Thread:Nyocchi/@comment-5209329-20150519070210/@comment-26336020-20150520042207

kanji for a person that doesn't have an asian background is especially difficult. it's difficult even for me to say where to start learning, I've just grown up with it. Then there's the beginner kanji that aren't even useful which makes it difficult to remember. Best to find similiar sounding words or find sounds and associate images of them to help you remember meanings. Using emotions is the best method to remembering things. ex. one of my favorites is that 空気 is kuuki, but it sounds like cookie :D although it just means air. who doesn't love cookies?

However if I'd give a recommendation it'd be to first start studying the basic grammer like the ている form from before. But look closely and try to remember the general shape of the kanji used. typically they'd be using a lot of subjects like 先生, 学生 (teacher/student) and verbs like 食べる, 飲む.(eat/drink)  These will be the kanjis you'll always be seeing in a lot of situations.

I say general shape or form mainly because its difficult to write every stroke, and remember the order and direction all at once. You just need to expand your vocabulary first and try to recognize patterns in the characters. Flash cards would definitely help, and don't worry about the splitting 先生 or others into both parts yet just try to get the feel. If you do split them up you'll learn that the characters individually mean first/before + born meaning a person older or born before you. So that's another method to help learn them.

However once you get to a certain level of mastery you'll have to distinguish between similiar kanji like 土 and 士. You'll need to be able to pick out certain things and in this case the only difference is that the two horizontal strokes the middle is shorter and the bottom is longer and vice versa for the other, they have different meanings too but all that is just experience and will come with time.

Definitely get a teacher if you can, I'm sure that'll help a lot of course :)