Drawing Kanji and Vocabulary

Ahhhh ok!!! I get it! You mean lessons:
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I always pictured it as the ‘pink square’, never paid attention that it was written ‘lesson’ underneath, my bad.

Ah I never noticed that. Gotcha.

Oh I always do all of them right away, I thought everyone else did.

A ‘lesson’ here is essentially just a new element, whether it is a radical, kanji or vocabulary. Just to clarify in my head what you mean.

Ok, yes, it’s clear now. Thanks for clearing up the confusion on my part. The person who made it through all of the lessons in one year mentioned that 'you need the re-order script but it’s not true. You don’t need the script provided you clear everything as it comes up.

In other news, for those who had doubts about the drawings, I got all of them on the first pass (where I’d miss some of them at first pass before). I missed ‘express’ because I didn’t draw anything for it and ‘discuss’ because I put ‘conversation’ instead.

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cheers.
by the way, do you learn the stroke order for the kanji while drawing your images, or is it a pure memorization tactic?
pretty cool either way

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Hi!
I learned stroke order when I was studying Chinese a few years before I started Japanese so I mostly focus on the drawings. Honestly, I see the drawings in my head when I review and I very seldom miss. Much more efficient than rote for me anyway.

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Day 2:
Is this day 2 or 3? I’m not sure! Anyhow started level 10 radicals today as I’ve covered all of the content of level 9 already.


(shoot, just noticed I forgot to put the dynamite radical:
丙)

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Day 3: Level 10 Preview
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Time for some mistake analysis as I haven’t done any for a little while now.

付近「ふきん」So the issue with ‘neighborhood’ is not the meaning, it’s the reading. I’m used to 付 to be read as つ. As it turns out the on’yomi for this word is ふ, not つ. It’s weird as most of the time the kun’yomi of 付 is used even in compound nouns as far as I can remember.

番組「ばんぐみ」program. I decided to put this one up there because of the meaning of ‘program’. Here program is in the sense of something on TV if I check the sample sentences provided. Also, this one is a rendaku which makes it slightly more challenging to remember. Finally, I don’t watch series of TV so maybe my brain is less enticed to remember that word as well.

投手「とうしゅ」pitcher. The reason why I get this one wrong is because of 手 being read しゅ instead of the usual て. The kun’yomi for ‘hand’ seems a lot more frequently used than the on’yomi based on what I’ve been exposed to so far.

Apart from that there’s also 私自身, ‘personally’. There’s another word at level 9 with 私 but instead of being read わたし it’s read し. I don’t remember the word from the top of my head however. Anyways, whenever I’m shown 私自身 and the other word, I’m uncertain if I should used わたし or し.

Once I reach level 10, I’m considering writing a Japanese blog or at least writing in Japanese to consolidate what I’ve learned and produce output. I’m reluctant because I’d need to have my writing double-checked before showing it to Japanese people so that what I write can be understood.

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Day 4: Wani Kani Video Game

Some progress as I made way from 0 to 20 kanji. Pope isn’t finished because I made a typo. The full set of kanji is unlocked. As far as I can tell, I’ve got all the kanji for level 9 memorized so it’s just repetition until I reach level 10.

I tried to draw the five kanji characters as quickly as possible so that I could come up with some video game designs to learn Japanese using WK characters and vocabulary.

Design 1 is too boring and would get repetitive real quick. Design 2 is more interesting to me but also limited in scope. The idea would be to progress through a labyrinth by clearing vocabulary nodes until you reach a target, a durtle.

What happens then I don’t know. I was thinking that food goes down as you progress through nodes and use up your food supplies, same thing as you get the wrong answer.

So I’m not impressed or enthusiastic about the ideas I’ve had so far, nothing I’d feel like pursuing in its current state. But hey, good ideas don’t just appear overnight most of the time. They need to be refined, polished, clarified etc…

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Zizka, you make games too? :smiley: That’s awesome! I love educational games lol, I’ve been trying to think up interesting mechanics for tackling grammar lately - it looks like a few people are interested in doing that kind of stuff!

Lemme know if you ever wanna collab on the execution! I’ve used almost every popular engine! ☆⌒(ゝ。∂)

I know other people have said so already, but I love seeing your kanji drawings! You’re so good at expression and characterization! AND LINE WEIGHT, omg, that’s like the hardest part of art for me xD That probably adds to your art being so lively!

It makes your art so fun to look at! And the way you draw them is totally reminiscent of the logographic origin of kanji, too!

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Day 5: More concepts and designs.

Thank you for the kind words! I have yet to design a concept yet so it’s still early to seek collaboration but I’m not closed to the idea :+1:

Different designs for Crabigator but with pixel art this time:
Alligator01 Alligator02 Alligator03 Alligator04
V.1 V.2 V.3 V.4

Walking animation first pass:
Walking

Some durtle designs:
durtle
durtle2
durtle3
durtle4

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Day 6: Mistake analysis
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Yup, it’s that time again to look back on problematic elements.

保つ「たもつ」I have trouble remembering the kun’yomi for that verb, たも. It’s the first time I’ve ever encountered たも so that might be part of it. The mnemonic provided here it ‘tamots’ which is a type of tomato. So the idea here is to preserve the ‘tamo’. There’s a risk to remember this as ‘toma’ as in tomatoes.

対談「たいだん」My issue with this one is that ‘conversation’ is the right answer but I type in ‘discussion’. As far as I’m concerned they’re fairly identical so this one is moot and not really a problem.

表す「あらわす」to express, the verb. To express that you ‘are a wuss’ is a good mnemonic. I’m starting to get this one actually but it’s still part of my troublesome words.

表「おもて」another reading for this kanji. This one doesn’t have anything to do with ‘expressing’ something however as it’s related to the surface or front of something. ‘Oh motel’ should allow me to remember this one as well. I just didn’t take the time to make a mnemonic. Sometimes I want to plough through and don’t want to bother reading the mnemonics but in the end it comes back to bite me in the you-know-what.

交わる「まじわる」The issue with this one is that it in joins with ‘to mix’ and ‘to be mixed’ so it’s starting to be a lot of mixing going on. This one means ‘to intersect’.

In other news, I didn’t draw today as I’m too far ahead in level 10 already and I probably still have two days left at level 9.

Worked on WK video game instead:

Walking_2
New Walking Animation

durtleWalk
Walking animation for durtle and new design with bigger head.

Mockup
A mockup concept.

The idea is similar to pacman. In order to move from node to node, you need to type the correct kanji in the circle. Failing to do so imposes a cooldown before you can try again. Meanwhile the durtle is trying to catch you. The goal is pick up the coins and reach the car to move on to the next level. Still very rough. What do you guys think, like honestly?

coinop
Bouncing coin to pick up.

Not sure, not sure!

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Day 7: Back to Drawing
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Aw come on now, if we don’t get an interaction going about the game I won’t be able to pull it off on my own :hot_face:.

Anyhow, as it stands, I’ve covered both radicals and kanjis for level 10. I won’t be doing any drawing until level 10 is finished as I’m already way ahead.

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I really like your drawing style

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Why thank you sir or madam.

Day 1 & 2: Level 10 started yesterday

So I’ve started working on level 10. Interestingly, there actually were some kanji I had not covered in my drawings ahead of time which came back to bite me in the ass. I’ve got the radicals covered. So better nip those mistakes in the bud before moving forward:

転「てん」So I had not studied this one ahead of time so I missed it. This one means ‘revolve’ and is composed of the radicals of ‘car’ and ‘cloud’. てん is the reading and the mnemonics mean ‘ten’, as in ten times. So you revolve around the cloud with your car because it’s too hard to see to go through. You need to revolve ten times around the cloud before going through. Going around ten times probably dissipates the cloud bit.

I missed 聞 because I typed ‘listen’ instead of ‘hear’ but other than that I have this one synched.

運 I knew this one to mean ‘carry’, ‘car’, ‘forehead’ and ‘scooter’. The mnemonic about the umbrella doesn’t stick with me so I’ll need to find another one for うん. I’ll spend more time and energy on this one if I miss it again.

横 I missed all the way. It means ‘side’ (I put in ‘angle’). It’s composed of ‘tree’ and ‘yellow’. The side of the yellow tree is marked. ‘Yoko’ is the person who marked the tree. Again, unsure if this will stick, just like うん for ‘carry’.

最「さい」 ‘most’. I knew this one from Chinese. It’s the reading I couldn’t remember. A cyborg is mostly machine.

So that’s five mistakes on the first kanji pass and no mistakes for the radicals. I don’t know if those five mistakes will postpone my next level up by a day but that’s fine, no big deal. Level 10 has 34 kanjis which is three less than level 9.

There are some vocabulary words I’m having trouble with as well since I was exposed to a whole new batch when I leveled up but my priority at the moment is to focus on those five kanjis I missed and getting them right. I didn’t do any drawings and they didn’t prime them so this is why I missed them.

部室・ぶしつ. Clubroom.
So the issue with that word is that I’m not motivated to learn it, no drive at all. It’s so niche. So that’s part of it.

Another problem is the reading of the word. My first instinct is always ‘ぶんしつ’ which is not accurate.

So I was under the impression that one possible reading of 部 was ぶん but as it turns out I was mistaken. It’s either ぶ or へ. So it’s really simply 部室「ぶ・しつ」. Club room is something unusual where I live but a lot more common in Japan from my time over there.

実験「じっけん」experiment. So this one is a trap because it’s one of those situations where the pronunciation changes as it’s a compound noun. Apart from that, ‘a test which tries to find the truth is an experiment’. That should stick. Again, I cruise through all of the lessons on the first day so I don’t always take time to memorize the word correctly.

近所「きんじょ」 ‘neighborhood’ is another trip because しょswitches to じょ.

台所「だいどころ」kitchen. The problem is that this one too changes reading from ところ to どころ.

So that’s a lot of content. Level 10 has been the most daring for me so far. Lots of words which change reading due to being compound nouns: 台所;近所;実験;

Whether or not I’ll assimilate these mistakes will depend on how much time I study each one individually.

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Day 3: Level 11 Radicals
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I missed ‘end’ due to not paying attention. Not too dramatic as I don’t need 100% of the kanjis.

Since I finished covering both radicals and kanjis for level 10, I move on to level 11. I don’t want to be caught off guard when I reach level 11. I want to have previewed everything at level 11 before getting to it.

There are 38 kanjis at level 11. I should have about 5 days before level 11, which means 5 kankis x 5 (5 kanjis a day). The 38 kanjis won’t be unlocked at once though so if I cover the first set of kanjis, I’ll be ready for level 11.

Kanjis take longer as I need to memorize readings and meanings.

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I feel like you’re probably going to catch up to me before long - do you take all the lessons as they come? It usually ends up taking me a day or two after leveling up to get through previous level vocab at a rate of about 20 things a day (combining this with anki stuff so I don’t want to take on too much at once)

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(taking a bit of advance, felt like drawing today).

Well, it depends on how long you usually take to finish a level. I don’t touch Anki and solely focus on WK. I deal with all the lessons as soon as I level up. I’ve found that dealing with around 200+ reviews/lessons is still bearable to me. I’ve found that my study has increased quite a bit since level 10 as I’m not burning anything but I’m holding on at the moment.

I’m considering Bunpro or starting to write my own Japanese blog as well. Haven’t decided on which one I’ll end up doing just yet. (I mean Hello Talk for the blog).

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Usually it’s the fastest I can go outside of that lead-in of vocab (which takes like two days or so), since I tend to cover the radicals in one go, then while those are getting up to Guru I cover the first batch of unlocked kanji, and then when the radicals pop I cover the rest of the kanji

I couldn’t imagine dealing with all the reviews from doing all the lessons at once and trying to keep up with any sort of reading/listening practice (which I’m doing and grabbing vocab from to go into Anki) and looking at grammar (which I’m doing less of now that I have enough of a base of grammar to read the basic stuff (and I’ll look up the more advanced stuff as I go). For reference though, I still haven’t reached my first burn - it takes a long time for those reviews to pop up. I’m sure they’ll start happening soon though

I definitely think if you haven’t started on grammar, it’s worth dong so sooner than later - it can help a lot with WK with regards to things like transititve/intransitive verbs, vocab items that include particles (stuff like 口にいる), etc, and gets you to a point where you can do reading which is a great way of consolidating vocab you know and picking up new stuff to learn

My personal preference when it comes to grammar is just reading through a guide (preferably using multiple sources for topics if you can) and then reading and looking up whatever you’ve forgotten or bits you don’t know. For me bunpro just wasn’t really that much of an extra help because reading provides natural repetitions of grammar (and grammar is generally something that’s going to be more repetitive than vocab)

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Day 4: Hello Talk!

I’ve set up my ‘Hello talk’ account and started chatting with a Japanese woman this morning. I could understand what she wrote so that was quite fun. Conversation wasn’t very interesting but I guess that’s on par with talking with a stranger the first time.

I’m thinking of having a contest based on my drawings. Almost all of the characters are from various TV shows or cartoons but some of them are not well known. I’d be curious if people can spot the various sources. Some of them are from South America or England and sort of hidden gems.

I haven’t been doing much of anything besides WK for the last few months. I want to set time aside for Hello Talk and blogging in Japanese.

I actually have an ‘extensive’ background with the language. I went to Japan and before I left I was trying to memorize 80 words a day (with mediocre success!). I have read Tae Kim’s guide and bought both Beginner and Intermediate Japanese Dictionaries. I’d say I’m at N4. I have done a lot of exercises with particles and progressed through the Genki books.

I’ve also invested a lot of time with DuoLingo which is how I ended up moving to WK (DuoLingo is mediocre). It shows that competition isn’t very strong when it comes to Japanese learning which explains the resounding success of WK. In this case, I think WK’s success is well deserved however.

I’d like to write Japanese blog entries here before putting them up on ‘Hello Talk’ but my concern is that the blog isn’t read by enough people to get frequent feedback about my written mistakes.

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Day 5: First Audio Sentence
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I talked in Japanese to a Japanese woman this morning. Hello Talk is pretty cool so far!

I’ve cleared all the radicals and all the kanjis are unlocked for level 11. I should be ok to finsh the level, I know all of them.


The radicals for lesson 11 are done and I’m more than 50% through the kanjis for level 11.

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Day 6: 発表!

I might end up posting my daily kanjis on Hello Talk! We’ll see. Still at level 10 at the moment although the end is near.

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I’ve decided to stop my blog here and will continue on Hello Talk. There’s not much interaction here and besides I’ll feedback on my written Japanese.

Also, I’ve decided to space out my levels. It was manageable before level 10 but I’m going too fast and the content is piling up. I went from waking up to a review of less than a hundred to close to 200. I can’t stand leaving things unfinished so I clear each stack but it’s getting too time consuming. 7 days per level is so fast I don’t even have time to use the new vocabulary as I’m already exposed to new one. I think 8 days will be better until I start burning stuff anyway. There are also some leeches I want to study and understand to clear them so this takes time too.

Thanks for all the support!
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