Radicals: The Key to Learning Kanji

Hello everyone,

Alright, so a change of plans, it seems as though most people recommend learning the radicals first which will make learning the Kanji easier and I'm inclined to agree with them. Also, some radicals are Kanji in and of themselves so I'll be learning some Kanji at the same time!

So the plan is to learn every radical first, there's 214 (or so). Then start going through the Kanji. I'm hoping everyone is right and that this helps me learn Kanji more easily! I'm going to try and do at least 10 characters a day, preferably more, but 10 will be the minimum. So far, I basically I have the first 10 radicals down.

Nokanmuri!

Natsuyasumi (Summer Holidays) Kanji challenge! 1100 MINIMUM Kanji in 3 and a half months.

こんにち　は　みなさん、

夏休み　に　わたし　は　漢字　を　勉強　したい！

Hello everyone,

I'm going to be studying a lot of Kanji on the summer holidays!
I want to try and at least get through all the Kanji presented in 'The Key to Kanji' book which we have as a part of our course. There's 1100 in total, so far we should have learnt about 150 or so Kanji at Uni so far but, like many of my classmates, I probably only recognised about 10, if that, before today. I have about 3 and a half months before semester starts and want to make the most of my time.

Today I made a point of learning the Kanji for numbers 1-10 (I know, it's terrible I don't know this already after two semesters), 100, 1000, 10000. Making sure I am at least familiar with their stroke orders, normal sound in Japanese and their meanings. I'm trying to become familiar with each Kanji's kun and on readings as well as their radicals. I've heard knowing the radicals helps with learning any Kanji that use them. Obviosuly it's good to know everything about them but, the main thing I'm trying to achieve is to have good foundation of Kanji knowledge. Alright, alright, I'll go back and make sure I know all that. Fine.

Anyways, if anyone would like to join me in learning Kanji, and just Japanese in general, you're welcome to! If you would like to exchange comments in Japanese or even have a competition to see how fast we can learn a certain number of Kanji just let me know. It'll be motivating to know other people I interact with are out there doing this and knowing their's competition.

Here's the table I've made up so far, I'm planning to organise the Kanji I learn into groupings which I'll have printed out into a folder which will be useful for classes etc.

The numbers next to the radicals indicate the 'Kanxi' number.

一	音読み	イチ、　イツ
	訓読み	ひと（つ）　(X Things)
	部首	一　（１）

二	音読み	ニ
	訓読み	ふた（つ） 　(X Things)
	部首	二　（７）

三	音読み	サン
	訓読み	み、みつ、　みっつ　(X Things)
	部首	一　（１）

四	音読み	シ
	訓読み	よん、　よ、　よつ　(X Things)
	部首	囗 （３１）

五	音読み	ゴ、
	訓読み	いつ　(X Things)
	部首	二　（７）

六	音読み	ロク、　ロツ
	訓読み	むつ　(X Things)
	部首	八（１２）

七	音読み	シチ
	訓読み	なな、　ななつ　(X Things)
	部首	一　（１）

八	音読み	ハチ、　ハツ
	訓読み	やつ　(X Things)
	部首	八 （１２）

九	音読み	キュウ、　ク
	訓読み	ここの、　ここのつ　(X Things)
	部首	一　(乙, ⺄, 乚) （５）

十	音読み	ジュウ、　ジュツ
	訓読み	とお
	部首	十　（２４）

百	音読み	ヒャク、　ピャク、　ビャク
	訓読み
	部首	白　（１０６）

千	音読み	セン、　ゼン
	訓読み	ち
	部首	十　（２４）

万	音読み	マン、　パン
	訓読み	よろず
	部首	一　（１）

Semester 2 Week 2 Part B

Hello everyone,

Here is week two's second lesson. It's a little light on I'd say but here goes.

We mainly looked at the words for the days of the month and the months themselves.

So, let's look at an example of this.

Japanese: Watashi の tanjobi は roku gatsu futsuka * desu.
English: My birthday is on the 2nd of June.

Let's break down the sentence.
Watashi = I
の 'No' = Particle which turns the I into 'possessive' making it 'my'. So Watashi no = my
Tanjobi = Birthday
は 'Wa' = particle, marks the topic of the sentence. In this case, Birthday or "my birthday"
Roku = 6
Gatsu = The counter** for months
Futsuka = 2nd***, this is used for saying the 2nd day of the month.
Desu = Is/am/are etc. In this case it means 'Is'

* Here, if the number for the day of the month is over 10 you must place 'nichi' (the Kanji for nichi is 日). Nichi means 'Day'

**Counters - In the Japanese language, words called 'counters' are used for different things. There are counters for all sorts of things including months, people, general objects etc. So June in Japanese is known as Roku Gatsu (6 month)

***2nd - Another use for this is saying something like "I went to Brisbane for 2 days."

Days of the Month

1st	Tsuitachi	8th	Youka
2nd	Futsuka	9th	Kokonoka
3rd	Mikka	10th	Tooka
4th	Yokka	11th	Juuichi+nichi
5th	Itsuka	20th	Hatsuka
6th	Muika	14th	Juuyokka
7th	Nanoka	24th	Nijuuyokka

Here are what we call the 'irregular' days of the month. To say any day number not listed here we use the normal words for the Japanese numbers and add 日after. Examples....
'[number] + 日'
'Nijuuichi 日' = 21st
'Juusan 日' = 13th

Months
For the months themselves, we simple say the 'number' and add 'gatsu' after. Examples
Nichi Gatsu = January
Ni Gatsu = February
San Gatsu = March

Irregular months
NOTE: There are 3 months which are 'irregular'
When saying the 4th month, 7th month and 9th month we say...
4th month = Shi Gatsu
7th month = Shichi Gatsu
9th month = Ku Gatsu

Four & Seven - While we normally say Yon**** (4) and Nana**** (7) for the numbers 4 and 7. When saying the months we must use Shi and Shichi.

Nine - Normally nine is kyu however when saying the month we say Ku and drop the 'Y'

**** Japanese number system uses the what we call the Onyomi reading and the Kunyomi reading
Onyomi = The way of saying the number in Chinese
Kunyomi = The number in Japanese.
The Japanese for some reason mostly use the Chinese words (Onyomi) for numbers. However they do not use the Chinese words (Onyomi) in the cases of Shi (4) and Shichi (7) because they mean pain and death in Japanese so they prefer to use the Japanese (Kunyomi) words for 4 and 7 which is Yon and Nana. However, when saying the months, we must use the Chinese (Onyomi) words for 4 and 7 which is Shi and Shichi.

END
Well that's it for this week! I hope you found these lessons informative and useful.

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