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How many characters is enough?
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leosmith -

JimmySeal, I've heard about 3,000 characters/10,000 words = 99% in Mandarin. Are you using the RTK
method to learn the new characters?



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JimmySeal -

No, I'm just brute forcing them for now. I'm now familiar enough with kanji that most of them
stick in my head without mnemonics. I might slow down and Heisig the new ones when my trip is over.










david1978 -

Sorry to say this but something smells rotten in the state of Denmark. If I understand correctly
you say you are "feverishly studying" 30 new characters per day, every day? Well gosh, man! You
should be a fluent Chinese speaker in less than a year at that rate! I just don't believe you know
what you're talking about, sorry.










JimmySeal -

Thank you for your repeated apologies, but they are unnecessary.
That middle part might be true, if I were able to keep that pace, but as the number of characters
increases, retaining the already learned ones becomes harder, and I have slowed down to about 10
per day after reaching about 1300.
I do think it is possible to reach a high level of reading and listening proficiency within a
year, and I think that with enough practice, that can be parlayed into speaking ability, maybe
over a bit longer period of time.










gato -

David, Jimmy said before that he already knows more than 2000 kanjis from learning Japanese. For
the kanjis that have exact equivalents in Chinese, he just needs to learn their new Mandarin
reading. So it's not so unbelievable that he can learn 30 "new" Chinese characters per day. But I
agree that he can't keep this pace up because at this rate, he'll be learning 10000+ new
characters in a year.










sthubbar -

Jimmy, let's see how this challenge works out. I contend that 4000+ characters are necessary to
read Chinese.










stephanhodges -

I tracked down the reference to "anki" at http://repose.cx/anki/index.html but I don't know what
"the RTK method" is.

The top Google search for "RTK Method" returns:


Quote:

The RTK method is available in SewerGEMS to calibrate your sewer model and is used to generate a
hydrograph based on precitation data by combining ...

I'm sure THAT's not it










stephanhodges -

Ah, never, mind. "RTK" = "Remembering the Kanji"










furyou_gaijin -



Quote:

Sorry to say this but something smells rotten in the state of Denmark. If I understand correctly
you say you are "feverishly studying" 30 new characters per day, every day? Well gosh, man! You
should be a fluent Chinese speaker in less than a year at that rate! I just don't believe you know
what you're talking about, sorry.

And what is wrong with becoming a fluent... well, if not a speaker then a reader is less than a
year?! Some people don't have a lifetime to dedicate to this pursuit.

I'm very much like JimmySeal on this and I have a personal goal of 6,000 characters by year end.
It looks like both or us have started off with 2,000+ of Japanese characters so it can be safely
assumed that we do know HOW to learn characters...

I'm actually finding this quite easy and very entertaining. My biggest challenge in this seems to
be memorising the correct tones.










david1978 -



Quote:

And what is wrong with becoming a fluent... well, if not a speaker then a reader is less than a
year?! Some people don't have a lifetime to dedicate to this pursuit.

Did I say there was anything wrong with it? I don't believe it's possible, that's all. I don't
care how many Kanji you know, you're not going to be a fluent Chinese reader in a year, or two, or
three...












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