Japanese is quite a challenging language to learn especially since it doesn’t just have one writing system but three altogether! For beginner students this is quite a lot of new information to remember, but for situations like these, there are books like Remembering the Kana Part 2 Katakana. This book serves as a practical tool to help students of all levels develop both their reading and writing skills in a quick an efficient manner.
Overview
Like the first book in the series Remembering the Kana Part I Hiragana, Remembering The Kana Part II Katakana follows the same structure and flow. Each chapter offers the student a number of tips, activities, and examples to help them become familiar with this writing system. The book is meant to help learners remember, recognize and retain the Katakana characters to help them improve their reading and writing skills. The chapters in the book go over 50 characters and makes sure to work on each one in a very detailed and informative manner. The activities in this book aim to help the student learn each character through rules and strategies that rely on word/image association.
In each chapter the book will provide students with brief history lessons, helpful tricks to remember each character and plenty of writing practice. Throughout the book, students will also come across exercises that work on stroke order, pronunciation and timed quizzes to help students develop a proper writing speed.
Pros
· The student is given more than enough information to learn how to read and write each character.
· The book offers different strategies to learn and retain the information in the book, rather than just memorize it.
· The book has a layout that is easy to follow.
· Although the book is heavy with information, it does not overwhelm the student.
Cons
· No images or pictures to provide some visual appeal.
· The book is somewhat short (75 pages).
Recommended For
· Students who want to remember all the Katakana characters in a quick and simple manner.
· Learners who have just learned Hiragana and are ready to move onto learning the Katakana script.
· Students of all language levels.
· Students who are enrolled in a course and need extra practice outside of the classroom.
"Throughout the book, students will also come across exercises that work on stroke order, pronunciation and timed quizzes to help students develop a proper writing speed."
If you’re having trouble remembering the many Katakana characters and you’re interested in an easy way to retain this information, this book is definitely worth your time. Remembering the Kana Part 2 has some useful tips and tricks that can help you become familiar with the Katakana writing system. I would recommend this book to independent learners and students who are already enrolled in a Japanese course and want some extra writing practice. It’s not easy to remember all these new characters, especially if you’re used to the Roman alphabet, but Remembering the Kana Part 2 will help you feel less intimidated by the Japanese writing system, and will allow you to advance further in your language learning journey.
