[steven]

I'm regurgitating stuff I've said in other threads recently... but I think it helps to alreay be familiar with the word before you go and study the kanji.

A lot of people will say otherwise, though.

I think that learning the spoken language makes learning the written language easier and more comprehensible. Learning the written form first can be overwhelming and... I think impossible without context.

There is a point in everyone's study of language-- including their mother language, where studying the written form becomes very important. I think you'll know when you're at that level. It is at that point that I believe you should concer yourself with less common readings of kanji and kanji wih readings that don't come up in everyday conversation.

Frankly, there are a lot of readings for kanji that are useless. You could read 茶道 さどう (sado) or ちゃどう (chado). I don't think anyone says chado, and people would prbably have a hard time understanding what you're trying to say if you said it to them.

This is all coming from a person who's pronunciation and daily conversation skills far outweigh his reading/writing skills though. I'm quite happy with the road I've taken, but there are embarassing moments when I feel like someone who is illiterate, which is basically what my Japanese self is. I can tell you though, approaching kanji at this level is a lot easier than when I tried studying kanji years ago when I was first starting out. I can feel the synapsis actually connecting while I write the kanji down-- which is part of the memorization thing MMM was talking about, if I understood him correctly.

I might be pushing it, but I think I could go as far as to say that stressing over what on-yomi and what kun-yomi are would be time better spent just learning from experience. That is to say, getting an idea of what context the kanji/readings are being used in. The more you read kanji and stuff, the more you gain a sense of what the kanji would or could be. I think gaining that sense is far more valuable than being able to tell which is onyomi and which is kunyomi.