What is the best way to memorize the kana?

[wndola]

Ok so I have tried a bunch of ways to memorize kana. I am about halfway through now and it is suddenly getting hard to keep so many in my mind without forgetting some. So I am looking for some hints, tips help.

I also keep a scrapbook with words I am familiar with that start with the given letter.

[Rizu]

Initially, drilling over and over. 2-3 weeks is typically how long you should spend learning the kana. Then, expose yourself to them as often as possible through reading and writing.

[valvwen]

When I initially started learning the kana, I attempted to use a flashcard style system to drill them but I found after a while that I was forgetting many of them.

It took me a while but I finally got them all memorized. Writing them is very important. I started writing the table of hiragana and katakana everyday. I'd try to think of random sounds and write those. Even now, I try to write them as much as I can, just to make sure they stick.

Reading is also very important. Read them as much as you can, even if you don't actually understand the sentence they are in. Go to japanese websites and try to read the content. Read the signs in the background of anime/manga. This is especially fun when they are written in katakana, because half the time you'll find once you can read it, you know what the word is.

Just keep reading and writing and you'll get it!

[Belton]

It takes time, repetition and daily use.

Some people take longer than others.
I know someone who has been studying Japanese for at least 4 years who still hasn't mastered kana. (amazing I know) Because I don't write katakana so much I have to stop and think sometimes to remember a character when writing by hand.

But it's not a race, eventually it makes sense. Even after you manage to learn the individual characters it takes more practice to read.

For me, writing them worked. I could learn a row every day or so, while at the same time reviewing what I'd already learnt. After 30 or 40 minutes it's best to do something else. The thinking is nothing much is being learnt after about 30 minutes. It also takes time for something to transfer from short term memory to long term memory to an instantly accessable, not having to think, memory.

I also found a little program called Nuku for the Mac to be quite useful.

Then once you've got the basic characters, use them. Write in kana not romaji. Read whatever you can.

Oddly I found that childrens books weren't that useful. Japanese children have a different vocabulary and natural knowledge of grammar than I do.
But using a textbook with passages written in kana helped.

The kana pdfs here would be useful as you can read along with the podcast.

I think because of their shapes I still find reading kana to be quite slow compared to English or romaji. but that's a whole other topic.

Stick with it! がんばって！

[metablue]

I broke them up and learned one row a day. Learning just a few at a time makes it much easier. I used flashcards and the "Kanji Pictograms" book. It has a section on kana at the front where each kana is linked to a picture.

eg
あ - if you turn it on its side you can see an A in there.
い - chopsticks - you eat with them.
う- someone getting hit in the stomach and going "u!"
え - exotic bird
お - an olive with a toothpick in it

That made them super easy to remember.

[markdweaver]

I broke them up and learned one row a day. Learning just a few at a time makes it much easier. I used flashcards and the "Kanji Pictograms" book. It has a section on kana at the front where each kana is linked to a picture.

eg
あ - if you turn it on its side you can see an A in there.
い - chopsticks - you eat with them.
う- someone getting hit in the stomach and going "u!"
え - exotic bird
お - an olive with a toothpick in it

That made them super easy to remember.

I'll second this approach. When I learned I had a weekend to learn them, and I used flashcards with this type of visual mnemonic.

Another system I've used for many different things, such as vocabulary, is to take a normal sheet of paper and fold it into half, and then half again, so the crease runs from top to bottom, with four sections, folded like an accordion. Write the kana in the first column, then write the romaji equivalent in the second. Then fold the first column behind the second, so you can only see the romaji, and write the kana in the third column. Then fold the second behind the third so you can see the kana again, and write the romaji. Do this on both sides, front and back. Give it a try, maybe it could help.

[jemstone]

i first learned katakana from games. back then it was snes. there was a particular game by squaresoft, final fantasy 5. it wasn't translated to english back then (anthology wasn't out yet). plenty of katakana here and there.

keep looking at those katakana, get a card that has all 46 sounds in the japanese language (preferably in both hiragana and katakana) and check out those katakana words.

soon you'll realize that you can read those katakana words (by translating them to english) without referring to the card. that's when you know you've somehow memorized katakana.

as for hiragana, it'd be a little tougher without knowing the meaning. that's when you spend a half hour each day listening to jpod101 and practice them. then when you see those hiragana words, you can speak them out and see if they are something you've already learned before.

[Fedgrub]

Childrens books are useful, or the new Zelda game for NDS.

Does anyone know any good childrens books that are better than another?

[wndola]

great tips jemstoneさん and Fedgrubさん I have a movie version of one of the Final Fantasy games my husband picked up at a sale. I tried watching it with the Japanese subtitles instead of the english... I also picked up a manga and was very pleased to find I could read all of the dog's dialogue ワ ン ワ ン and ガ アアアア Hey it's a step

[sphere]

I don't know if others agree with this but here are some of my own comments

1) using them over and over again.
This does not mean forcefully memorizing the whole table, which could be tiring and boring. personally, I run through the kana table a few times as warm up, then go through vocab. most of the kana are memorized through reading the vocab (of course, the common ones will be learnt faster). it helps to practice writing the vocab word entries while reading aloud.

2) don't use romaji.
I know this can be tough for native english (latin-based languages?) speakers, "abandoning" the notation that reminds us of the pronunciation, but if I feel that we have to cut the umbilical cord somewhere. When I'm not looking at the kana table (which has romaji denoted), I don't use romaji at all. For noting down pronunciation for kanji etc, I use hiragana as furigana. It could be tough at first, but I find that after you get past the initial bump, it feels so natural that I hardly put any conscious thought to it anymore. Conversely, if one keeps relying on romaji, it may subconsciously make it slower to accept hiragana.

3) learn the kana sets one at a time.
my feel is start with hiragana. don't start katakana until you are very familiar with the former. don't start with kanji too until hiragana is as natural as breathing. Keeps things from getting too confusing.

just my 2 cents

[Shumiston]

ALTHOUGH IF YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT IT IS SAYING IT IS STILL GOOD RECOGNITION PRACTICE, the japanese version of pokemon diamond and pearl is all in kana. The problem is is that if you don't know the words, it seems like nonsense. I reccomend playing the english version first so you don't get lost on the japanese version. The games are for the nintendo ds, and you can play them on any DS.

[strugglebunny]

I know this is semi old, but what helped me was this one-two-three combo.

1. Flash cards. Make your own (like I did), or use a flashcard program (I believe this site [if you're a premium member] and japanesepage.com [free] both have online kana flash cards. You can probably find others if you look).

2. The "Let's Learn Hiragana/Katakana" book series. These books don't leave a lot of room for individual kana practice though, so you may want to make a photocopy of some of the pages or have a notebook handy.

3. Read and write them as much as possible. Even if what your reading seems like gibberish or your writing is actually gibberish. Especially with katakana, I'll try and take English words or phrase and see if I can "katakana-ize" them, if you know what I mean. With reading either of them, I try and sound the syllables out loud. For me, this seems to help make things stick.

Well, I probably just wasted my time, since this topic is older and there have already been a lot of great suggestions, but what the hell. I don't really feel like typing my school work right now anyways!

[lazysunday]

I started transcribing the Romaji in the lesson notes to Kana without looking at the answers and then checking later. It took a couple weeks but now I can actually read without the cheat card.

I also have a great plastic chart I got at Marukai Market. It's a lot easier than looking in the back of a bulky text book over and over.

[Ulver_684]

Ok so I have tried a bunch of ways to memorize kana. I am about halfway through now and it is suddenly getting hard to keep so many in my mind without forgetting some. So I am looking for some hints, tips help.

I also keep a scrapbook with words I am familiar with that start with the given letter.

Wndola-san!

Great topic, I'm taking notes right now!