I'd just like to say that I have launched a Chinese character challenge over at Hacking Chinese aimed towards helping people stop relying on rote learning and use mnemonics and active studying instead to deal with tricky characters.

I'm going to participate in the challenge myself and I'm going to use Skritter. People who already use Skritter should find it very easy to join the challenge. Check the article for more details, but in essence, it's about actively studying and dealing with reviews we fail, rather than just repeating them again and again until they sort of stick.

Read about the challenge: http://ow.ly/gv84H

Join the group on Skritter: http://ow.ly/gv848

新年快樂！

Best wishes,

Olle

Thanks, I am in. I need the extra motivation and different approach as well. I have started to use google news, fluentu and other sources to work on the troublesome ones. Some words where simply not possible to brute force learn. Especially reading articles with the word/expression helps me. I have little problems in writing but big problems in remembering the pinyin. Jakes blog "list overdose" is also somehow in the same area about trying to get away from static to active learning of context oriented words.

I'm in there, too.

Should be fun. I look forward to seeing lots of members join the ranks. Let's see how many characters we can actively learn this year.

一起加油！

I saw that yesterday. Don't we all do this anyway? I'm sure you all do! SRS is for revising, not learning.

I'm in! Sometimes I do this already, other times I don't - so this is about me doing it all the time :)

Zeppa: If that were the case, I don't think anyone would really care about the challenge. The fact that ~40 students signed up within three days says something. :)

I must admit that, as CC says, I don't do it all the time. So I agree that it's a good initiative, and I hope it gets to the people who need it most.

I was still surprised that people like Jake and Nick would do it!

If I don't recognize a card on review, I put it on a paper card, sometimes with compounds, and review it outside Skritter. I have to trust myself on that.

I am committed to this, but finding it's taking time (well, it would, wouldn't it!) So, my clock on skritter is moving very slowly, while my actual time spent (and number of characters to review) is increasing!

I'm also spending a fair bit of time sorting out things which are like each other, but where I don't have enough distinction in my head. That's particularly useful for me, so I can now see a character, and know it's the one with the extra line or something, which is helpful to distinguish it from the one without.

I'm also now signed up on Hacking Chinese. I made a mistake and thought if I said 'yes' here, and joining the skritter group, it would be enough - it isn't. To get on the official list, you need to sign up over there. Thought I'd mention it in case anyone else made the same mistake (or is it just me who's this dumb?)

As you say, it's only natural that it takes more time, but the idea is of course that it will take less time in the long run. You're right that you need to sign up on the website, that's how I keep track of people joining and how I put you in touch with other participants. If you registered recently, don't worry, I will send out an e-mail soon.

I hope you are all going well with your Hacking Chinese challenge! I thought about signing up, but then I thought it might be too time intensive.

However, I do something a little similar every time I learn a new word. What I do is go through to Pleco and save an entry from ABC's Pleco Dictionary with the 'part of speech' and usually put in an example of what it relates to from either the ABC dictionary or Pleco's.

For example:

放下：R.V. ① lay/put down; set aside (e.g. ones work, pretentious airs, or arms) ② digress

怀念：V. cherish the memory of; think fondly of (e.g. revolutionary martyrs, university friend or hometown)

I find that this helps me get the context of the word. It does take a little longer to do the cutting and pasting, but my comprehension has improved since I have started doing this.

Can we restart the challenge? Looking at the group specs, I think I lost my comrades.