2.3 Kanji Compounds, Okurigana & Strategy

Jukugo (熟語) Compound-Formation Patterns

Two-kanji compounds are the backbone of N2 vocabulary, and reading them well starts with knowing which reading each half takes.

Most compounds are on+on, so when a reading item stumps you, on+on is the base guess. But the two mixed patterns are named after their own examples — 重箱 (じゅうばこ, on+kun) and 湯桶 (ゆとう, kun+on) — and N2 loves them: 台所 (だいどころ, daidokoro, kitchen; on+kun), 場所 (ばしょ, basho, place; kun+on), 献立 (こんだて, kondate, menu; on+kun).

Semantic structure also predicts meaning, which helps you decode an unfamiliar compound:

• Synonym pair: 豊富 (ほうふ, hōfu, abundant), 増加 (ぞうか, zōka, increase).
• Antonym pair: 増減 (ぞうげん, zōgen, increase-decrease), 高低 (こうてい, kōtei, high-low), 売買 (ばいばい, baibai, buying-selling).
• Modifier + noun: 国立 (こくりつ, kokuritsu, national/state-established).
• Verb + object: 読書 (どくしょ, dokusho, read books), 登山 (とざん, tozan, climb mountains), 帰国 (きこく, kikoku, return to one's country).

Recognizing the pattern lets you reject nonsense options and infer meaning you were never explicitly taught.

Okurigana Rules (送り仮名)

Okurigana are the kana tails that show a kanji's inflection and pin down its reading.

• Verbs send from the conjugating syllable: 動く (うごく) / 動かす (うごかす) / 動き (うごき). The stem 動 is shared; the tail marks intransitive, transitive, or noun.
• Verb families split purely by okurigana: 起きる (おきる, get up) / 起こる (おこる, occur) / 起こす (おこす, cause). One kanji 起, three verbs.
• i-adjectives keep the final い and often one syllable before it: 新しい (あたらしい), 大きい (おおきい), 高い (たかい).
• na-adjectives and derived words send the final syllable: 静か (しずか), 確か (たしか).
• Some words allow accepted variants (行う vs 行なう; 表す vs 表わす); the test uses the standard form.

Because the katakana in task 2 includes okurigana in kana, matching the okurigana pattern often eliminates two options at a glance.

Radicals (部首) as Memory Aids

A kanji's radical (部首, bushu) and its phonetic component are powerful hooks.

• Semantic radicals hint at meaning: 氵 (water) in 海・液・混; 木 (tree) in 森・板・机; 忄 / 心 (heart) in 情・慣・悩; 言 (speech) in 論・議・訳.
• Phonetic components hint at the on-reading: many kanji containing 青 read せい — 清 (せい), 晴 (せい), 精 (せい), 請 (せい); those containing 寺 lean toward じ — 時 (じ), 持 (じ). The rule is imperfect (待 is たい), but a strong first guess.

Grouping study by shared phonetic component turns dozens of separate readings into a few families.

Elimination Strategy for Reading & Orthography Items

1. Reading items — fix the mora count first: long vowel? small っ? Then check voicing (rendaku or dakuten). しんちょう not しちょう; じっし not じし; はあく not はにぎ. Eliminate any option that mixes on and kun.
2. Orthography items — read the sentence for meaning, translate the katakana word into a concept, then pick the kanji whose meaning matches; reject look-alikes and wrong-sense homophones. Ignore character complexity.
3. Both — never leave a blank. Even a one-in-four guess earns expected points, and the JLPT applies no penalty for wrong answers.

A Study System That Works for N2

• Learn kanji in compound context, not in isolation — store 緩和, not just 緩; the exam tests words, not lone characters.
• Spaced repetition keyed to the reading: front is the word in kanji, back is the reading plus meaning plus one collocation (状況を把握する, grasp the situation).
• Minimal-pair drills for the vowel and voicing traps: 実施 (じっし) vs 実質 (じっしつ); 許可 (きょか) vs 強化 (きょうか).
• Group homophones — put はかる, つとめる, and おさめる each on a single card so you rehearse the meaning split, not just one spelling.
• Weekly mixed quiz of about 20 reading plus orthography items under a timer, to build the speed the 105-minute combined Language Knowledge and Reading section demands.

Internalize the roughly 1,000-kanji, 6,000-word N2 layer as words with fixed readings, and the two kanji tasks become quick, reliable points that protect your 19/60 Language Knowledge minimum.

Compound Verbs and Prefixes/Suffixes

N2 word-formation extends beyond two-kanji nouns. Compound verbs (複合動詞) stack a verb stem plus a second verb that adds aspect: 引き起こす (ひきおこす, cause/trigger), 思い込む (おもいこむ, be firmly convinced), 書き直す (かきなおす, rewrite), 泣き出す (なきだす, burst into tears). The second element carries predictable meaning — 〜出す marks a sudden onset, 〜込む marks depth or saturation, 〜直す marks redoing, 〜上げる marks completion with effort. Learn the suffix once and you unlock a whole family of verbs.

Prefixes and suffixes built from single kanji also recur: 未〜 (み-, not yet: 未完成 unfinished), 無〜 (む-, without: 無関係 unrelated), 不〜 (ふ-, un-: 不可能 impossible), 〜的 (てき, -ish/-al: 経済的 economical), 〜化 (か, -ization: 国際化 internationalization), 〜性 (せい, -ness: 可能性 possibility). Spotting the productive affix tells you both the reading and the grammatical category of an unfamiliar word.

Putting It Together on Test Day

Work the two kanji tasks first and fast — they are the most mechanical points in the Language Knowledge section, and banking them early preserves time for the slower grammar and reading items. Read each option out loud in your head, apply the mora-count and voicing checks for readings, and the meaning-and-object check for orthography. If two options survive, pick the one whose reading or spelling you have actually seen in a real word; recognition beats reconstruction. Then move on and never revisit — kanji items reward decisiveness, and second-guessing an already-checked reading is how careful students lose easy points.