I am doing both because while learning to write the symbol for a sound/meaning and identifying the symbol’s sound/meaning are separate skills, they enhance the fluidity of _thinking_ in Japanese significantly for me. It has a synergistic effect and to me seems to improve the brain’s understanding and efficiency in compressing the knowledge.
But my goal is not just to read and understand but to talk conversationally. While Japanese is very different from my other languages, I’m already multilingual (Norwegian, English, Dutch and German) and this approach has always worked best for me.
I might have to play with writing alongside vocab reviews.
Back in the earlier days of the online Japanese learning sphere (when AJATT was still the big new thing), I tried learning by starting with writing by studying kanji independently, but that went nowhere even after several months in.
More recently I’ve been making a point of audibly speaking the sentences associated with vocab cards and that’s helped a lot with being able to fluidly speak the various long trains of sounds that are common in Japanese but rare in English as well for improving recall and improving reading speed. It would follow that writing might enhance that effect.
My foremost goal is to become conversational too. The rest should follow more naturally if I can achieve that.
But my goal is not just to read and understand but to talk conversationally. While Japanese is very different from my other languages, I’m already multilingual (Norwegian, English, Dutch and German) and this approach has always worked best for me.