Do you have any musical ways of remembering the kanji or vocabulary, their meanings or their pronunciations? This really helps me to retain them in my memory.
For example, I remember the pronunciation for 先回り by singing it to the tune of
Carly Simon’s 1970’s hit ‘Anticipation.’ SAH-KEE-MAH-WAH-REE…
(Yes, I am that old lol)
Hello,
For 心 i sing the dutch children song “papa gaai ging fietsen” and replace papagaai by kokoro.
This has helped and hindered me - for 並列 there’s the Cockroaches’ “Hei, retsu go! retsu go retsu go - In a row, In a row In a row”. Which it great for the vocab, but it stuffs me up for the individual kanji.
I know I’ve used songs in a few other places too. I’ll try to rememebr (they don’t pop up unless I see the Kanji).
In kind of a roundabout way, the “I’m in heaven” part from Tom Tom Club’s Genius of Love helps me with the meaning for 天才 (I sing that part in my head and remember the song title, otherwise I might want to add stuff (“heavenly genius”?) or confuse it for “god” or something)
I forgot to mention that I imagine totoro on a bike when i sing this
I don’t understand how to wite kanji with my japanese keyboard so I post an image:
Ko, little kyoto
Ko, little kyoto
In the past
In the past
Lies your private dirt
Lies your private dirt
Don’t forget
Don’t forget
Melody: frère Jacques / Are you sleeping
世
Saive the whole world with your saber (x3)
And this generation too, yo!
Song: we’ve got the whole world ín our hands
他
See your leader, alligata
Another while, crocotaile.
Not really musical and very bad but on the rhythm of see you later alligator
I had a lot of trouble with the reading on 馬力 until I began to sing:
Ba-riki you’re so fine, you’re so fine you blow my mind Ba-riki (clap clap clap)
If you’re a certain age, good luck getting that out of your head.
竹
“Papa panda take the bamboo”
Melody: la bamba: Para bailar La Bamba
In reference to Panda, go panda (Takahata, Miyazaki)
Police could sing, “TAIHO! TAIHO! Off to arrest we go!”
to the tune of, “Hi ho! Hi ho! It’s off to work we go!”
for the kanji in 逮捕 する meaning to arrest.
I remember 差す with “Shine on, さす harvest moon–up in the sky…
I ain’t had no loving since January, February, June or July…”
(with apologies to Kate Smith)