If a mnemonic doesn’t make sense to you, then come up with one that does. They should be easy for you to recall. Sometimes I can’t think of an easy mnemonic, but it’s best to really try. Sometimes the act of trying to think of a mnemonic is enough to put the word into your head.

As for remembering the readings for kanji I had a hard time remembering if a sound was on or kun. I asked several times for advice on the boards here, and only got useless answers like “You just remember.” In the defense of the people responding I wasn’t asking the right question. The question I should have asked was “Is there a good way to remember which is which?” The answer is yes. When I use Anki on the kanji deck I say the meaning of the, say to myself “this is an on’yomi”, and then the sound. The step of actively reminding myself it’s the on’yomi reading is the trick to remembering which sound goes with on vs. kun.

@ hey,

Well that’s a bit of a relief to hear. I’ve finally reached day 7 and I still haven’t experienced any sense of burning out so I must be doing something right. Finally managed to get the bulk of  Hiragana into my head (All the characters!).

• This reply was modified 11 years, 10 months ago by  Wasif Asif.

@hey — I’m a PhD student in computer science. So by skill set, yes I am (could be) a software developer, but not by profession. I guess it depends on why you’re asking.

@Ben Reilly – Your picture is tiny, so it’s hard to say, but you look like a guy I met at a Microsoft convention last October.

I do not work for Microsoft. I was lucky enough to be sent to a Microsoft conference for work. I’ve also been lucky enough to write applications for some fairly well known organizations, and I’m currently writing health care applications.

I’ve found Japanese to be fairly challenging, but when I first started writing code it was challenging as well. Knowing my weaknesses as a programmer was key to getting better. One day I suddenly realized people were looking to me as the experienced software developer. I take the lessons I learned from becoming an experienced programmer, and apply them to learning Japanese. It’s not too different from the philosophies you’ve expressed.

Don’t worry about kanji it takes time. It takes time for people who live kanji 24/7. You can’t expect to pick it up faster can you?

One thing I did, but not around season 2, much closer to season 4, is learn the top 100 kanji. It’s a really good bang for your buck sort of thing. It won’t nearly be enough to let you pick up a book, and read, but they do pop up a lot, and it’s a great start.

Here you go:

http://www.kanji-a-day.com/100kanji.php

I also decided to learn the stroke order for the top 100 kanji as well. That slows you down a bit, but it’s worth it because I can have a very strong sense of the stroke order for just about any other kanji I see. I still come across kanji that learning these don’t help me with, but nine times out of ten I know the stroke order or kanji I’ve never seen.

Why does stroke order matter?

There are plenty of times I can’t copy, and paste kanji. When I’m on the street, when it’s an image, when it’s in a book, etc. There are three different tools you can use to look up a kanji by stroke order, and sometimes you can get away with getting the stroke order wrong, but usually if you want to find it you have to be exact, or 95% correct.

The one I use the most, is an app for my android called kanji recognizer. I can’t recommend this app enough. It also includes a quiz mode that lets you practice JLPT kanji, or your favorites. The author is awesome, and has responded to every email I’ve sent him, and even added a couple of feature changes for me:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.nick.kanjirecognizer&hl=en

The second tool is Windows IME Pad. When you install the Japanese keyboard option in Windows it will add an extra icon called IME Pad. If you are unsure how to find it or use it just Google, since it’s slightly different per version of Windows. However, once you have it installed, know where it is, and how to use it it’s the most flexible kanji recognizer I’ve seen. You can really mess up the kanji, and it’ll usually have what you’re looking for in the possible matches. I try to use it less for that reason however. While I’m learning I want to be strict about my stroke orders. Still, in a pinch I’m glad it’s there.

The last option is a real denshi jisho. I have friends, American and Japanese that don’t have Windows, or Android, and they just use their denshi jisho. I don’t have personal experience with one. I’ve seen them use them to great effect though. They don’t understand why I use my phone, but my phone is smaller than a denshi jisho, and I tend to always have my phone on me anyway. Also, denshi jishos are not cheap.

I think that’s everything I can offer on kanji at the moment, but if you have questions let me know.