Kanji stroke order practice would be great!
First thing first, I would like to thank Duolingo team and contributors for doing great work for the Japanese course, keep up the good work! As far as I'm concerned, learning kanji is difficult, especially when you're learning Japanese by yourself and don't have the need to use it routinely/on a daily basis, (e.g., you don't live in Japan/China, you don't take a formal Japanese lesson, you don't read untranslated Japanese books/newspapers/novels/comics, you don't write in Japanese). Even it takes around 12 years (from elementary up until high school) of learning for most Japanese themselves to "befriend" jōyō (regular use) kanji. Learning kanji letter isn't just memorizing it's shape and reading, but the stroke order when writing kanji as well. Based on my experience, knowing the stroke order really helps to remember and write the letter (some research even state it could sharpen your memory). Because Duolingo currently doesn't have kanji stroke order practice in it's lesson, I (maybe some other users too) sometimes look for the stroke order and practicing on sites like kanshudo, jisho and yamasa. That's why if Duolingo add the kanji stroke order practice feature to the Japanese course lesson, it would be highly appreciated because it surely will really help a lot of user to understand Japanese better (it might help user who wish to take Kanji Kentei Test too!).
14 Comments
There's this really good book which teaches over 2,000 of the main kanji students should learn, along with their stroke order. You can get the whole pdf here: http://simpleromanian.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/4805311169-Japanese-Kanji-and-Kana.pdf
Hey, I've got that book. :P It is great. I personally don't look at the stroke order, though.
I was like you "why does stroke order matter?" Then my wife pointed out "we do the same thing with cursive". Once I started trying to get it, the symbols formed much easier.
Thank you for sharing these sites! I seldom take time to learn Japanese apart from duolingo, but when I do I focus on Kanji writing. I agree that learning how to write a Kanji makes it easier to tell it apart from similar looking Kanji and to remember it in general. In a way, it makes it easier to read Japanese. I appreciate the duolingo course for what it is, but I'd be thankful if this feature was added.
On Pinterest there are contributors who dedicate lessons to one kanji at a time, with proportion details, angles, stroke order, and pitfalls to look out for. It's a good place to start with Kanji and it's lots of fun since it's very visual and colorful.
I never knew that, thanks for the information! Will definitely be checking it out. :)
Look at the app Write It Japanese. They teach the stroke order and pronunciation. But, teaching the letters Duo is much better.
I have been using Duo to learn the letters plus Write It to learn to draw the letters. It is working fairly well.
In just 2 weeks, I can answer the phone in Japanese and tell someone bye.
It would be really useful to have the kanji stroke order, even congress in Japan just passed a law about teaching foreigners the right stroke order. It's primordial to have the right stroke order. For myself, I find it very helpful to learn the right order, as there is a definite rhythm to writing. Try the Midori app for phone. It's really great, but the only thing better would be for them to have the app with "brush" strokes instead of just "pen" strokes.
That would be a really useful feature, even if I can't imagine how that would work into the lessons.
What's helped for me, is that I have an app on my Android phone, called Kanji Tree. It's pretty basic, but it teaches and reviews how to draw all the Joyo kanji, and kentei and names. It would work even better, if I remembered to practice regularly. Also, the first thing I used for kanji, was the website wanikani.com. Very good site.
