In the master's thesis, we are dealing with the memorisation of Chinese characters, when studying Japanese language, among students of the Japanology program in Slovenia. We have found that learners from an environment where Chinese characters are not in everyday use, encounter various learning difficulties, which are the cause for difficulties in remembering and learning Chinese characters. In the literature, we also looked for existing strategies that make learning of Chinese characters easier. In the theoretical part, we first defined the importance of multilingualism and later switched to the explanation of the Japanese language. We have analyzed problems that make learning of Chinese characters less difficult. Furthermore we picked up some common strategies used by learners. We found that the greatest problems of the learners from the environment, where Chinese characters are not in everyday use, is the large number of characters they have to memorise, difficulty with remembering the form, handwriting, reading and, last but not least, composing words that consist of several Chinese characters. In the empirical part, we analyzed learning materials for the learning of Chinese characters, furthermore we conducted semi-structured interviews with higher education teachers, and a focus interview with students of the Japonology program. We have mainly examined their views on the complexity of the Chinese characters, how they are learned, and, last but not least, which information regarding Chinese characters contribute to more efficient memorisation of Chinese characters.
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