In January of last year, I read and practiced RTK (Remembering the Kanji) for the first time. I don’t know why, maybe I didn’t fully understand it, but my system was, using an ANKI deck, to first see the kanji and then say its meaning/concept recognizing the components and using the mnemonic story.
I believe that’s how it worked by default; in fact, I think the decks I encountered at that time were all like that. I went through all the kanji and, more or less, achieved good retention—not perfect, but acceptable. However, it was slow. When I saw a kanji, it often took me a lot of time to recall the keyword, and the more I learned, the harder it got.
This year, I’ve taken the opposite approach: I’m using a deck that first shows the concept, and from it, I draw the kanji. The increase in productivity I’ve experienced has been incredible—not only because I already had some recollection from the first attempt, which has helped me a lot, even though I hadn’t reviewed in almost nine months—but above all, because I’ve noticed a massive speed increase. Seeing the concept and being able to recall the kanji, and vice versa, has become much faster. After writing out the long kanji tables in my review sessions, I test the reverse order, going kanji by kanji and quickly saying the concept, and it’s almost instantaneous for practically all of them.
That said, I still have some issues, mainly with kanji that share the same meaning, have very abstract or vague keywords, or that I don’t use often. But this might only account for about 1% or 2% of the kanji.
If you’re following the first method, try the second one—I find it much more productive.
PD: I’m opening this thread because I recall someone mentioning a few days ago that RTK was meant to be used this way, but I don’t remember it like that. In my first approach, all the decks I encountered were in the first style described.
That said, I end up exhausted, my eyes tired, and my hand sore. But it's worth it.
by Neat-Stable1138