LogFAQs > #905110098

@YonicBoom posted...

I reckon it's possible to learn all the Jouyou Kanji as fast as 3 months if you are super hardcore, but in a more natural way (through learning vocabulary) it would probably take 6 months to a year depending on how much you read.

That's what I did (the three month thing) it's really not for everybody but since I already wanted to learn how to write all the I did it and it's now helping me a lot when it comes to learning words that have said kanji in them.

Even though writing them by hand is not necessary at all it really does help a lot when it comes to memorization. Once one gets accustomed to how kanji work it all gets really easy and it's all a matter of actually putting in the time and effort to learn the ones you actually need.

For some reason the different readings of the kanji was never a problem for me, I tell people to imagine them as some root words in English. Take the prefixes hydro-, aqua- and water-, they both originate in different languages but that's not the point, the point is that they mean the same thing, water. Now let's look at some words:

- Hydrophobia
- Aquatic
- Watersports
- Hydroplane
- Aquarium
- Waterfall

Now replace said prefixes with a cool symbol that kinda tells you what the character represents, in Japanese that cool symbol would be the kanji.

phobia
tic
sports
plane
rium
fall

As weird as that explanation is, it seems to tick for people who have trouble with kanji when I explain it to them :P
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Chez moi, il fait beau.