Japanese Kanji 101 (and How I’d Learn Kanji Starting Over) 

Something that should always be said on videos like this: This is how I would (and do) learn kanji. It’s not the ONLY way to learn kanji, and it might not even be the best for you! But it works well for me, and is very efficient, so I want to try and make it work for YOU too! Things I used to recommend: RTK - I cover in this video why I’ve shifted, despite using it myself 10 years ago. Kanken Video Games - I enjoyed these for a while, but they’re actually what lead me to THIS approach. The games are lacking in many ways, and ALSO as you get further along they become quite tedious, time consuming, and the little extra steps necessary become annoying. So this is what I’ve broken everything down into. BUT, those might work for you. So never feel like you have to quit what you’re doing if it’s working. 😊

"Don't learn kanji, learn words that consist of kanji." This is the best advice in the whole video - and maybe the only one you even need.

Having learned about 650 kanji so far, I can't imagine trying to intentionally learn the readings. As far as I can tell, the readings side of things comes intuitively as you grow your vocabulary.

As a former gacha game player, I find Wanikani’s gamified level system really motivating. I highly doubt I would put as much time in if I was trying a more self-directed method. And it’s working fine-after around level 10 the process started feeling fairly intuitive.

I think instead watching how to learn kanji, if i actually start learning kanji for once only then i can progress 😅

Honestly this video couldn't have dropped at a better time. Reading is an important part of my journey since there are a few books I want to read that were never translated and I'd just been getting ready to dive into the Kanji-verse.

The Chinese: *laughs maniacally*

Wow. So I've been casually learning Japanese for the past 4 months. I have some textbooks (but not Genki) but thanks to you I've gone through the material a few times already. And just today I sat down and said ok let's start writing kanji and I did, then a couple hours later your new video posted and I immediately signed up. I NEEDED this so thank you and I can't wait to get started!

I can warmly recommend the Outlier Kanji Dictionary for Yomiwa. Being able to look up a kanji and read the actual history of a kanji has really unlocked kanji for me. And for many kanji you can read it’s history with pictures of the ancient forms and their evolution to modern script. Outliers kanji course is also excellent - it’s allowed me to actually understand kanji. For my currrent studying I downloaded a All in one kanji deck for Anki and simply look up new kanji as they show up in Outlier Dictionary. Lastly I downloaded an Anki deck based on the Kanji in Context book to learn readings and new words.

I’m almost finished going through the entire RtK book 1. I’ve been working on this book for the past 4 months. I knew going into this that it wasn’t going to make me be able to read Japanese Kanji. Before RtK I would see a kanji, move on, and if I saw that exact same kanji again, I would have no memory of seeing it before. What RtK has done is make each kanji infinitely easier to recognize since I’ve trained my brain to be able to break down each kanji into parts and see patterns, rather than try and memorize the kanji as a whole. I like to think the RtK method as a way of building the scaffolding into place that would eventually lead to building the actual structure which is being able to read and understand the Japanese language.

Would definitely buy membership once I get the job. But for the meantime, a big thanks for still releasing the kanji series on RU-vid for free even though we'll get it later than those who are already members of your course. Thank you for making kanji learning fun. ❤❤❤

Thank you for the very clear, smooth, easy to follow information and recommendation! You are amazing

Thank you! I've been falling behind with kanji in my classes and I think this will help a lot

Your approach is excellent ; it's the best I've ever seen . WELL DONE ! I am implementing your program to learn the Kanji .

I’ve been waiting so long for this!!! Thank you!

This is a very well timed video for me. I was literally sitting down today planning how to approach kanji after failing over and over again for 3 years or so. Essentially your video is what i have been thinking about the kanji pitfalls but articulated better. I'm around the JLPT4/3 level with a kanji level of low 5. This changes today....hopefully. Great video

I’m working through the Learning Japanese from Zero book with my wife. We’re preparing for a trip to Japan in around a year. We’re studying that book, Remembering the Kanji 1 and 2, and the N5 workbook. These videos are very helpful, thank you!

Andy, you are an amazing teacher! Thanks to you, I got through Genki I, and I'm now half way through Genki II. This kanji method sounds awesome, but as I already have a lifetime membership with Wanikani, and things are working out, I'm going to stick with that. Good luck to everyone who tries Andy's method.

I’ve been learning Japanese for almost 8 years now. I am at an intermediate level when it comes to speaking and listening but my reading and writing has always lagged behind. Even though I’ve spent years working on Flashcards that never really stuck in my head. I also spent tons of money on graded readers that were okay but the stories were never that captivating. I would always try to brute force the knowledge into my head but after I stopped studying those Flashcards most of the knowledge would not be immediately available when I needed them. This system of using both the JLPT and Kanken lists while reading is the best way in my opinion. Interacting with topics you care about in the language will always result in more knowledge being kept in long term memory easier. Love the great videos keep ‘em coming.

So excited for this series! Omgg

This dropped at a perfect time indeed! I'm going to take the JLPT N4 this December and I've been struggling to learn kanji ever since. Really excited to check this series out and try your tips for learning kanji as well. 😊

Thanks a lot for this material! Now I know what is my next step❤

So excited to watch this. Thank you Andy. ❤

What a terrific and helpful video. Thankyou.

I really appreciate for those new videos thanks Andyさん😊

Yyeeeess!!! Is it finally here?! A kanji lessons made easy by my fave instructor!!

Learning kanji is arguably my favorite thing about learning japanese at the moment, so I'm very excited about this series!

Woo! I’m gonna be studying abroad in Japan soon so this is super helpful. Definitely gonna take a look at the website 👀

Your videos are so creative and helpful.

I personally really like how I learned kanji and it definitely has to do with breaking down kanji in sound and meaning components. I like the Outlier Dictionary for this reason!! It breaks down kanji in a logical manner, describing it's origin, assembly and all its characteristics. If you understand something you automatically know it!! I hate memorizing things by heart, I'm generally bad at it and it burns me out, however understanding the assembly rules behind a kanji and it's pronunciation makes learning kanji almost like a puzzle!! Learning kanji > memorizing kanji!! The fact that I'm a linguistics major probably attributes to how I'm enjoying learning kanji in a way. It may not be the way for some people, it entails a lot of information that some people might deem "useless". However I've never considered learning kanji as fast as possible as my goal. I want to understand the Japanese language because I'm interested in it, but not because I want to get good as fast as possible. Breaking down kanji in components and understanding its history is straight up my alley because I'm simply linguistically inclined, but not necessarily "language-proficiency"-inclined. Trying to play with kanji and feeling out what your preferred approach is, is in my opinion the best way to learn! The only thing I regret about learning kanji before is that I was too stuck thinking I have to stick to one specific pre-established method. However as we are all our own individuals it makes a lot more sense to pick small parts from several methods and approaches that you personally enjoy and make your own personalized method. Creating your own method might take years so I wouldn't feel remorseful not immediately knowing how **I** personally study the best, learning takes time and self-reflection! Also! Small correction about your radical explanation, this is a commonly made misdefinition that I often hear people make. Every kanji has just one "radical" (部首) , the other components simply are "components" or "elements"（部品、(構成)要素、パーツ）. Radicals were established by a committee meant for indexation. Radicals aren't necessarily linguistically or etymologically logical or correct either, sometimes a kanji has one component labelled as that kanji's "radical" while another component seems more suitable for it. Sometimes a kanji's radical is actually a simplification or misinterpretation of a totally different character, where the meaning actually has nothing to do with the kanji's meaning anymore. That is why simply going off a kanji's radical can be misleading. I personally enjoy breaking kanji down in functional components: meaning, form and sound-components, that have developed from history, like written in the Outliers Dictionary. There is a reason why a kanji has a certain meaning or sound, and you can deduce that information by looking into it's etymology and component assembly and development. This way you immediately tackle a lot of on-yomi because of the sound-components (honestly, this is how I passed the language knowledge section of the JLPT N2, simply by recognizing sound-components).

Yay new video! been waiting for your new upload for a while! Thanks for this!

I learned with the old fashioned RTK method between 2005 and 2008, and eventually passed all five JLPT levels, ending with N1 in 2011. The old method worked, but it was insanely time consuming. My wife is thinking of learning Japanese now so I will definitely recommend this alternative approach to her. Seems much more efficient!

This video is a gem! Thank you so much🫶

This is going to be a great series! 🎉

Thank You for doing this, Sensei

Can't wait to see it 💪😎

楽しみにしてる！

I've gone through high school and university level Japanese and after a long break (10+ years) I picked up wanikani earlier this year as a way to get back into learning, mostly with the aim of improving my reading comprehension. It's worked remerkably well for me so far, but I did have a decent vocab and grammar background going into it. Without already knowing a lot of common words and phrases you would probably be much better off taking Andy's approach. That being said the real key to all of this is SRS. God I wish we had that 20 years ago in school :D

The way i describe scripts to people picking up japanese; Hiragana - native japanese words Katakana - foreign words [lots of cognaits] Kanji - shorthand for ideas, names and concepts. Honestly, i think the most effective method is learning to write in hiragana. Then learning sentence structure. Then learn vocab with everyday sentences. Then write those sentences out, writing in kanji where appropriate. This way you're getting practical kanji down without having to study every meaning and also for practical applications. Kanji doesnt become a vague character, it becomes the shorthand for dog for example.

Started using Wanikani in March, I'm a third of the way through the program at lvl 22 and I've learned about 700 kanji, I could not give the program a bigger endorsement. I tried all the books, learning the kanji, did several anki decks and it's been my absolute favorite. Do Anki if you don't want to spend anything though.

I've been learning Japanese through college courses and you've basically listed a lot of the issues with those courses and what I've found works best for my self in this last semester. I appreciate the video and how I focus my personal time now that I'll be out of college soon. Also, Based fellow Dorohedoro reader!🤘 I hope you're enjoying her sequel Dai Dark as well~!

I really enjoy WaniKani and how it builds each level of kanji up with new radicals and then immediately follows up with vocabulary words. Thanks to Andy's suggestions, I've also started incorporating Japanese sentences SRS through Anki. Since I'm new to grammar, the sentences on WaniKani have always felt a bit too difficult during early levels.

I struggle mostly on combined words. I often can guess a rough meaning from it's parts but can't remember the pronunciation of compound words. But after I thought about it I think that's a good thing rather than a bad thing. Compared to English where when you don't know the meaning of a word you can pronounce without knowing it's meaning it's opposite of the way kanji work and I think being able to get the meaning of an unknown word is more beneficial then being able to pronounce it.

Thank you, this should become the new standard instruction for everyone wanting to learn kanji.

Stoked on this

Thanks for the interesting video. I just want to say that for me, always writing the kanji in the right stroke order makes it easier for me to remember the kanji. Sometimes, I don’t clearly remember one but if I can remember the first few strokes it generally gets me started and the rest just falls in place.

to be honest, i only clicked on this video mainky because i saw '鬱' and i happened to learn about it today. after watching this video, i really liked the information you presented here. i've been more or less learning japanese since 2015-ish but i'm so one and off that i'm still very much a beginner 😅 i want to start again and slowly learn and i've been wondering how i'll approach kanji as it's always been a tough area for me. i'll definitely use this info to plan my own learning and will check out your kanji series. thanks!

I love you, thank you so much for sharing and teaching this hard lenguage ❤❤❤

Yessss, I need that video.

Hi Andy! Started following your videos when I lived in Hawaii dating a Japanese woman. Now that I am living in Japan your vidoes are even more appreciated as I work towards fluency. This video was exceptional! Thank you!😊

Love your video! Very easy to understand. After I finished Hiragana and Katakana, I've been delaying to learn Kanji because it looks scary to remember 2000 words . But I still have to learn it as I'm really interested in Japanese. Thank you for this video. Very helpful! Arigato Guzaimasu

the coolest feeling is like hearing a new word, checking its writing & already knowing every kanji there 😎😎

I'm almost done with my Kanji Journey and I think I took a very similar approach. There is an free Add-On for Anki called "Kanji God" which makes learning Kanji very natural and keeps you close to the Vocab. The way it teaches you is by automatically making a customized Deck (or two in case of Writing as well as Recognition) in order of your Vocab Deck, be it a Kanken, JLPT, Core2,3K or Sentence Mining Deck and combined with Sentence Mining from Manga or Videos this works so effortlessly well. This Method combines Immersion, Kanji and Vocab and gave me more time than RTK would ever let me have.

haven't watched the video yet, but the thumbnail pulled me in. 鬱 is precisely the kanji I use as an example where knowing radicals really helps. it looks super complicated, but it's really not once you break it down.

あ、ありがとうございます♪ とても役に立つ！ helps with learning Chinese too!

Thanks a lot Andy. Greetings from Argentina!

Here's some other power moves (from someone that's been fluent for 15 years and knows 2500+ kanji): 1) Write with correct stroke order so when you encounter similar kanji you've already gone through the muscle memory of writing radicals or parts of the kanji are familiar to you making it much easier to memorize when you get to more advanced kanji later. example: 首→道→導 　(Also 目 you would have learned earlier if you follow his advice about doing common kanji first, important radicals appear at the beginning of your journey, think of the first 80 1st grade kanji as radicals and it'll make the rest you learn easier) 2) Read a lot of manga with furigana to supplement the kanji you're learning (and harder stuff when you want to test your reading ability). Like if the kanji you're learning is common enough you should see them constantly, and you'll see how they are actually used in context. Even Japanese children that only know 100-200 kanji do this a lot, and just naturally remember how to read them through exposure (then they already have dozens of combinations they can read with those 100-200 kanji). I think this is also crucial because too many people study out of context and then have to work on reading years later and realize their vocabulary is really small. Like you know 1-2 readings per the 2000 kanji and maybe can read a few thousand kanji words out of the 20k+ combinations that could appear in manga or novels etc. And I also totally agree with the kanji kentei order since that's the same order as Japanese children would learn at schools.

I did the Heisig method originally, it took me a year to learn all of them. I did it on weekends, lunch breaks, etc. I always had the book with me the entire time. I think it really helped. I can understand a lotttt of words just based on the kanji but ultimately I agree that that time would have been better spent on reading and vocabulary. And yes, I bought and started part 2 "Reading the Kanji" and ultimately realized it was more trouble than it was worth.

Thank you so much you have helped me so much!❤

I just found your video 1 minite into it you had me laughing what great personality and teacher !

It's a good approach. It basically combines what the other systems mentioned do, but expedited and makes up for what's missing in any other singular approach. I think for me, the best way would be to do this process once and go through about 2000 kanji this way right from the get to, in 24 days or so as you said, and then not worry too much about reviewing them while just doing your SRS of choice. I personally really like wanikani, because it made it very easy to cement a kanji and really deeply understand it more than writing or just straight up immersing alone ever did, but as I got better and higher up in the levels, when there was a kanji I encountered, I basically found that using your process was what I'd do and then just add it to anki and forget about it and naturally learn it as time went on while immersing/doing SRS. Without wanikani though, I wouldn't have gotten used to the radicals of kanji or being able to break them down and infer them and make up story mnemonics for them nearly as easily. I will mention too, while doing wanikani, I also still did anki and immersed, I just didn't assume I would learn the kanji that well until I saw it in wanikani or they just magically stuck eventually. Which for me, that's how it went. Now when I see a new (and at this point rare kanji) what I basically do is wanikani's radical decomposition and mnemonic method, and then I write it by hand once just as you mentioned, then I just remember them as I see it more. I had to learn about 1000-1500 kanji or so fairly well through wanikani though to make this feel less frustrating, as by then I could get through most things okay enough to not feel too bogged down. Now I can just kinda remember kanji eventually by doing this without much effort. At the start, it felt too rote and too hard to enjoy native content, and wanikani really helped bridge that gap and make me kanji really well. The way wanikani does SRS feels effortless to me and the intervals are much better and more straightforward than anki for solidifying memory. I would find that once a kanji or word showed up in my wanikani list, within the first few days or week I'd pretty much feel like I knew it any time I saw it in the wild, even when I was starting. When I was starting, it felt like no matter what I did kanji didn't stick. When I was a kid, just writing them 10 or so times was enough to remember, but not as an adult getting back into it. For me, without wanikani it would have taken me a lot longer for my brain to get used to just picking up new kanji. Wanikani is slow to start, but I think it makes the process of learning how to really feel kanji much smoother in the long run and didn't feel like much effort, but it should be done alongside methods like yours I think. If I had to go back, I would have at least written the kanji one time each just so I'd see and remember some of the joyo kanji at least once, doing like 20-50 a day, and not trying to actively remember them, and then done my SRS as normal. I think that has a bigger impact than it feels like for priming your brain to just "absorb" them easier when you start seeing them as you immerse and review.

I am currently about ~500 Kanji in. I find the best way is through SSRS via anki. I do the Moe Way Tango series for N5 and N4 and it seems to be doing wonders. This was about 2 months of consistent study. Best of luck everyone.

this helped me so much 😃

Aware this is an old video but I just wanted to say that "はははは" got an instant subscribe from me. Well done.

I personally just learn kanji as i come across them in vocab which i come across in sentences, i dont learn all of the individual readings. So i basically learn the meaning, stroke order, and the reading for certain vocab. I was hoping id eventually pick up a pattern to how theyre read based on future exposure to it in different sentences. Ive been worried that this will hold me back and that i will regret it cause everyone else seems so focused on the readings. I basically learn each kanji as a vocab word. It kinda sounds like how you said youd do it if you started over so this has been a huge relief for me❤ the only thing im not doing is learning based on a list. My textbook teaches situational phrases (like asking directions or ordering food, its meant to teach you japanese needed as a tourist) so ive been focusing on those first lol i think using a list as a guide is a great idea so you can get to reading faster! :) love this advice!

Also I think that paying attentions to the individual kanji readings becomes a worthwhile thing to do when you start encountering multiple words with the same kanji and reading.

25:26 I started to be suspicious about the fact that I should write ✍️ down hiragana and katakana in order to learn both of them. I didn't knew why write hiragana and katakana on a traditional paper was helping me. Well thanks 🙏!! Now I know why. It's like a magic. Before I was stuck 2 years trying to learn hiragana and katakana, over and over with my smartphone and never, never keep on my head.

Great video Andy I definitely like this method!! Especially if you have a Japanese 3DS you could play the kanken game as soon as you complete a level!!

I've studied Japanese 15 years ago. I've forgotten almost all of my kanji, and I have a really hard time digging them up again. It seems harder than the first time (which makes no sense to me, but oh well, my brain decided to get old it seems). I personally never enjoyed the Genki books. But I'm very interested in your Anki Deck. Will you sell it separately at some point? Everything has become a subscription model these days, I'm beginning to develop a phobia.

I personally find that learning kanji out of context is quite useless. Thus, I have tried Heisig‘s method in the past and didn’t really like it, especially, since the meanings and readings are done separately. However, I can recommend the series Practical Kanji. Each lesson starts with a single page where a guy has as a specific problem that is especially common in our everyday‘s life. For example, the first lesson deals with numbers, so that you will be able to read meal prices in restaurants and telephone numbers on business cards. Exercises include reading, writing and listening. The 2nd lesson is about time and days of the week and introduces new kanji, but in addition uses the older ones for repetition. Furthermore, you don’t learn every reading from the start, but only those which are important for the story of each individual lesson. These books helped me a lot.

ありがとう！めっちゃ便利です

Couldn't agree more. I'm at 600 kanji in Wanikani and almost finished with Genki I. Right now I'm enjoying Japan as a tourist much more than I would without it. Speaking in infinitives or messing up grammar is cute...but then I impress people by knowing how to read stuff like 新宿駅 :D

My method similar - I use "Kanji Look and Learn" which is published with the Genki Books and when I learn a new Kanji I always look for radicals and previously learned parts and use that to help me memorise it, The book has pictures and mnemonic devices which help, but sometimes I imagine my own things to memorise it.

so Andy is doing things the same way I've naturally started doing after doing so many kanji from Heisig lol. Do a little of Heisig while reading stuff on the side: manga if you're starting out, novels if you need those elusive kanji to show up. Easy Peazy

Don’t even get me started on trying to figure out name reading. I saw a name the other day… It was 風花風花. How do you read this? Fuuka Kazabana, obviously. How is this even fair? 🤦‍♂️ I realize I’m still on my journey to learn the language but come on. XD It made me realize why characters in manga/anime always place so much emphasis on introductions. Because you’d never be able to figure out the name unless someone tells you…

庭には二羽鶏がいった this sentence single-handedly proves why we need kanji i think lol and also i love reading kanji so i wouldnt want it to disappear.

I clicked in this video because I learned that difficult kanji of the "cover" of the video 4 days ago hahah I felt so happy with myself that I could identify its meaning

I used to think that Kanji was useless. Now that know how to read kanji, I realise that it makes the entire language 500 times easier to read.

I can confirm after watching several game shows on kanji, learning it by taking it apart is the equivalent of learning latin roots or word origins (spelling bee style) to both spell the word and define the word. Like understanding kanji beyond the common words is the equivalent of just being a linguist. I think some thing like gasoline or octopus doesn't use the kanji symbol in everyday use, but it does exist and most people dont know it

I use WaniKani, but I use Tsurukame to filter out the kana vocabulary. I read the common word combinations and example sentences then if I am having trouble remembering them I look that word up through Immersion kit. I’m not practicing handwriting right now, but I know when Shujinkou comes out they will have handwriting practice on the switch. I do want to find a kanji practice notebook where I can trace over the kanji 7 times instead of 2-3 times to get some more extra practice. That would be great to have along with practicing the writing on the switch when playing Shujinkou once that game releases. ❤️

As someone who is currently learning Japanese this was my experience: Japan uses 3 alphabets (4 if we count Romaji but that's basically just using the roman alphabet to represent kana). Two of those alphabets (hiragana and katakana) are phonetic alphabets which are basically identical to each other in terms of syllables. Hiragana are used for classic Japanese while katakana are used for loan words so there are certain unique rules for katakana in how the characters can be combined to produce sounds but there is really nothing preventing people from applying the same rules to hiragana to create the same result. Which means at least one of the alphabets could be obsolete. But alas... so Hiragana and Katakana each have 46 characters (48 if we count the characters for "we" and "wi") already almost double that of the roman letters. But then you notice that there are quite a few sounds the Japanese alphabets simply isn't capable of creating (hence the special rules for combining katakana characters to create sounds but even those aren't enough. Especially words ending in consonants isn't something that really exists in Japanese except for n). So they already use way more characters per alphabet while achieving less but then have 2 basically identical alphabets with different characters (except for "he"). If we count all the special rules and ways in which the characters can be used and combined (ya yu yo, small tsu, etc) we are talking way over 200 syllables. And that's JUST the phonetic alphabets. Then come the characters of Chinese origin: The kanji, which basically stand for entire words and concepts (and sometimes have their hiragana counterparts written next to them because even some Japanese people don't know how to read/pronounce the kanji). Which include roughly 10.000 characters. Yes there are "only" about 2200 characters in common use but more are added over time. In the last century there was a movement to get rid of kanji altogether and the first step was to introduce the tōyō kanji list which included "only" 1850 kanji. But this list has since been expended to the jōyō kanji list with over 2000 and more have been added since to make it over 2200. And with media and authors using more of the "unused" kanji more and more are getting back on the "in common use" list. I just wonder: WHY? Already with just the phonetic alphabets Japanese learners (both native speaking children and foreigners have to learn 92 characters and over 200 syllables (while being able to produce less sounds/syllables than westerners with under 30 character alphabets). But then on top a 2200+ kanji list? I love the japanese culture and language. In my opinion it's the most beautiful language in the world. But it's written form gives me a headache. So I ask: Just why?

While the video for a moment dissuades the way Genki teaches kanji, and I would mostly agree if one were to only use the textbook (and workbook); I will say that the way Genki teaches Kanji is massively improved if one uses the mobile app that accompanies the book's Kanji writings. For 6 dollar or so, this app helps you memorise the most common readings by teaching you common vocabulary words. Personally I put all the assignments of the app into Anki so that I can learn them as part of a SRS - which I find to work better. What is especially great about the readings you're taught through this app, is that you're kind of "primed" for vocabulary words that will appear in the next few chapters. Having already seen and practiced them, it'll be much easier to memorise them as part of the chapter's vocabulary list; especially since you'll be using the word a lot then. Supplementary, when the app asks "Do you know the missing kanji?", I always make an effort to write the kanji on my hand or preferably on paper. I added the stroke order to my Anki flashcards too to check if I wrote them correctly. This way, I find that by the end of the chapter, the kanji are utterly hewed into stone. I easily memorise and can easily recognise them even in words I don't know yet, and often find myself already capable of reading them or guessing the meaning. That's the method that works for me. tl;dr: I think Genki's teaching method is great IF you use the app; without the app (just using the back of the textbook) it falls apart. But I think Genki falls apart anyway unless you embrace the complete teaching method of the book. Textbook, workbook, and apps all in unison. Reading, writing, listening, and speaking.

Hi! Thank you very much for your amazing videos that you create! I am curious about one thing - could you please share which kind of brush and paint are you using for the Caligraphy?

12:13 - The kanji for "liberty". From liberty sprout all other great things to do in life. A watering can with two trees represents that fact that liberty has to be nurtured and cultivated by every generation so as not to die off. If it is taken care of properly, then it can sprout new possibilities. Under this is the base of liberty, represented by the American flag. What a great kanji! (Okay, it actually means "depression" in Japanese, but still, it's cool.)

Kanji has a higher information density - and it’s faster to read with Kanji once you know them. I love it!

日本人だけど最近はペンで字を書く機会が少ないので漢字は読めるけど書こうとすると思い出せないことが多い。漢字はもちろん便利だけど使いこなすのは難しいよね。

i usually learn the radicals first, then try to make up a memorizing sentence for each kanji using the meaning of its radicals

You’re doing god’s work here. Thank you very much

I go to SJSU and am about to do a study abroad next semester. Its almost like you knew. ありがとう

Me, a mandarin learner crawling my way into learning thousands of hanzi and watching this video to help my motivation: thank you sir ❤😂

I love how the kanji in the thumbnail means depression

Love it! Kanji ABSOLUTELY necessary if you want to succeed in Japanese

習字で書かれる字がとてもきれいですね。

I couldn't agree more with you @ 3:25, so much different readings among each of kun and on'yomi, and I must say I laughed so hard when I saw the "meme" of the vehicle bursting "TA NA BA TA" out of nowhere x) Nonetheless, let's get back at Kanji studying ;)

I like learning kanji in order of radicals/ complexity, since it gives a natural progression of complexity. I don’t want to take the JLPT, so the levels are at most a difficulty rating for me. Regarding the problem where I can’t start reading yet because I don’t know some common words due to the kanji being more complex: If you use a site like Satori Reader, that eliminates the problem because you can display Furigana according to your kanji knowledge.

its true, i learn kanji by memorizing the each kanji's word then break it down by comparing it to other word that use kanji for Kun-On yomi. i've been stuck nowhere for almost 2 years by following genki or learning from repetition and remembering Kun-On yomi. cause i ended up will forgetting it.

I love Kanji. Learning Japanese is fun to me. ^^ (I try to remember it like a picture or something that I see that makes me remember what it means.) It's hard to write, but I'd rather have it over Hiragana or Katakana. But definitely not get rid of Hiragana or Katakana those are very useful too. 8:26 😂 I like how 4 and the above are written tho I'm saddened by the fact that four (shi or yon) is like the same sound meaning the Japanese word for death "shi" and it's why 4 is considered a bad luck number. 😢

Andy and Yuki, i love you. That is all. Invaluable

interesting approach. i came back to learning japanese about a month ago, and was on a level where I had to start over completely. I picked an anki core2k deck with audio and example sentences for learning kanji and it worked great. Actually still works fine. But I just lowered my "new" daily cards, because for some kanji I have some problems differentiating them. I planned to the spare time to get some reading practice with manga, but maybe I'll try your course instead for at least N5. Maybe it helps me to recognize kanji and differentiate similar ones better.

Thank you! This is very helpful! I kinda got stuck after Hiragana and Katagana. I am using Wani Kani but I kind don’t like the system of the site, so I’ve been at a standstill. 😅 This helps a lot.