Gayathri Haththotuwa Gamage

This study aims to comprehend how adult beginner Japanese Language learners tackle the challenge of mastering kanji. Six tertiary students with alphabetic language backgrounds underwent ten weeks of paired, one-hour weekly kanji sessions. An inductive analysis identified thematic patterns in kanji learning. The findings indicate that novice learners proficiently self-generated visual or semantic imagery for most introduced kanji, demonstrating an engagement beyond radicals and/or components. Pedagogical implications are discussed in light of these results.

This longitudinal qualitative study investigates how cultural experience of staying in Japan may affect attitudes and self-directed learning of kanji among learners of Japanese as a foreign language. Six beginner learners pursued semester-long weekly kanji learning sessions and their diachronic behaviours were observed and recorded for attitudes and self-directed learning. The six volunteer participants responded to a poster on 'kanji learning workshops' put up on notice boards in a university in Australia. All participants had completed their undergraduate studies majoring in fields other than Japanese and were not pursuing other studies in Japanese The learners who had spent a considerable time in Japan consistently demonstrated trends of negative feelings toward kanji compared to those who had not been to Japan at all. These attitudes were partially reflected in their reported ability for self-directed learning. This interesting finding is discussed in terms of preconceived beliefs and how teachers could help develop positive attitudes in learners.

The present study examines the attitudes of learning kanji outside Japan based on the data from Sri Lankan learners of Japanese. This study also provides empirical evidence concerning perceived difficulties of reading and writing kanji by these learners. This was examined by a questionnaire, which was analyzed in terms of learners and Institution. The questionnaire revealed that the majority of learners had positive attitudes for learning kanji. However, they lacked the motivation for independent, self-directed learning. Learners in private institutions were significantly more enthusiastic in learning kanji than learners of secondary or tertiary institutions. The results also revealed that positive attitudes towards kanji gradually reduced with the increase in number of kanji being learnt. Differences in attitudes towards learning kanji outside Japan were identified suggesting that there are important cognitive aspects to learning kanji among non-native learners of Japanese.

This study investigates three important issues in kanji learning strategies; namely, strategy use, effectiveness of strategy and orthographic background. A questionnaire on kanji learning strategy use and perceived effectiveness was administered to 116 beginner level, undergraduate students of Japanese from alphabetic and character backgrounds in Australia. Both descriptive and statistical analyses of the questionnaire responses revealed that the strategies used most often are the most helpful. Repeated writing was reported as the most used strategy type although alphabetic background learners reported using repeated writing strategies significantly more often than character background learners. The importance of strategy training and explicit instruction of fundamental differences between character and alphabetic background learners of Japanese is discussed in relation to teaching strategies.

A significant amount of research has contributed to our understanding of language learning strategies in the past decade. Orthography-specific characteristics of kanji (Chinese characters used in Japanese language) have seen the development of a growing interest in kanji learning strategy research. This paper examines recent trends in language learning strategies in general and identifies unresolved issues related to research in kanji learning strategies. A conceptual framework for further research is discussed in order to assist approaches to kanji learning strategies and research conducted within the area.