Hi everyone,

I just checked out my stats and found that I have more writing reviews than all the other parts (reading, definition, tones) together. Besides it also takes me longer to do a writing review than a tone one.

I also found out that after a 2 week break I "unlearned" quite a few characters (about 3%) in writing, while "reading" shows a steady up.

So I was wondering if it would make sense to drop practicing writing altogether or if someone has tried to.


Reasons for dropping it:
1. I probably hardly ever need handwriting.
2. It takes up a lot of time. I could be far ahead if writing wouldn't slow me down that much.
3. After a longer break, I would have to relearn a lot of those characters anyway. This "relearning" might also work if I just read them before.
4. I write characters very fast, so they are not really getting any better or more beautiful.

Any ideas?

>1. I probably hardly ever need handwriting.

True, not even in China, besides perhaps filling in forms etc.

>2. It takes up a lot of time. I could be far ahead if writing wouldn't slow me down that much.

True

>3. After a longer break, I would have to relearn a lot of those characters anyway.

True, this seems to be a universal problem. Even for native speakers. The only way to solve this is to keep reviewing and constantly handwriting FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!

>This "relearning" might also work if I just read them before.

Not true, reading won't teach you how to write. Even if you have learned how to write a character before.

BUT: Knowing how to write a character helps with reading speed and recognition. You should have written every character you can read at least several times. It helps

>4. I write characters very fast, so they are not really getting any better or more beautiful.

As long as you write every stroke and stick to the stroke order, writing very fast does not mean they will look uglier. For me, the faster I write them, the better they look!

I feel like writing the characters forces me to take more time over them. I wonder if it would detract from my reading ability if I stopped writing.

Sure, if you want to stop practicing writing then why not? I can write very little, but can read newspapers and books just fine.

However, it's true that reading won't help with writing. You can know how to read a character but have absolutely no idea how to write it.

After taking into account I will stop writing for 2 months and try to learn the writing then. I'm curious how it will work out, and I don't "need" handwriting right now.

I'm learning how to write in order to be able to read. I'm actually not interested in writing at all but I think it's just the best way to be able to read. The additional time you spend on the character is time that the brain uses to get the characters into the long term memory, so I don't have the feeling that the time is wasted. Seeing a character is something very passive, but moving your finger (or a pen) adds another important and tangible sense which is significant for learning.

However, if it works for you and serves your goals, of course you are free to learn in the most efficient way for you.

At the moment I have the writing OFF. The problem I have is that my speech is a much better (higher) level than my character recognition...leaving my writing way behind at the starting line. So the problem? The characters in my lists are way too complicated for a beginner who is learning to write. All three of the disciplines (for me) are at different levels making it very tricky. When I turn the writing on...too difficult and time consuming...though I can see character recognition gets burned into the brain better...
I'm too battling with what to do? I'm living in China and feel my priority has to go with speaking and reading.
I really want to be able to have something like Skritter 101 basics set with the writing feature on and all my other lists with no writing but I can't seem to do this in the normal study mode that incorporates throwing up a mix of lists?

I would recommend dropping it mostly. Most writing you are likely to do would be via a computer or smart phone. Some exceptions, such as filling out your address on a form, can be done well enough with minimal practice simply because you have to do it so many times.

Definitely, I recommend people practice writing Kanji/Hanzi in the early stages to help get a feel for the elements, and so that they do have rudimentary writing ability, but beyond that I don't think it is necessary. Time spent drilling handwriting could be spend learning new vocabulary.

Okay, I picked up writing again today, few things I noticed during my 1.8 hour (skritter time) review:
1. I didn't forgot that many characters/words. I got close 78.3% in word writing and 87.5% in character writing (and about 90-97% in the other categories).
2. Over the last two month I spent much less time on skritter, and also found out that writing practice is actually the most fun part.
3. I even got some words better than before, because I paid more attention to the phonetic elements in characters, because that's the only "help" I could get.

I might do it again, as I haven't found much of a decrease in my writing skills, however spending less time studying definitely has to be countered, because in fact my main goal to learn words faster couldn't really be achieved.