Remembering the Kanji

This is recommended by AJATT as your starting point. For those not aware, it refers to a book by James W. Heisig, Remembering the Kanji. The concept is quite simple, you learn the main meaning for each Kanji and tackle the readings later instead of getting bogged down trying to memorise too many things at once. The Kanji are also presented in an order suited to learning, where the simpler Kanji (to draw) are learned before more complicated ones which incorporate them. To aid the learning process, each Kanji is accompanied by a 'story' to help remember them.

At the time of writing I have memorised the meanings of 780 kanji with a 90% retention rate, so it certainly does work if you're motivated. The second book in the series covers the readings (pronunciations) of the kanji, but it's really not necessary. Instead of trying to learn all the different possible readings and the exceptions (e.g. proper names), you simply learn the pronunciations in context. For example, now (ima) 今　and this year (kotoshi) 今年. I have no idea what the readings for now (or year) are, but I know how to pronounce it in both of those examples simply by reading and hearing it in context.

The perfect companion to this is Reviewing the Kanji. It has an SRS* aimed specifically at practising your recall of the Kanji you have learned so far, but this can be done with any such tool (smart.fm, Anki). The biggest advantage of this site is the story submissions. There are many stories in Heisig's book which just don't sit well for me and aren't a great aid to memory. No matter! I can simply search or browse for that Kanji , and look up all the user submitted stories to see if one suits me better, or gives me ideas for my own stories. Also, since this is a site rather than a SRS program, I can access it any computer which is very convenient.

I mainly want to focus on the wealth of free resources available on the internet, so be aware it is not necessary for you to buy Heisig's book to benefit from the Reviewing the Kanji site. You will miss out on the stories and meanings for some primitive elements, but you will pick those up from the stories of the kanji that use them. You will also miss out on the stroke order diagrams, but you can find those here**. It will take longer, but it's the price you pay... for not paying a price. ;) You can however get a sample of the book here (right click, save as) with the first 276 kanji. Given that he stops giving full plots and just indicates the primitive elements at around 500, you might manage with the sample to get the feel of it, and come up with your own stories from then on.

A quick aside to also mention Kanji Damage. Personally I'm not fond of it as a learning tool as it bombards you with too much information, but it is a great reference. And it has some amusing phrases for helping you remember the meaning and onyomi of each Kanji.

Regardless of the tools you use, it's all about input at this stage. We want to learn to understand written Japanese, we don't need to know how to read out aloud at this stage.

* Will explain SRS in a later post.
** Actually, this is a rather handy site when you're not too sure which direction a stroke is written as it has animated diagrams. Bookmark it!