For some reason, I can always retain the meaning of a kanji but the reading seems to be overwhelming me already and I don’t know why I can’t remember it.
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i see you !
you know what i like about the SRS system ? you can (and will have to) review things again and again and again in order to move on.
it’s probably boring to say this, but my advice is to trust the SRS and trust yourself. just by seeing it over and over and over you’ll start to recognize and remember things and won’t even know how or why it happened. at least this is true for me.
besides this, have you been visualizing the mnemonics ? i find the more time i spend with them, the better it sticks.
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Are you using the mnemonics? You might need to make your own or use a memory palace if WaniKani’s aren’t working well for you.
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Oh well I should probably do that lol. I usually look at the mnemonics once and then just skip it not trying to visualize it. And the srs is giving me some confidence in it since I have improved since making this post.
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Yeah, but I should probably start visualizing it to make it stick better.
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Hi, welcome to the Wanikani community!
I understand that it would be hard for you as beginner.
Please take a moment to relax yourself. After that please focus on your reviews.
Please pay attention to the menemonic story for those items that you’ve learned cause they will be your main comrade to remember kanjis. Make sure that you understand them and can imagine vividly what the story is about.
Learning will always be hard, especially with Wanikani when you are investing so much time and effort.
It would be a stream of up and down with a testify to your determination. So, please keep in mind that this will be a long journey. No need to be rush, pace yourself and spend time to read and remember all those mnemonic stories (most important are those of words that didn’t stick. You can even make your own story if you feel you’re having better one).
Final thing, please make sure to read through the on-board series for an overview of the product and SRS system:
Have fun Wanikani!
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Thank you, I struggle with getting impatient at the lessons and their mnemonics. I will keep it in my next time.
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yay ! take your time and がんばって！
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Welcome!
I struggled too so I have to go slower.
I also write everything out. It takes time of course.
I also need to make up my own mnemonics for it to stick better.
Don’t worry you are not alone.
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I will and ありがとうございます！
I might try the mnemonics thing as far as making up my own.
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Part of learning is learning how to learn. Kanji and their different readings and meanings and how that maps to different vocab, plus exceptions and whatnot, it’s all very foreign to English speakers and there isn’t any real equivalent for us. It’s only natural to just not get it at first. Over time you’ll naturally get a better understanding, and it’ll become easier to learn the individual kanji over time as well.
Also, everyone learns differently. If WaniKani’s mnemonics aren’t working for you, you’re welcome to think of your own ways to remember meanings and readings. If you’re not using any mnemonics, it’s going to be very hard to memorize them, especially as you do later levels and kanji start looking very, very similar to one another. Me personally, I come up with my own for almost all my new kanji. They can be as simple or as complicated as you want them to be. It helps to connect them to media or people you’re familiar with.
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Ok, thank you for the advice!
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Before I started using WaniKani, I did not think mnemonics would work. It seemed like a very round-about way to do things. But I gave it a try and, to my surprise, it worked! I think it is because my brain finds it easier to remember stories than random definitions or pronunciations. And when the little stories (mnemonics) are attached to the thing you want to remember, it helps to drag it into your memory. At first it will be consciously, but later automatically. I almost always use WaniKani’s mnemonics, but sometimes I make up my own.
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Thinking of a mnemonic that means something to me definitely works for me.
And if you’re getting muddled by the whole ‘onyomi’ ‘kunyomi’ thing - then I can recommend this video of Cure Dolly’s Japanese on-readings and kun-readings - making them work for you - YouTube
Soon, when you start getting new vocabulary that’s made up of two kanji, and you realise that you know what it means, and you even know how it’ll be pronounced - it’s a marvellous thing.
Keep on keeping on. And believe in the SRS and don’t worry about getting things wrong. Most people have to get things wrong to get the right thing stuck in their head (I think the people who race through levels and can answer everything correctly must have special powers unavailable to most of us - and lucky them).
It happens! Nobody goes into Wanikani knowing every answer right away. That’s why the SRS helps so much – you can focus less on the answers your confident in and more on the ones you’re not.
I know Wanikani doesn’t teach stroke order but when I reached Level 26, I did an experiment and wrote out the new kanji – just five times, not a whole page or anything – to add an additional muscle memory to the mnemonic. I found that it REALLY helped my retention. It’s good practice if you find you need a bit of tactical of a reminder.
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That’s pretty normal. If you persist, the time will come it will be the inverse. You can read the kanji perfectly but can’t remember the meaning of the association. 
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For sure, I’ve definitely found that for a lot of Kanji or vocab I can’t think of a specific English translation, but I get that feeling that tells me what it is, and 9 times out of 10 that feeling was right. As I’ve progressed I’ve had to start adding synonyms to a lot more words, as I’ve started recalling the meaning, as opposed to the word WK told me to associate.
A lot of words I add 5, 6 synonyms, some of them just being onomatopoeia, because every time I know exactly what it’s talking about, but cannot for the life of me put it into a single English word. It’s definitely happened more often as I’ve gotten to the later levels, as I’ve gotten a more abstract idea of what Kanji are.
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yeah that’s the frustrating thing about quizzing on meanings, because translations are always imperfect anyways (and for kanji meanings its an even more sorta vague thing than vocab), so you have these times where you understand what it is, but you can’t recall the specific english that its expecting, and you can’t give WK a sentence explaining the general idea you have in mind.
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At first I also did that and couldn’t remember the readings. I remember how difficult it had been for me to learn the reading for the kanji of water, then I tried to visualize it and it worked like magic.
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