of rescheduling cards.
Tom Clayson: Ah, I think I’ll just wait until I go out there and get it cheaply that way. As for jMem, the reason I like it more than Mnemosyne is because once you have a huge amount of cards both Mnemosyne and Anki start to struggle a bit. I suppose if you manage your cards in different files they are better though.
Nice list… I’m mainly using Basic Kanji Book in addition to smart.fm and as much reading/writing as possible…
BTW, I’ve just finished my new Japanese educational game and reviewing tool Nihongoup. It can improve one’s kana typing speed as well as help one review the kanji and particles. It would be cool if you could try it out :) http://nihongoup.com/
Philip: I’ll give it a go, if I get the chance I could blog about it.
@Mike: Thnx! If you’ll have any comments, please contact me by mail or at Twitter (seifip) :)
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