Totally confused...

[itoshiihito]

Yeah so I am totally confused. With the words that have Kanji and Hiragana...how do you know if you use the kanji or hiragana? anyone got advice??

[Damicci]

if you know the word look for usage on the net, more commonly the kanji will be used but there are still quite a few words that have kanji but the kanji is rarly used.

You'll learn in time from reading and chatting what uses what kanji.

[Kinsao]

Kanji are used for the... dunno the technical word for it >.< but like the "core" of words, and the hiragana are used for the grammatical endings - e.g. changing the tense of the word - and for particles... and katakana are used for foreign import words and sometimes to give an added emphasis to a word (kind of like italics). :p

[Mike Cash]

Yeah so I am totally confused. With the words that have Kanji and Hiragana...how do you know if you use the kanji or hiragana? anyone got advice??

The obligatory question:

Are you using some sort of structured materials to learn Japanese or just picking it up from random places in random ways on the internet?

[undrentide]

Basically...

kanji
- most nouns
本、花、学校、自動車
- part of verbs/adjectives that does not conjugate (what Kinsao explained as "core" :cool:)
赤い、健康な、歩く、勉強する

hiragana
- part of verbs/adjectives that conjugate
赤い、健康な、歩く、勉強する
- particles
は、て、と、を、が

katakana
- foreign (loan) words
アメリカ、コーンスープ、ギター
- onomatopoeia
パタパタ、コトコト、
- scientific name for plants/animals/fish/insects etc.
ツリフネソウ、ツシマヤマネコ、ニジマス、アメリカシ ロヒトリ

There are many exceptions, but if you start with hiragana and then learn the words with kanji little by little, it won't be so confusing.
:-)