How to Read Hiragana and Katakana

Step-by-Step Guide

1. 1

   Step 1: あ/ア is the a character.

   You would pronounce this character "ah".
   
   Like when you go to the doctor and they make you open your mouth and say, "Ahh."
2. 2

   Step 2: い/イ is the i character.

   You would pronounce it "ee"
   
   like you are just simply saying the English letter "e". , You would pronounce it "oo"
   
   like the last two 'o's in the word "too". , You would pronounce it "eh".
   
   Like when someone says something to you and you can't hear them well and say, "Eh?". , You would pronounce it "oh"
   
   like you are simply saying the English letter 'o'. , When they start adding consonants to the beginner of the characters, you pronounce it just like in English.
   
   Example:
   Ka- You make the 'k' sound like in English and then add the Japanese 'a' at the end. ,,, きった), it means that the consonant of the next syllable is doubled.
   
   For instance, きった is kitta ("keet-tah") and means "cut" as in "he cut it yesterday"
   
   whereas きた is kita ("keetah") and means "north".
3. 3

   Step 3: う/ウ is the u character.

4. 4

   Step 4: え/エ is the e character.

5. 5

   Step 5: お/オ is the o character.

6. 6

   Step 6: The rest of the characters are very easy to pronounce once you get these five pronunciations correct.

7. 7

   Step 7: The R in Japanese is not like the English R. It is pronounced between an 'R' and an 'L'.

8. 8

   Step 8: Double vowels (aa

9. 9

   Step 9: oo) are pronounced twice as long as if the vowel was single.

10. 10

    Step 10: When the kana tsu (つ) inside a word is written smaller (ie.

Detailed Guide

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