Approach to learning Kanji

[JohnCBriggs]

One point I perhaps didn't make clear before was that I think you should study the kanji (on and kun reading) concurrently with words that use them. Previously, I had been studying just readings and stroke order (no vocab). Now I am studying kanji specific vocab plus readings.
Perhaps kanji specific vocab is an obvious studying tool. But it was not obvious to me for years, so that is why I mention it here.
じゃ　また
ジョン

[NickT]

Most of the time, knowing the English meaning of a character won't help you be able to read it in Japanese. Nor will being able to write it. Nor will knowing the kun and on readings. You have to know the word itself, and how to read & write it, and what it means. Once you do, recognizing it in context is easy.

If when you learn a new kanji, you learn all the useful words that contain it, and how to read and write them, then really you will have no problem. You will probably pick up the on and kun readings from doing this, but if there is a particular reading that is not used it any common or useful words, then really it is not worth remembering.

The problem I find with most kanji learning books is the sample words they give you - They often include some really obscure words, using other kanji you don't know, and may not learn for years, and they leave out some of the very basic ones, and ones that use the other kanji you have previously studied. In fact, I have seen some kanji books aimed at students around JLPT level 4, that give example words which are not even in JLPT level 1.

[NickT]

In order to illustrate the above point: A Kanji I recently learnt was "ha", leaf. Now, in my opinion the five most useful words that use this kanji are as follows:

葉書
はがき

葉
は

落ち葉
おちば

言葉
ことば

千葉県
ちばけん


Now, if you only learnt the kanji itself, and the readings, would you really be able to read these words? OK, "ochiba" and "ha" are pretty straightforward, but would you be able to guess that leaf + write = postcard? That say + leaf = word? Would you be able to recognise the kanji of chiba prefecture? I guarantee though, that if you practice writing these words a few times each, you will recognise them when you seem them no problem, even if you can't remember how to write them a few months from now. Also notice that none of these words use the onyomi, "you".

Three of these five words were not included in the vocab of my kanji textbook, which did include such gems as 針葉樹, a conifer tree - A word which uses a JLPT 1 kanji, a JLPT 2 kanji, and that according my vocab lists, is not even on the vocab list for JLPT level 1. For reference, I took JLPT 3 last month, and this book as aimed at students of about that level.

[nilfisq]

i am about to start studying the kanji and i was wondering if "kanji alive" could be useful: http://kanjialive.lib.uchicago.edu

it gives you:
- on- and kunyomi (in kana)
- stroke order (in animation)
- the radical
- examples with pronounciation + meaning
- different search filters (by reading, by meaning, by grade etc.)

i also bought the book "teach yourself beginner's japanese script", but it uses romanji throughout while i am forcing myself now to stick to the kana.

maybe kanji alive in combination with the heisiger memorization tricks is an option?