All booklets from Level 0 through the Level 4 are written in hiragana, along with the appropriate level of kanji mixed within the text.

Furigana is used extensively throughout the series, so as long as you have a good knowledge of hiragana you’ll know enough to at least be able to read through any text at this level.

A Look Inside – ジョンさん日本へ

The feeling you get from being able to read actual Japanese text yourself is a powerful one for beginners.

Even if you only know every third word/kanji, you’re reading in another language and that’s pretty amazing I think.

Each level has several volumes (Level 1 is available in three volumes), which come in multi-booklet packs and as the level number increases, the booklets add more vocabulary, kanji and more complex grammar.

The Level 1 booklets feature a 350 word vocabulary and each story at this level has between 400-1,500 characters.

If you’re currently studying at the N4/N5 level, these booklets are an ideal starting point for you.

Box Set – Front Cover

Basic grammar is covered with conjugations ranging from the -masu, -te and tai forms through to present and past tense, desu and several others.

The five illustrated stories included in the first volume of Level 1 are:

• おんあの子 – The Girl
• ハチの話 – The Story of Hachi
• ジョンさん日本へ – John goes to Japan
• 浦島太廊 – Urashimatarou
• 笑い話 – A Funny Story

Level 1 Volume 1 Booklets

An added bonus is the free CD, which includes the text from each booklet being read by a native speaker, which is a perfect way to improve listening comprehension while reading along with each story.

When I first started the series I ripped the CD and then listened to the booklets while reading along with the text from the booklets.

Having the audio with me wherever I went enabled me to practice my listening comprehension at any time of day.

As you move through the booklets, any new vocabulary you find in a booklet will repeated multiple times throughout the other booklets to reinforce their use and meaning in context.

I found this of particular use in quickly building my arsenal of Japanese words in the early days.

Close Up – Hiragana/Kanji with Furigana

I know I bang the “no romaji” drum quite a lot but it is something I feel strongly about and that’s what I enjoy about these booklets as they are 100% Japanese and therefore there’s no option to cheat yourself with romaji or English.

If you don’t know the hiragana or kanji then you’ll need to look it up and memorise it. It’s a powerful motivator.

While the Japanese Graded Readers Series will introduce you to new words and help to maintain your current reading and listening abilities, I think the biggest plus is to keep you thinking and reading in pure Japanese – there are no crutches whatsoever.

With it’s colourful illustrations and easy to read text, the Japanese Graded Readers Series sure beats the heck out of wading through boring lists of vocabulary and grammar.

Highly recommended.

BTW check out Harvey’s views on Level 0 of the Graded Readers Series over at japannewbie.com

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• The Tale of the Little Tsu
• Word Of The Week: Monogatari (物語)
• Hiragana: The S Line
• App Review: Japanese 101 – Particles

The first kanji (会) means meeting, meet, join or party and has the readings – カイ, エ, あう, あわせる and あつまる. We’ll be using the カイ (かい) reading for today’s word.

The second kanji is – 話 meaning talk (or tale) and the readings are ワ, はな.す or はなし.

The meaning of 会話 becomes clearer when we join together 会 (meeting, meet, join or party) and 話 (talk) and we get a “meeting or a joining together to talk”, which gives us “conversation”.

Examples

I particularly like the last compound in the list – 世話人.

We can break these down in to their meanings to arrive at the final translation – 世 (generation, world, society, public ), 話 (talk), 人 (person). So that gives us “public”, “talk”, “person”, which is a “manager” or “agent” for a movie star or band as an example.

Any questions? Please leave a comment below.

• Word Of The Week: Monogatari (物語)
• Word Of The Week: Gaikokujin (外国人)
• Word Of The Week: Densha (電車)
• Japan Signs: Waiting Room
• Word Of The Week: Choushoku (朝食)

To get you started I’ll kick you off with a quick explanation of some of the more popular terms.

Rōmaji

Rōmaji (ローマ字), often mis-spelt as romanji or rōmanji, is where Japanese words are written in the Latin alphabet. For example, konnichiwa rather than こんにちわ.

Rōmaji is mostly used in Japan where tourists need to be able to read signs such as a railway station, hotel, airport or restaurant. The further you get out of the major cities, the less rōmaji you’ll see.

It is also frequently seen in Japanese dictionaries and textbooks for use by Japanese language beginners.

Rōmaji is commonly used to input Japanese characters into computers. Japanese keyboards mostly look exactly the same as Western keyboards. So to input a Japanese word, the user must type in the romanised version of the word (konnichiwa rather than こんにちわ) and the computer will do the rest.

I am not a fan of rōmaji for serious Japanese students as I feel it is better to learn kana and kanji than to rely on rōmaji. Use whatever you feel works best for your situation and level.

Furigana

Furigana (振り仮名) is the small hiragana or katakana printed next to or above a kanji character to explain its pronunciation. It is mostly found in children’s books or Japanese textbooks for beginners.

Furigana is especially helpful when you are making the transition to learning kanji and don’t yet know the many readings needed to be fluent at Japanese.

Hiragana

Hiragana is the first of three writing systems (hiragana, katakana and kanji) taught to Japanese children and most books for kids are written purely in hiragana. As they move in to grade one, kanji is gradually introduced and hiragana mostly removed. A typical university graduate is expected to know over 2000 kanji!

Although hiragana is used by children and replaced by kanji in grade school, it remains a very important part of Japanese as it is commonly found in the grammatical endings of nouns, verbs and adjectives, as well as for particles like が or から, and many other Japanese words that have no kanji equivalent.

Each hiragana is either an individual vowel or a consonant followed by a vowel. The exception, and there always is one, is “n” (ん).

Find out more about hiragana and download free worksheets here

Katakana

Katakana (カタカナ) is the second component of the Japanese writing system and is generally learnt alongside or after hiragana.

While a beginner may not initially be able to tell Katakana and Hiragana apart, with a little practice they are distinctively different.

Katakana is generally more angular and has short, straight strokes while hiragana is rounded and more cursive. The difference is much like in the English language where we start off writing in a printing-style before learning cursive writing as we move through school.

Katakana is predominately used to write foreign or loan words in Japanese.

In the photo above you can see the city and country names from around the world, which are all written in katakana as they are loan words.

Kanji

Kanji (漢字) are the characters that are used in the Japanese writing system along with hiragana and katakana. They were imported from China around 500AD although the timing of its use in Japan varies substantially.

Kanji are taught to Japanese children after learning hiragana and katakana and the Japanese government has strict sets of kanji that are to be learnt at each grade level. By the time a typical Japanese student finishes university they will know approx. 2000 kanji!

The list of 1,945 kanji that must be learnt be all Japanese students is known as Jōyō kanji.

Japanese school children learn 1006 kanji characters from grades one to six and a further 939 kanji characters in secondary school.

There are changes taking place in 2010 that will see the number of official “must-know” kanji move to over 2000.

The total kanji figure is debatable but is said to be around 50,000. Let’s be thankful we don’t need to know all of those!

Readings

Kanji readings fit into just two categories, On (On’yomi – Chinese reading) and Kun (Kun’yomi – Japanese reading).

The difficulty for beginners and advanced students alike is that most kanji have more than one reading. So on top of having to learn the approx. 2000 Jōyō kanji there are also multiple readings of each kanji that you must know.

Also, when you add two or more kanji together their meaning might change or expand making the concept different.

For example the kanji for “outside” is 外. This kanji has the On readings – ガイ (gai),  ゲ (ge) along with the Kun readings – そと (soto),  ほか (hoka),  はずす (hazusu),  はずれる (hazureru),  と- (to).

So when 外 is used in the context of “outside” on it’s own you might pronounce it – そと (soto). However when it is used in 外国 (gaikoku), which means foreign country (eg outside country) then you can see the ガイ (gai) reading is used along with こく (country).

The general rule is that kanji that are on their own are typically read using their kun’yomi, as in the そと (soto) example above.

Kanji that occur in compounds, which are two or more kanji together as in the 外国 (gaikoku) example above are generally read using on’yomi.

These are only general rules and there are many exceptions but that is beyond the scope of this article so I won’t confuse things too much. ^_^

Stroke Order

In Japanese, a stroke order refers to the order in which the strokes of a kana or kanji character are written.

As a general rule, strokes are written from top to bottom and left to right. When there are upper and lower parts of the kanji, the upper strokes are written first, then the lower.

It is debatable that you need to focus heavily on learning the exact stroke order for each kanji. My personal view is that it is a good discipline to have but if you are fluent with the rest of your Japanese, not knowing the stroke orders isn’t going to hold you back too much.

Kana

Kana is the word used to refer to both hiragana and katakana. When you hear someone say that you need to learn the “kana” when starting Japanese, that just means that you need to learn hiragana and/or katakana.

That’s all for now – I hope this has helped to clear up any questions you may have had about these terms. Please leave a comment if you want to know more or let me know if I have missed anything.

• Learn Katakana: The Starter Kit
• Learn Kanji: The Kanji Starter Kit
• Hiragana: The A Line
• Joyo kanji list set for 2010 overhaul
• Hiragana: The T Line

Everyone learns a different way. It’s an obvious statement but one that bears thinking about when you’re attempting to learn a language.

For example, if you’re studying at school I guarantee that no-one bothered to ask you about how you wanted to learn Japanese?

In a typical classroom setting, you have no input in to what time of day you start or how many students are in your study group or what textbooks you use.

What if you learn better on your own? What if you don’t want to learn romaji? Maybe you’re better suited to learn kanji mnemonically rather than delving in to readings from day one?

For some of us, this type of disconnect between how we are taught and what we actually need to be able to learn, is enormous and it can seriously affect our ability to learn a language.

A common scenario is that on your first day of Japanese class you’re filled with anticipation at finally begin able to learn the language you love so much.

However, several months later, you’re lagging behind the class and have lost all motivation and even worse, you might be questioning your own intelligence. Am I just dumb? No you’re not – please read on.

Don’t Blame Yourself

Firstly if you’re reading my blog, your intelligence is beyond question – so no worries there at all ^_^

Secondly, don’t be too quick to blame yourself if you’re not at the level you think you should be. Perhaps the classroom environment and/or syllabus is just not right for you.

If you’re at a grade school there is not alot you can do about that but outside of school hours the time is your own and if you truly want to master Japanese then you’ll need to study the way that suits you and make up for the lost time in the classroom.

I’ve listed below several study variations that may help clarify in your own mind what works best for you. These thoughts apply to anyone studying Japanese – not just in school.

Goals versus Free-Form

You’re either a goal-orientated person or not. If you’re younger you may not know that yet but by the time you finish school you will.

Some people find setting personal goals to be claustrophobic and unnecessarily draconian. They would rather just take it easy, get the job done in their own time and on a timeline that suits them.

Others can’t function without goals. They need a short or long term goal to constantly maintain their motivation and feel rewarded by attaining their goals on schedule.

Both options are okay for the individual but our non-goal friends are probably not going to enjoy the classroom environment very much.

If you’re on the non-goal team, then after-hours tutoring is perhaps a better option for you or maybe teaching yourself on the interwebs. Both of these options will reduce any unnecessary or counter-productive stress caused by the classroom environment.

Be really careful not to allow the stringent nature of the classroom to dampen any enthusiasm you have for the language as it is very hard to regain that once it is lost.

Conversely, if you need to learn in a group make sure you put yourself out there and make it happen.

RTK versus JLPT

RTK or Remembering the Kanji is a well-known method of learning kanji and JLPT is of course the standard test worldwide for Japanese proficiency.

RTK focusses more on how a kanji is put together and is very visual whereas JLPT is pretty much a learn by rote system. RTK doesn’t teach the kanji readings at all (until RTK2) while JLPT starts with the whole package – kanji, radicals and readings – from day one.

If you’re struggling to remember any kanji in class then perhaps you’re more of a visual learner. In that case Remembering The Kanji may be more suited to your needs.

The trick is not to think there is only way to learn Japanese.

If something is feeling harder than it should be, make sure you look around for other options. You know you have what it takes to learn so don’t stop until you find the right method for you.

When you’re fluent Japanese, no-one is going to stop you mid-sentence and ask what method you used. If you’re fluent, you’re fluent – job done.

Classroom or Self-study

This is a big stumbling block for some people.

If you’re at school you have no choice but to learn with others in your classroom but if you’re working during the day and trying to self-study at night and getting nowhere then you might be someone who needs to learn in a group environment.

If you’re forced to self-study due to economic or time issues then make sure you get your face-to-face time with others online. Websites such as EduFire offer live video tuition for numerous languages including Japanese. You can then get your interaction fix while still self-studying.

Don’t give up now. Fix the problem by getting to the core issue of why you feel you’re not progressing. Only you know the answer to that question.

Morning or Night

Do you struggle to learn at different times of day?

Perhaps you work during the day and study Japanese at night and find yourself going nowhere fast?

Or maybe Japanese is your first class in the morning at school and you just can’t focus no matter how hard you try?

There’s morning people and night people. Some of us come alive the closer it gets to midnight while others are at their peak at 5am.

If you’re struggling at certain times of the day, then why not try re-arranging your day to see if that changes anything.

Instead of sitting down to study at 11pm, go to bed early and hit the books at 6am.

Give it a try – it might just be the thing that is holding you back.

がんばってね!

• Learning Japanese: Never Give Up
• Learn Kanji: The Kanji Starter Kit
• Word Of The Week: Choushoku (朝食)
• Mnemonics: Learn Japanese Faster
• Should You Take The JLPT?

Image Credit: Fey-Rayen (DeviantArt)

Whether you’re a beginner, advanced or somewhere in between, at some point in your Japanese studies you’ve probably “hit the wall”. I’m sure you know the feeling – you’re over it, you don’t want to see another kanji or verb conjugation as long as you live.

There are many reasons this can happen – perhaps you’re bored, too busy with school or work, sick and tired of studying or you’ve simply lost your motivation.

It happens to the best of us and it’s a common problem in any endeavour, not just learning Japanese. However, it’s the way you deal with the “wall” that will define your success or failure.

If you have read anything about successful people, a common thread is that they never give up.

It is what separates them from others who start a business and then get disillusioned when they’re not making $50,000 a week, a month after opening their restaurant and give up.

Perhaps they would have had a chance at making $50,000 a week but it would take 5 years of hard work and the determination to see it through. Either way, they’ll never know because they gave up.

The world is littered with the carcasses of great dreams that went nowhere because of a lack of staying power, focus and determination. It takes a certain person to push through the pain and keep going while others fall by the wayside.

The Tipping Point

The phrase “Tipping Point” comes from a book by Malcolm Gladwell, and basically means “the process in which, beyond a certain point, the rate at which the process proceeds increases dramatically.”

Put in the lingo of language learning it means that at a certain point everything just seems to come together.

Perhaps you’ve been studying hard for a few years and seemingly getting nowhere and suddenly there becomes a point where you just feel like it comes naturally. You’re not thinking about tenses and conjugations and how many strokes in each kanji – you’re just thinking in Japanese – it’s become part of you.

Right before this “tipping point” is where the problems lie. The years of study are taking their toll and you’re wondering if you’re ever going to be fluent. This is where many people just give up as the “wall” just seems to great to get over.

Remember The Reward

If you feel yourself losing focus or interest in your Japanese studies, it’s time to remind yourself of just how far you have come and what the rewards are for sticking with it.

Your goal may be as simple as personal improvement or as life-changing as moving to Japan to live and work. Both are valid reasons to push through any walls you hit along the way.

Value Your Progress

A great way to embolden yourself and also bring clarity and excitement back in to your daily studies is to look at how much you have achieved.

Even if it’s taken you three years to learn the basic hiragana and katakana then you’ve already accomplished what most of your friends and family will never do in their lifetime.

Just think about it – you can look at hiragana, which to others is a bunch of mindless squiggles, and make sense of it. That’s pretty impressive stuff.

It is too easy to dismiss your knowledge as “simple” but if it were that simple then everyone would know it.

Open one of your hiragana text books and show a friend or family member and I bet they won’t know what anything means and conversely I’m sure they’ll be very impressed when you can read a hiragana sentence out loud to them.

While it may seem like nothing, you’ve actually come a long way and you need to acknowledge that and use it to push yourself to the next level.

Have you ever visualised being able to read an entire Japanese newspaper or watching an entire Japanese TV show and being to able to understand everything?

Don’t think you could? Well you can – it’s just a matter of using the same skills that you used to learn hiragana and katakana – study, focus and determination.

Yes, it’s much, much harder but if 125 million Japanese can do it, so can you.

Name and Shame

If you need a kick along in the area of self-motivation then why not make your plans public? If you’re stuck on the first 100 kanji, then set yourself a goal to learn them by a certain date.

In my opinion there is no better motivation than to have your friends, workmates or classmates knowing about your goals. Post something on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace or even your own blog. Outline what you plan to achieve and make it public.

I guarantee the next time you feel like watching TV rather than learning a few kanji, you’ll think twice about the consequences ^_^

It’s All About You

In the end you still have to really want to learn Japanese – there is no getting around that and it is the most powerful motivator.

You can’t be doing it just to hook up with the hot new Japanese exchange student in your class or because your Mum and Dad want you to. You have to want it badly and you have to want it all by yourself.

So if you’ve hit the wall, please don’t stop there. It’s a very long road to proficiency but it’s also very rewarding.

Imagine being able to fluently communicate in another language? It doesn’t get much better than that in my book.

• Learning Japanese: Do It Your Own Way
• Use Twitter To Improve Your Japanese
• 3 Ways to Learn Japanese With YouTube
• Hiragana: The S Line
• Hiragana: The K Line

Halpern, a serial author, polyglot and 30 year resident of Japan, devised the Kodansha Kanji Learner’s Dictionary, which is based on his own world-renowned New Japanese-English Character Dictionary, in response to the need for “an easy-to-use kanji dictionary small enough to be easily carried around yet detailed enough to satisfy the practical needs of serious beginners and intermediate learners.”

The result of his work was a totally new kanji dictionary system that enabled students to “quickly locate the meanings, readings, and compound words for about 98% of the most frequently used kanji.”

SKIP

A large part of its ease of use stems from the use of Halpern’s pioneering SKIP (System of Kanji Indexing by Patterns).

SKIP works by organising kanji based on pattern rather than radical.

The kanji are divided into sections and grouped into four main categories: Left-Right (1), Up-Down (2), Enclosure (3), and Solid (4). A user then counts the number of strokes in each segment, and uses them to determine the kanji’s SKIP number.

Core Meaning

Outside of the obvious benefits of SKIP, my favourite feature is the listing of a core meaning for each kanji. Quite often one kanji can have several different meanings, which can be very confusing for beginners of Japanese.

For example 辞, which is listed in Japanese dictionaries as having the meanings – resign, word, term and expression.

Halpern narrows down the options by highlighting its primary meanings in red below the main kanji listing.

Compounds

One of my favourite ways to learn new kanji is to view them in the context of a compound. Kanji compounds are where two or more kanji join together to form another word.

The resultant word can either be an obvious union of the two meanings or something different altogether.

Halpern lists over 30,000 compounds throughout the Kodansha Kanji Learner’s Dictionary, which are invaluable in cementing the primary meaning of the kanji plus pushing your knowledge forward by introducing new words based on the kanji.

Lookup Methods

As noted previously, Kanji are ordered according to their SKIP numbers, which allows any level of student to look up characters with ease.

• The Pattern Index allows characters to be quickly located from their SKIP numbers
• The SCAN Method is a powerful shortcut for locating some characters almost instantly
• The On-Kun Index lists the characters alphabetically by both their on and kun readings
• The Radical Index lists the characters by their traditional radicals
• The Direct Method for locating characters without using any index

What You Get

• 2,230 entry characters, including all the kanji in the Joyo and Jinmei Kanji lists
• 41,000 senses for 31,300 words and word elements show how each character contributes to the meanings of compounds
• 1,200 homophones with core meanings explain differences between closely related characters
• 386 variant forms used in prewar literature and in names
• 1,945 stroke order diagrams show you how to write each kanji stroke by stroke
• 7,200 character readings, including name readings
• Over 2,000 cross-references and five appendixes give instant access to a mass of useful reference data

It Just Feels Good

While aesthetics aren’t usually at the top of the list when it comes to shopping for a dictionary – that’s exactly what is special about the Kodansha Kanji Learner’s Dictionary.

Everything just feels good; from the clean layout to the beautiful type-setting and the wafer-thin paper. This is a dictionary that will make searching for kanji a visceral experience.

Recommended

I love this dictionary. I love the way it looks, feels and how it helps take away some of the pain along the path to memorising 2000+ kanji.

It is a dictionary that no beginner or intermediate Japanese student should be without. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

The Kodansha Kanji Learner’s Dictionary is available from all good book stores.

NB – Please note that this is not an advertisement. I only recommend products that I have bought and used myself.

• Learn Kanji: The Kanji Starter Kit
• Review: My Top 5 Kanji iPhone Apps
• Japanese Terms Explained for Beginners
• Word Of The Week: Toshokan (図書館)
• Word Of The Week: Monogatari (物語)

Why are there so many words for breakfast? If you think about it in English we have the same situation as breakfast can also be known as “brekkie”.

Choushoku is made up of two kanji – 朝食 (ちょうしょく).

The first kanji (朝) means morning and has the readings – あさ and チョウ. We’ll be using the チョウ (ちょう – hiragana) reading in today’s example.

As a beginner you’ll first see this kanji in the new N5 level (the first level of the new JLPT) and it can be used in situations such as 今朝 (けさ – this morning) and 毎朝 (まいちょう – every morning).

The second kanji is – 食 – meaning eat or food and the readings are ショク, ジキ, くう, くらう, たべる and はむ.

To wrap up this week’s Word of the Week we join 朝 – morning and 食 – eat, food, which gives us “morning food” eg breakfast.

Examples

Please note that I have only included the relevant kanji readings for this example in the table above. Almost all kanji have multiple readings but not all are applicable to the examples in this article.

Any questions? Please leave a comment below.

• Word Of The Week: Monogatari (物語)
• Word Of The Week: Toshokan (図書館)
• Word Of The Week: Densha (電車)
• Word Of The Week: Gaikokujin (外国人)
• Word Of The Week: Kaiwa (会話)

In terms of similar kanji, 氷 (icicle) and 永 (eternity) are very close. They’re clearly not indistinguishable but at normal reading size they can be difficult to tell apart especially for beginners.

If we threw in 水 to the mix, which is the kanji for water, we could thoroughly confuse ourselves – so I think we’ll just stick with these two for today. ^_^

My mnemonic (visual clue) for keeping these two kanji clear in my mind is to visualise that “If you snap the tip off the icicle (氷), it will be broken for an eternity (永)”.

The icicle kanji – 氷 – has the straight up tip with the small stroke to the left while the kanji for Eternity – 永 – looks like someone has snapped the top and pushed it to the left.

Remember that as crazy as some of these mnemonics sound, they really work.

Example Usage

Readings

氷 (On: ヒョウ Kun: こおり, ひ, こおる)

永 (On: エイ Kun: ながい)

• Japan Vocab: Weather Words
• Word Of The Week: Choushoku (朝食)
• Similar Kanji: Taste vs Wisdom
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• Similar Kanji: Eye vs Oneself

Monogatari is made up of two kanji – 物語 (ものがたり).

The first kanji (物) means thing or object and has the readings – ブツ,モツ, もの – although we’re only interested in the もの reading for today’s example.

At the beginner level (JLPT4/N5) you’ll come across this kanji in several words including 食べ物 (food – たべもの), 動物 (animal – どうぶつ) and 飲み物 (drink – のみもの).

The second kanji is – 語 – meaning word or language. The readings for 語 are ゴ (ご), かたる, かたらう and a popular example for those of us learning Japanese is にほんご (Japanese language – 日本語).

To wrap up this week’s Word of the Week we join 物 – thing, object and 語 – word, language, which gives us objects of language or words eg a story.

Examples

Please note that I have only included the relevant kanji readings for this example in the table above. Almost all kanji have multiple readings but not all are applicable to the examples in this article.

Any questions? Please leave a comment below.

• Word Of The Week: Choushoku (朝食)
• Word Of The Week: Gaikokujin (外国人)
• Word Of The Week: Toshokan (図書館)
• Word Of The Week: Densha (電車)
• Word Of The Week: Kaiwa (会話)

I have listed below an overview of my top 5 Kanji learning apps, which is based solely on the trial and error of hundreds of applications since the iPhone debut in 2007. I download and test almost every Japanese learning app as they are released and most of them end up rarely used and/or deleted.

Please note all apps have been paid for by me and used extensively since their release.

1. iKanji Touch

iKanji Touch from ThinkMac Software is, without a doubt, the most fully featured of the iPhone kanji apps. If aesthetics mean much to you, you’ll also appreciate the stunning design – a rarity in the current crop of iPhone kanji apps.

Features

• Kanji are grouped by grade/JLPT and divided into sets of 20 for easy practice
• Reference cards for each kanji with readings, stroke count, radical etc
• List of example compounds for each kanji
• Leitner System based spaced repetition Teach Me mode
• Reading test to quiz you on kanji readings (onyomi and kunyomi)
• Meaning test to practice your ability to recognise English meanings
• Compound test to complete words by filling in the missing kanji
• Stroke order test to practice writing most kanji
• Search for kanji by readings, stroke count or meaning
• Ability to create a practice set and track wrongly answer kanji

How It Works

iKanji touches on all areas of the kanji learning process with the ability to study the onyomi, kunyomi, stroke orders (currently 700 kanji covered) and English meanings of over 2000 kanji.

Having downloaded more than my fair share of Japanese Learning apps over the past couple of years, I would safely say that this is the only iPhone app that will teach you all aspects of the JLPT kanji. It is by no means perfect but it’s the closest I have seen if you want an all-in-one kanji learning app.

2. Kanji

Kanji’s simplicity is immediately obvious with little in the way of screen bling, however underneath the hood it has everything you need to become a kanji ninja.

The app covers all JLPT levels with over 2000 kanji plus the standard on and kun readings along with the English meanings.

Features

• A complete set of 2040 kanji characters from any level of the the JLPT
• Over 4000 example words with readings in hiragana and English meaning
• Select which kanji you want to learn and create your own custom lists
• Search for kanji by entering a meaning or drawing the kanji
• Intuitive, clean, and simple interface
• Your kanji selection is saved when you exit the application
• Shake to restart going through the list
• Does not require internet connection

How It Works

You work your way through each kanji by guessing the meaning and readings and then tapping the screen to reveal the answer. Much like Kanji Flip, this method requires you to be very honest with yourself. If you get it right, you tick the card as done otherwise you leave it and it will continue to appear until you master it.

The feature I enjoy most is the example words on each kanji card. These are very helpful in giving some context to the meaning of each kanji, which I find helps me to memorise them more quickly.

Although the app comes preloaded with most of the kanji you will ever need, you can add your own in and also create custom lists from existing or new kanji.

The custom list feature comes in handy if you use the Remembering The Kanji method rather than the included JLPT lists or you may simply want a targetted list of kanji to practice for your next class or to make a note of any kanji with which you are constantly struggling.

While it’s not the most exciting app to use, it does what it does very well and in the end that’s really all that matters.

3. NihongoUp

I first came across NihongoUp as a Flash-based desktop application and loved its clean design and of course the actual Japanese learning software part of it too. Eventually an iPhone version was released, which I quickly purchased and still enjoy using almost every day.

Some parts of the game don’t translate well to the smaller iPhone screen (eg Vocabulary) but overall this is a superb little app, which no kanji learner should be without.

How It Works

The app has four main parts: Kana, Kanji, Vocabulary and Grammar. All games work on the same basic premise; a question (in the form of a sentence or word) at the bottom of the screen and multiple choice answers floating down in balloons from the top of the screen. You have to choose the correct answer before the balloons hit the ground and the quicker this happens, the more points you get.

You also accumulate extra points with the more consecutive correct answers.

With regards to kanji, it’s strength is testing your knowledge of the readings of JLPT 3 and 4 kanji. A sentence appears at the bottom of the screen and you have to choose the correct kanji with the reading.

Although simple in premise, I have found it invaluable in testing my ability when it comes to on and kun readings – admittedly a weak point in my Japanese – one of many. ^_^

While I have only focussed on kanji, this app tests many core aspects of your Japanese knowledge and turns it in to a bit of fun.

The iPhone and desktop version are highly recommended.

4. KanjiPop

KanjiPop is another app that is deceptive in its simplicity featuring 16 squares each containing one kanji and an English word at the top of the screen with its On and Kun readings below it.

How It Works

The aim of the game is to choose one kanji from the grid whose meaning correctly matches the English word at the top.

Seems pretty simple, huh?

Well, the kicker is that there is a time limit of two minutes, which is displayed at the very bottom of the screen and ticks away relentlessly as you fumble your way through each level.

If you finish a level and beat the clock, you are automagically taken to the next level where sixteen new kanji await you.

This cycle continues until you eventually reach a level where your kanji knowledge fails to beat the clock. Here you are presented with the option of choosing a lower level to re-try or you can simply test yourself on the same level again until you master it and can move on.

With over 2000 kanji across 127 levels, KanjiPop has something to offer everyone from newbies to advanced students of Japanese. Beginners can use it to revise and learn while more advanced students can use it as a fun way to keep their kanji knowledge fresh.

View my full review video review of KanjiPop

5. Kanji Flip

Kanji Flip was one of the first ever Japanese learning app I downloaded and I used it extensively at the time and still do.

It works like a standard paper-based flashcard system but with the added advantage of a spaced repetition system, that automagically tracks your progress and shows the cards you need to work the most on, while hiding the ones you have successfully learnt.

Features

• 2230 Kanji & 255 Kana
• 4700 Example Words
• Hiragana & Katakana Study Set
• Progress Tracking With Stats & Auto Save
• Browse Mode Lets You Review All Words
• Add Your Own Kanji To Customize All Sets
• “How To” Guide Inside The Program
• Completely Offline
• Four Difficulty Levels As In The JLPT
• Meanings In English
• Readings In Hiragana & Katakana

How It Works

In the screenshots, you’ll notice a list of numbers at the right of the screen, which gives you an indication of how many cards you have mastered and what you have left to do on that level and also how long ago you were last tested.

Cards that have not been tested in a while will randomly reappear to make sure nothing is forgotten over longer time periods.

As per the Kanji app I mentioned previously, Kanji Flip relies on the user honesty system. You are shown a kanji, then you click “Show Answer” and choose “Right” or “Wrong” depending on your answer. If you choose “Right” when you were “Wrong” then you are only cheating yourself and this type of app may not be right for you.

Kanji Flip stores your answers in its database and builds up a list of what you know and don’t know and focuses on the problem kanji, while only showing the ones you already know at longer intervals.

While development work seems to have slowed in recent times as the company focusses on other languages, it works really well and will definitely help any serious kanji student.

Review Summary

• Kanji Touch – Best overall app that covers all aspects of kanji learning.
• Kanji – Basic but very usable. Its strength is in the ease of use and example kanji usage.
• NihongoUp – Beautifully designed app. Great overall app for JLPT 3 and 4 students.
• KanjiPop – Simple, easy to use. Fun way to test your Kanji/English meanings.
• Kanji Flip – Best kanji SRS app. Relies on user honesty to work well.

Any questions or suggestions of apps you like, please leave a comment below.

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