HIRAGANA Lesson 1: (a, i, u, e, o)

, , , and are the first five letters of Hiragana alphabet and are placed in the first row of
the Table of 50 sounds [ gojon-zu ].




Table of 50 sounds
You basically read as written in Roman alphabet [ rmaji ]. But the
way you usually read may be different from the sound of Japanese.
Try to imitate the pronunciation of native speakers.



Mark Name Function

tten same as English comma

kuten same as English period

kagikakko same as English quotation mark (beginning)

kagikakko same as English quotation mark (end)

gimonfu same as English question mark

kantanfu same as English exclamation mark
You can assume that these marks have almost the same functions as English marks.
You don't have to read out these marks.
[ ] and [ ] as a group are called kutten (punctuation marks).
Quotation marks [ ] (beginning) and [ ] (end) have different shapes.

Japanese language has five short vowels [ tan-boin ] and five long vowels [ch-boin ].
, , , and are the five short vowels.
Long vowels , , , and are indicated by an additional short vowel letter.
A horizontal bar is also used (e.g. , , , , ). This is not the official way but is
used quite often in casual expressions.
In Rmaji, long vowels [ ], [ ], [ ] and [ ] are indicated by a horizontal bar
on top. [ ii ] is double " i ".
How to Write


Look closely how lines are crossed.
Line 2 is slightly curved.
Start Line 3 at the right place.


Lines are parallel and are tilted.
Lines are very slightly curved.
Line 1 is a little longer.


The whole shape is vertically long.
Tilt Line 1 properly.
Look closely how Line 2 is curved.


Tilt Line 1 properly.
Line 2 ends at near the bottom (not going up).

The vertical part of Line 2 is not on the center
(shifted towards left).
Place Line 3 on the right position.
It is important to write in correct stroke order. It is natural and efficient.
Wrong stroke order often results improper shape of the character.
The tilt angle of lines should be correct. Do not write in Italic
Standard Shape

In this course, specially developed original font is used to present the standard shape of Hiragana
letters.
This type of font is called Kykashotai (textbook style) and is ideal for character study.
Sample Fonts

Here, commonly used fonts are introduced so that you can get used to different style of letters.
Just take a look and observe the difference.
Please note that the shape of these sample fonts can be inappropriate for handwriting. Be sure
torefer the standard shape when you do the writing practice.
Qui z
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