I'm a bit stuck here

Hi there, i recently started learning kanji.

I bought myself the "kanji & kana" book. Here i can find all the 1945
kanji with their -on and -kun readings. So i'm ready to start working !
However, i'm having trouble finding a correct way of studying.

Should i just learn the -kun meaning, and study the words that have
2 or more kanji "like that", without further explanation. Just memorize
them like that ?

Or should i learn the -on meaning, so i can read compound words
(even if i don't know the translation). Because there are more words
without a unique -kun meaning, and every word has a -on meaning(s).

I'm a bit lost here ...

I was wondering, in Japan they start giving kanji in elementary school right?
How do they do it over there ? How do they teach the childeren that e.g.
for the word "ue" (above/up) you have THAT word as a -kun meaning, and
about 2 or 3 -on meanings ??

What's a good way for learning kanji? Study and repeat i know, but you
have got to have something to hold on to. Tell me ! do i have to learn
all the -on words or not ?


Thank you very much

I am a beginner as well, and the most important thing I have learnt so far about learning kanji is that it takes time! You have got to be VERY patient, and realise that you will keep forgetting half of what you have learnt!

I got very frustrated learning the kanji by rote, but I stuck at it until I knew enough to write some useful sentences. That was annoying for me, because I knew what I wanted to write, but only had half the kanji. Only when I have started writing sentences do the kanji seem interesting and worthwhile, but I had to put up with a few weeks of boredom or I wouldn't have got to that stage!

But it was worth the frustration now that I can write what I want to say!

And I should have said, learn all the readings, because the so-called rules(like -on in compounds and -kun on their own) have so many exceptions it's untrue - and then there are the irregular readings, like otona and hitori.

Trust me - you need to experience pain to get where you want to be!

I reccomend Heisig's method. Here's a link to a PDF of the first 100 pages of his book.

A lot of people hate this method, but I reccomend that you take a look at the PDF and see if you think it will work for you. It's a lot of hard work, but I think in the long run it will be easier for me than trying to brute force cram all the kanji into my poor little brain.

Thank you for your help.

I'll just start studying, a friend of mine is helping me for the moment.

@Tsuyoiko - You can use the "edit" button to add on to a message that you've already posted if you do so within 1440 minutes (24 hours) of posting. Just an FYI.

Thanks Glenn - you can tell I'm a newbie to forums! I'll remember in future!

While Japanese children learn the characters by repeatedly writing them, I would not recommend this method of learning to an adult. I'm not saying that you shouldn't practice writing kanji, on the contrary, but adults usually need something more to be able to commit the characters to memory.

Fantt recommended Heisig's method. While I agree that breaking kanji down into recognizable, common components is a great way to study, I strongly advise avoiding Heisig's version. While the names Heisig gives to components might be memorable, they are usually not in any way based on the actual (known/believed) origins of the characters; I personally find that knowing why a character means what it does can help to remember it. Many of the 'key words' that Heisig gives to the components are down-right silly; while memorable, I found that they did not really connect with the actual meaning of the characters (especially when a character has multiple meanings). Also, many common components can appear in slightly different forms, though always express the same meaning; however, Heisig treats each of the different forms as if they were totally different components, which further complicates learning.

A good book that covers the etymology of characters is Henshall's "A Guide to Remembering Japanese Characters". It covers the evolution of the general-use (jouyou) kanji from their Chinese roots. This book may not provide the best method for studying the characters, though, especially for beginners. If possible, though, I would at least recommend reading the introduction, which explains the different types of kanji (pictograms, logograms, semantic-phonetic, etc.). This information can also be found online through some searching.

Another book to consider is Bonjinsha's "Basic Kanji 500, Vol. 1", a workbook which provides simple, structured lessons for learning the kanji, along with common vocabulary that incorporates the studied characters. I've only recently started reviewing the book, but so far it seems quite useful. It can be purchased in Japan through Bonjinsha (世界の日本語教育に貢献するにほんごの凡人社

What method works best is, of course, different for each person. It's taken me a long time to find the method that works best for me. Also realize that learning the kanji is not an overnight process... I've been studying Japanese for over seven years, and still have a lot to learn.

(If anything above doesn't make sense, please forgive me... it's Monday and it's early, thus my brain isn't quite in tune yet (^_^ )

I feel like ashikase and I were seperated at birth! I've basically tread the same path.. in fact, I also just began going over the 'Basic Kanji 500' book as well!

I have to agree with ashikase on just about all the points. I personally wouldn't discourage Heisig so much, but I found him much better for Kana than Kanji.

'Remembering Japanese Characters' is quite good and interesting. The memorization tips/sentences are not all that helpful, but I actually found the review of where the kanji comes from to be helpful.

Basic Kanji 500 actually seems pretty good.. to bad my copy off of amazon cost $50!! The link above is much better... I like the workbook approach to it.

I think its a problem where you just need to throw a bunch of techniques at the wall & see which ones stick. Look at it this way, you will learn the first 100 kanji real good (cause you will be learning them 3+ different ways!)

Another way to learn some kanji is by using any of the more commonly reccomended textbooks. I'm using the Genki texts, and by the time I'm done with Volumes 1 and 2, I should know more than 300 kanji - not quite 2000, but better than the 100 or so I kinda know now.

I just now recomended Kanji and Kana in this forum not ten minutes ago ^_^. It's a really handy dictionary, and I've learned a lot from it personally, but it's also useful to have a good Japanese dictionary to go a long with it so you can look up more examples of certain kanji. Another thing I do is try to find exucuses to use the kanji I know, or I'll get rusty! I'm not as good at studying by myself as I wish I was, but what I find I do like doing is, after a meal at a Sushi House or the like, writing a note to the waiter or cook, complementing the food and service using all the kanji I can that's appropriate. Once, the owner of a resteraunt found my note and came out to say thank-you as we were leaving. She thought it was the neatest thing ever ^_^ and it was very rewarding. I need to get myself one of those workbooks too! I'm glad I found this thread, now I can investigate things to buy... when.. I get money >.<