All through 2008 I was experiencing burn out, mainly because I really wanted to study Japanese my own way but had to do it the University way. Now that I’m out of university, it means that I can do it my own way but no longer have the push that I absolutely have to get something done. So in a way, I can’t have it all, dammit!

So while my start to this year hasn’t been filled with as much Japanese study as I could have done, I’m making more of an effort now. Here’s some of the things I’ve been up to in Feb:

Anki, Remembering the Kanji and 2001 Kanji Odyssey

Currently I have 755 cards in my Anki deck, with 45% of the “mature” cards.

In Japanese at the moment my main aim is to be able to read. Even in English my reading and writing ability are stronger than my speaking ability. I am much more articulate in writing! I love to read, and what I really want to be able to do is read my manga collection with relative ease.

In manga, because of the relatively short dialogue, I am sure I know most of the grammar, but my biggest weaknesses are kanji and vocabulary. Eventually I want to move on to big thick novels.

I’ve decided I’m going to attack this with Remembering the Kanji and 2001 Kanji Odyssey, using Anki. What I am doing is going full speed at RtK, until I get bored of it, then I will study KO. I do reviews of both in the one Anki deck, but take turns in actively studying whatever I feel like it out of the two. I think I’m making good progress.

I don’t mind so much now about powering through RtK. Originally I wanted to just go through RtK as quickly as I could and get onto other things. It wasn’t working for me, which is why I’ve changed to this approach. With RtK, I do find it is the best way for me to learn how to write the kanji, plus a basic keyword which does come in handy when reading, as I can sometimes guess what a word is from a keyword.

However, while I really want to write the Kanji, perhaps a bigger concern for me at the moment is actually reading/knowing words. I’m really excited about KO as it provides what a lot of Kanji guides have PLUS three sentences for each Kanji. I find that when I’m using a SRS program, I do learn better with sentences vs just words. So this is great.

The first book is 555 kanji, and if I’m persistent (and don’t revert back to RtK or move on to something else… which is highly probable) I could finish it by my birthday in April easily.

If I was still in university it would still be another month away before it starts up again and before I would be actively studying. But that is no excuse now, as I’m out of university (actually… going to edufire reminds me of university, which is prob why I like it so much – all the stuff of university without assignments!!). What I need is to ship shape myself into action! I really have been slack.

So today I flicked through the text book and I’ve been working through what has built up in anki… If I clear out my deck tonight I want to add in a few more sentences from 2001 Kanji Odyssey – I’ve decided that I can’t do RtK on it’s own, I lose steam. So instead I’ve been alternating, depending on how I feel. Sometimes I’ll add KO to my deck, sometimes I’ll add RtK.

I’ve also decided that things like textbooks, manga that I read, etc etc. I’m not adding those sentences to Anki. Instead, I’ll just read them where they are. I’ve done the “sentence” thing and I got bored of it. OK, Yes, that’s what I’m doing with KO, I feel that would be the best way for me to study that book. But for manga, I don’t want to rip it to pieces. I want to enjoy it. So, if I really want to learn something from it, I will seek out the word/whatever in a different form.

So, fingers crossed that I can push myself to and over the intermediate level of Japanese.