stroke order on a lot of simple kanji (including 右 and 左 actually - whose cruel joke was it for one to have the vertical stroke first and the other the horizontal?!) and apparently even in some hiragana characters! I was sub-teaching 1st grade 国語 on Fri (no joke!) and apparently I have been writing も wrong for 11 years! Thank god the thing was color-coded and numbered so I didn't teach it wrong to all 20 impressionable young 6-year-olds!
I always remember right as having to open your mouth to say the word right, hence the mouth radical. Left you don't need to open it as much... works for me!
[quote author=Tanooki link=topic=1239.msg7526#msg7526 date=1304951862] for 右 and 左, you could remember that "right" has a "box" in it, with RIGHT angles : D!!!! lol~
As for me...I suppose tsukuru and tsukau (when speaking/listening mostly) I get mixed up randomly :/ so annoying.
Oh, and I write "KA" with improper stroke order. But no one can tell just by looking o^o;;;; [/quote] I never thought of the right angle thing, I passively accept the stroke orders given to me. that's pretty cool. often, I will read kanji with the hanzi pronunciation. this is super embarrassing in the middle of class. also, I forget or add lines in some kanji when I am thinking too hard, especially with 見 or 買.
[quote author=Tanooki link=topic=1239.msg7526#msg7526 date=1304951862] for 右 and 左, you could remember that "right" has a "box" in it, with RIGHT angles : D!!!! lol~
As for me...I suppose tsukuru and tsukau (when speaking/listening mostly) I get mixed up randomly :/ so annoying.
Oh, and I write "KA" with improper stroke order. But no one can tell just by looking o^o;;;; [/quote] I never thought of the right angle thing, I passively accept the stroke orders given to me. that's pretty cool. often, I will read kanji with the hanzi pronunciation. this is super embarrassing in the middle of class. also, I forget or add lines in some kanji when I am thinking too hard, especially with 見 or 買.
[quote author=Tanooki link=topic=1239.msg7526#msg7526 date=1304951862] for 右 and 左, you could remember that "right" has a "box" in it, with RIGHT angles : D!!!! lol~
As for me...I suppose tsukuru and tsukau (when speaking/listening mostly) I get mixed up randomly :/ so annoying.
Oh, and I write "KA" with improper stroke order. But no one can tell just by looking o^o;;;; [/quote] I never thought of the right angle thing, I passively accept the stroke orders given to me. that's pretty cool. often, I will read kanji with the hanzi pronunciation. this is super embarrassing in the middle of class. also, I forget or add lines in some kanji when I am thinking too hard, especially with 見 or 買.
my weird mnemonic for 右 vs 左, just which one is which, was 'I am left alone' (the 工 part of 左 looking like a capital I) - my other awesome mnemonic from way back when? "The difficult cow's mother belongs in a zoo" for 難しい - you've got mu (moo = cow), zu (zoo) ka (kaa-san = mother).... yeah I don't know how that helped but somehow it did! Another awesome mistake? My old Japanese professor, when he was introducing 敬語 to us, mixed up 待つ and 持つ... so instead of 'I was waiting for my boss'.... a-MAZING.
For me 石 and 右 have been quite frustrating. By the time I got to 待つ though, I had worked out how to make sentences out of the elements. one 寸（すん＝３．０３ｃｍ） of earth (土） can become a temple (寺） 彳(ぎょうにんべん = people going) to the temple (寺） wait （待つ）。 carry(持つ） a temple (寺） in the hand（扌）。。。扌＝left variant of 手。 And yep, I haven't found the right mnemonic for 右 nor 石。
[quote author=Garyuuchin link=topic=1239.msg7540#msg7540 date=1305045393] For me 石 and 右 have been quite frustrating. By the time I got to 待つ though, I had worked out how to make sentences out of the elements. one 寸（すん＝３．０３ｃｍ） of earth (土） can become a temple (寺） 彳(ぎょうにんべん = people going) to the temple (寺） wait （待つ）。 carry(持つ） a temple (寺） in the hand（扌）。。。扌＝left variant of 手。 And yep, I haven't found the right mnemonic for 右 nor 石。 [/quote]
That's why I wish my particular Japanese class had given us a little more information on radicals, and the break down of kanji :( If you can make a little story (like your 3.03 cm of earth making a temple) it helps you remember the overall kanji!
For 左 the first stroke comes from the left. That's how I remember it. If you need more the first and third stroke of both 左 and 右 mimic one another. Either they are both left to right or both top to bottom.
[quote author=lilisin link=topic=1239.msg7558#msg7558 date=1305252254] For 左 the first stroke comes from the left. That's how I remember it. If you need more the first and third stroke of both 左 and 右 mimic one another. Either they are both left to right or both top to bottom. [/quote] lilisin - that's a really good way to remember! Thanks for your insight ;)
Mysticfive's vote seconded. Not only helps on the stroke order, but also sorts 右 from 石 (account 左 and 右 both have the same t shape. Wonder why that didn't occur to me before now.)
Though I can't vouch for the accuracy, I remember reading somewhere that the character 右 is actually derived from 手＋口 lending a meaning of the hand that you use to feed yourself -- (i.e. if you're right handed, your right hand) ... So, regardless of whether or not that's actually the origin of the character or a clever way of remembering it -- it seems a good way of recalling the meaning (if you're right handed)..
While I'm thrilled that I now have a way to remember them (I'm going with 'right angles'), I'm equally embarrassed that I seem to be the only one with a dysfunction like this (I don't think stroke order mishaps count, sorry mystic!).
[quote author=srm924 link=topic=1239.msg7566#msg7566 date=1305344891] Though I can't vouch for the accuracy, I remember reading somewhere that the character 右 is actually derived from 手＋口 lending a meaning of the hand that you use to feed yourself -- (i.e. if you're right handed, your right hand) ... So, regardless of whether or not that's actually the origin of the character or a clever way of remembering it -- it seems a good way of recalling the meaning (if you're right handed).. [/quote] I have this fabulous 3-book series on kanji origins (in Japanese: 漢字ワールド by 土屋秀宇[つちだひでを] - one book for kanji born from people shapes, one from animals, one from the natural world） and according to this at least, 右 is, in fact, from 'hand' and 'mouth,' and 左 is apparently a hand and a carpenter's ruler!
[quote author=lilisin link=topic=1239.msg7558#msg7558 date=1305252254] For 左 the first stroke comes from the left. That's how I remember it. If you need more the first and third stroke of both 左 and 右 mimic one another. Either they are both left to right or both top to bottom. [/quote]
The Japanese stroke order is definitely weird. In Chinese the stroke order for 右 and 左 is the same. It's like 田 : the Japanese write the vertical stroke in the middle before the horizontal one but in China they do the opposite.
[quote author=Nolan link=topic=1239.msg7598#msg7598 date=1305653074] The Japanese stroke order is definitely weird. In Chinese the stroke order for 右 and 左 is the same. It's like 田 : the Japanese write the vertical stroke in the middle before the horizontal one but in China they do the opposite. [/quote] Now that *is* interesting! I wonder how those changes came about...? (here goes the etymology geek, off on another adventure! :P)
