𝙎𝙏𝙐𝘿𝙔 𝙏𝙄𝙋𝙎 || How to learn Kanji - 5 ways to memorize Kanji

Hello everyone. Welcome to SS Japanese. I'm your Japanese teacher, Takina. Are you learning Japanese and struggling with kanji? Kanji is a Japanese writing system that uses Chinese symbols. There are thousands of kanji characters, so I know it's one of the hardest part of learning Japanese for any level of student. As a Japanese teacher, I want to erase my students' struggle as much as possible, and I want you to guys enjoy learning Japanese, so I decided to make this video, 5 ways to learn kanji efficiently. In this video, I will share 5 techniques to learn kanji not only efficient but also more enjoyable. I really hope this video helps you to learn kanji. All right, then let's get started. Soredewa, hajimemashou. First, let's talk about why learning kanji is so important when learning Japanese. Some people might think learning kanji is not that important, especially when their main focus is to improve their speaking skills. Yes, you will be able to say something in Japanese without knowing kanji, but I would say it's very difficult to be fluent in Japanese without knowing kanji. Kanji is not just for writing. It's the key to understand Japanese at a deeper level. In Japanese, there are many words that sound the same when it is written in hiragana, but they have totally different meanings. For example, the word kami could mean paper, Without kanji, it's hard to tell the difference and kanji helps to show the meaning clearly. Kanji also makes reading faster because you can recognize a word at a glance. For example, let's see this sentence. When it's written only in hiragana, we can tell that if it is asu, rusu, ban, ni, koi, which means I'm away tomorrow, come tonight, or asu, rusu, ban, ni, koi, come to house keeping tomorrow. But when it's written in kanji, we will know the meaning right away. So learning kanji is a big step toward becoming fluent in Japanese. Now, before telling you effective tips to learn kanji, let's talk about common kanji practice methods that you should avoid if you want to learn kanji faster and efficiently. Many people start by learning each kanji individually, like try to memorize each kanji stroke order and write each kanji again and again to memorize. I don't say it's wrong. It's actually what Japanese kids do at school. But as you can imagine, there are so many kanji characters in Japanese, so it takes so many times and you will feel boring for sure. And even if you memorize some kanji character with this method, if you don't know how to read and how to use kanji characters, then it's kind of pointless and it's hard to stick in your head as well. So those methods often lead to frustration and burnout. So I will teach you five smarter ways to master kanji. And before jumping into kanji practice method, let me remind you how important it is to mastering hiragana and katakana. Hiragana and katakana are Japanese alphabets and these are the foundation of Japanese language. Without knowing hiragana and katakana, you cannot read or pronounce kanji. So if you still don't know this Japanese alphabet, then please study this alphabet first and then learn kanji after that. Kanji characters are often composed of smaller components called bushu, radicals. They often have their own meanings, which help you guess the meaning of a kanji. So when you learn some basic radicals, it makes studying kanji much easier. For example, let's see this kanji. This kanji's radical is on the left side and it's called gonben. Gonben is a radical related to words and this kanji means language. Let's see other examples as well. Here are some kanji which have gonben. For example, hanasu means to speak, shi means poem, iiwake, excuse, nikki, diary, and yomu means to read. So as you can see, all of these kanji and these words are related to a language and word. Not all kanji follow the original radical meanings, so you cannot use this method all the time, but knowing some basic radicals would help you a lot to memorize kanji and to predict the meaning when you encounter kanjis that you have never seen before. The second tip is to learn kanji in context. Don't try to memorize single kanji without knowing how they are used. Instead, study kanji as part of words or sentences. For example, this kanji means to eat, but it's more helpful to remember as words like taberu or shokuhin. By doing this, you will remember not only this kanji, but also you can learn how to read it and at the same time you can increase your vocabulary. Besides, this method is easier than trying to memorize each kanji one by one. It's good to use textbooks or your favorite comics or books as study materials, but especially for beginners, I recommend to use textbooks like Genki or Minna no Nihongo. The words and kanji in the textbooks are suitable for your level, and you can learn from easy one to difficult one step by step. It's also good to use kanji learning app like Mochi Kanji Learn Japanese, who is kindly sponsoring this video. Mochi Kanji is a language learning app that focuses to remember and review kanji and words. From their vocabulary and kanji section, you can choose the course you want to study. There are so many courses like textbook-based courses, JLPT courses, and also there is a course specific for different industries, such as nursing and IT, which I think are very useful for people who work in these industries. With this app, you can learn kanji and vocabulary as if you were playing a game. There are flashcards with pictures and audio, quizzes, and you can practice writing as well. It's easier to forget if you just use textbook to study kanji, so it's good to use a foreign language learning app like Mochi Kanji as one of your study materials. Using Mochi Kanji is really good, especially when you are outside and you cannot actually practice writing in an outfit. Because Mochi Kanji offers kanji courses from N5 to N2 level, where you can practice writing kanji through each stroke order. With this app, you can learn vocabulary and kanji at the same time in a fun way yet effective. You can also search new kanji in their dictionary of Mochi Kanji and save it for review later. Another great way to remember kanji is to use pictures and stories. Not all kanji characters, but a lot of them are formed in the shape of objects, so if you know it, then it will be easier to remember. For example, this kanji is made from the shape of the sun, and this kanji is made from the shape of the moon. So then, can you guess the meaning of this kanji? This kanji is combined the sun and the moon, so you can imagine how bright it is when there is the sun and the moon together. So this kanji means bright. It's good to use your imagination to remember kanji. You can also create your own stories or draw pictures to match the kanji. The more creative or funny the story is, the easier it will be to remember. Making your own kanji notebooks or flashcards are one of the best ways to remember kanji. When you're making your kanji notebooks or flashcards, don't write everything you learn. Just write the ones you always forget and the ones that seems useful for you. And when you're making it, make sure to write reading, meaning, and the example sentence for each kanji. And just making your kanji notebooks or flashcards is not enough. The most important thing is to review it again and again. You can put it on a wall or somewhere you see it often. It's also good to use a flashcard app and use it whenever you have spare time. Repetition is the key, so review your notes or card every day, even just for five minutes. That's also why I think mochi kanji is good, which is the app I mentioned earlier. What makes it special is that it uses a technique called spaced repetition, an interval learning method. This app sends you reminders to review kanji or words right before you have about to forget them, so it's helping you remember more effectively over time. What's even better is that all your learned kanji are organized into five levels of memorization, from level 1 to level 5, and you can easily check the level of each word in the digital notebook. The higher the level, the less often the word will appear in your review lessons. This system is really useful, right? You can download mochi kanji app on Apple Store, Google Play, and their website. I will attach the link in the description box, so feel free to try it. My final tip is to study kanji a little bit, but every day. Don't try to study too much at once. Normally, most people are motivated in the beginning, so they tend to spend too much time to study kanji at once, but sadly, it doesn't last long and it's easier to forget. So let's set a small goal. For example, learning two or three kanji a day is good enough. Even if you are a really busy person, you can find time to study just two or three kanji every day, right? And it doesn't seem a lot, but after a year, you will know more than 1000 kanji. The key is to stay consistent, so use your spare time to practice and review kanji. All right, so those are my tips for learning kanji faster and efficiently. I hope you learned something new from this video. Remember that learning kanji doesn't have to be boring. With a light tool and method, you can learn kanji step by step and enjoy the process as well. As a fun learning tool, try to use MozuKanji app I introduced in this video. You can take some free trial lessons and see if it works for you or not. I will attach the link in the description box. And if you think this video was helpful, then please give it thumbs up and subscribe to my channel. It will motivate me a lot to create more content. And I have Instagram and TikTok, so please follow me. And if you want to learn Japanese more, then join my membership. In my membership, you will receive weekly homeworks, PDF study materials, and there are so many member-only benefits. Details are on my website, ss-japanese-sakina.com, or you can see the details for my description box as well. All right, so thank you very much for watching the video, and I hope to see you guys again soon. Saigo made mite kurete arigatou gozaimasu. Mata tsugi no video de aimashou. Bye bye.