see: https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/24437266
Learning Japanese is quite challenging, but Duolingo is here to help! First and foremost, let’s start with Hiragana, one of three Japanese writing systems.
This chart starts from upper right hand side corner, and goes down from top to bottom.
あいうえお
Here’re the first five letters.
| - | a i u e o |
|---|---|
| Hiragana | あ い う え お |
| Roman letters⁺ | a i u e o |
| Pronunciation | /a/ /i/ /u/ /e/ /o/ |
⁺ Roman letters = Romaji, ローマ字(じ)
These are the vowels, and pronounce as short vowel sounds. This is easy to say but very hard to do for English speakers. When you see those vowel letters, it’s natural for you to pronounce as long sounds as English letters, a e i o u. This would be one of the best advice to keep in mind as you read Japanese in Romanized letters (Romaji). Reading those vowels with short sounds will definitely help you pronounce the rest of the Hiragana.
あかさなたはまやらわ
| - | Learning hiragana |
|---|---|
| Hiragana | あ か さ た な は |
| Roman letters | a ka sa ta na ha |
| Hiragana | ま や ら わ を ん |
| Roman letters | ma ya ra wa wo n |
This is the top row of the Hiragana chart from left to right with the irregular words added at the end. As you can see, the vowel “a” (あ) is combined with a consonant “k” to make the word “ka” (か). So, the rest of the chart will be the same: a consonant followed by a vowel. This is the way the Japanese students learn hiragana by memorizing the top row. Thereafter you would go into “ka” (か) column, and follow “ka, ki, ku, ke, ko” (かきくけこ), the next is “sa” (さ) column, “ta” (た) column, and so on. Once you learn the vowels, the rest is quite systematic. “Wa, wo, n” (わをん) are the irregular words. Also, the “ya” column only has three, “ya, yu, yo” (やゆよ).
たてがき・よこがき (Vertical and Horizontal writing)
In Japan, scripts can be written horizontally or vertically. Hiragana chart is usually written in the vertical writing (top-bottom) in the same way as in school textbooks for Language Arts and newspapers. Most literatures are also published in vertical format. However, more and more books are written in horizontal writing (left-right) as you see in digital world. Manga frames still tend to flow in right-to-left horizontal direction just as in the hiragana chart.
ポケモン (ぽけもん)
Now that you learned the trick to pronounce Japanese words, you know it's "Sake" (酒／さけ) not "Saki", and "Karaoke" (カラオケ／からおけ) not "Karaoki". Knowing this, you'll also be able to avoid the common mistake of saying "Poke-EE-mon"!
・Related posts: Katakana
・Kanji
・Language guides to help with learning Japanese
・Days of the week
・Useful expressions in Japanese
・Extended hiragana list
・Let’s make some words using hiragana!
・Sentences in Japanese, such as がくせいですか
・20 Food names in Katakana
・Particle と