Moekanji

Buy Now!

Pre-order will be available soon at the following retailers - will update this list as data gets propagated through the distributors.

• AmiAmi
  
• Hobby Search
  
• J-List
  
• Toy Coin (convenient for Singaporeans)
  
• Amazon Japan
  
• Goodsmile Company

Learn kanji the fun and moe way with Moekanji

Through my own experience of learning Japanese, I wanted to make Japanese learning more fun and developed the Hiragana learning series called Moekana [もえかな]. Thanks to you, we sold tens of thousands of Moekana packs worldwide.
Many of you asked for something to help you learn Kanji too - so here it is - Moekanji! [もえ漢字].
Kanji are the Chinese characters used in the Japanese language which you need to learn if you want to be proficient in the lingo.

What is Moekanji?

Moekanji is a set of 87 illustrated cards to help you learn First Grade Kanji which include the “On” and “Kun” readings written in hiragana. First Grade Kanji is what elementary school children in Japan first learn. Retail price is 2,500 yen but many retailers are nearly discounting up to 20% ^o^

My mascot characters Mirai Suenaga, Haruka Suenaga and Kanata Hoshikawa taught us hiragana in the first series Moekana and now they are joined by Eiji Seiun, Retrokyu and our new character Kizuna Yumeno makes a couple of appearances too - all adorably illustrated by the Japanese illustrator Ikkyuu-sensei.

Once again I'm working with the hobby maker Good Smile Company to bring you Moekanji.

The commercial for Moekanji is now up at Youtube!

Product Details

• Product Name: Moekanji (もえ漢字)
  
• Series: Culture Japan
  
• Material: Card
  
• Card Size: 88mm x 63mm
  
• Pack Size: 90mm x 65mm x 34mm (170g)
  
• Specifications: Each pack of Moekanji contains 87 cards. Every pack contains the same set of cards.
  
• Category: Japanese language flash cards
  
• Retail Price: 2500yen (includes tax)
  
• (info for retailers) Packs per carton: 40 (each carton contains 10 boxes of 4 packs)
  
• (info for retailers) Carton size: 287mm × 447mm × 100mm (7000g)
  
• (info for retailers) JAN CODE: 4562360860015
  
• Release Date: 2013/05
  
• Released by: Culture Japan
  
• Ages: 6 and up.
  
• Made in Japan

What's Included

• 80 Kanji Learning Cards - Each card has a unique illustration and example for learning the complete set of first grade Kanji
  
• 5 Special Character Cards - Collectible cards featuring the mascot characters of Culture Japan and their profiles
  
• 1 Kanji List Card - A full list of all 80 Kanji characters, good to carry around and check back to see how many new Kanji characters you can remember
  
• 1 Instruction Card - An example card with annotations to explain how to use Moekanji for learning.

Buy Now!

Pre-order will be available soon at the following retailers - will update this list as data gets propagated through the distributors.

• AmiAmi
  
• Hobby Search
  
• J-List
  
• Toy Coin (convenient for Singaporeans)
  
• Amazon Japan
  
• Goodsmile Company

Folks who preorder at AmiAmi get this exclusive 365×125mm-ish Moekanji Wallscroll free!
It features the illustration of Koizumi-sensei with Mirai-chan illustrated by Ikkyuu-sensei doing the same pose ^^
The bottom of the scroll has a list of the Moekanji First Grade Kanji too which you can look at everyday. AmiAmi price of Moekanji is discounted down to 1,960 yen.

The front and back of the instruction card that comes with each pack.

As you can see, knowledge of the basic Japanese syllabary hiragana is required to benefit from Moekanji. If you have not done so already, you can learn hiragana with Moekana.

I was considering showing the readings in romanized format but came to the conclusion that there is not much point learning kanji if you are not going to bother learn hiragana. Also, although Moekana was developed as a product aimed at foreigners learning Japanese, many Japanese parents bought Moekana for their kids to learn Hiragana and it even became the 2nd best selling anime product on Amazon Japan. Therefore, I've decided to keep the "kun" and "on" readings in hiragana - it caters for domestic folks in Japan and forces you to learn hiragana before you attempt kanji - because there is not much point learning kanji without hiragana!

And if you are wondering what "kun" and "on" readings are, Wikipedia has a thorough explanation on the differences in classification. But very simply put, they are just different ways of reading the same Kanji depending on the situation.

There are many flash cards on the market that are packed with information like Kanji stroke order and a barrage of compound words. Based on my own experience of learning Kanji, I felt that learning stroke order from the start slows down the learning of Kanji. Also, a barrage of compound words is not useful when you are just starting out to learn that kanji!

Moekanji follows the original design elements of the successful Moekana and focus on what you need to get up and running as soon as possible while fusing Japanese learning with Moe culture.

Here is the full preview of every card in the pack! This time round you will notice that more attention to detail has been put into each illustration than Moekana. Have a look at some of my personal favorites below to see exactly what I mean ^o^
If you want the full set of images from this post then just grab them from the Good Smile Company website.

There are collaboration cards as well, this one with Super Sonico from Nitroplus.

And this one with Miu of Dracu-riot by Yuzusoft!

The front and back of the Kanji List card show the full list of 80 Japanese Kanji that appear in Moekanji. You can keep it in your wallet to remind yourself how many Kanji characters you have learnt or still need to work on.

And these are the special character cards featuring the mascot characters of Culture Japan!
This one of Mirai illustrated by Japanese illustrator Koizumi Amane-sensei.

Haruka illustrated by Japanese illustrator Iizuki Tasuku-sensei.

Kanata also illustrated by Iizuki Tasuku-sensei.

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Moekanji is going to the printers very soon but all I got for now is the mock up of the box - here it is in comparison to the Moekana box.

This is Moekana which is available now. Do remember that you need to understand hiragana if you are going to use Moekanji for learning Kanji.
The card quality of Moekanji is the same as Moekana which is the same as the many Japanese trading cards on the market - we use the same factories.

And this is how I started to learn kanji many many moons ago. I didn't have one of those AmiAmi Moekanji Wallscrolls so I had to make my own to stick on my walls ^^;
At the time, I dropped the learning of Kanji stroke order as I wanted to learn as many as soon as possible.
If you are serious about learning Japanese then check out this post where I talk about all the techniques that I used to learn Japanese.

And if you are here for the first time wondering whether my level of Japanese is up to par to be developing Japanese learning products - I guess its good enough to work for the Japanese government ^^;