How to study for hiragana and katakana

Do you find difficulty memorizing all the characters? Here are some 3 learning methods that I can share with you.

Lets start with memorizing hiragana

Method number 1

Take the first 5 hiragana characters out(あ、い、う、え、お),and then take a piece of paper and try to write them down while looking at the first 5 hiragana characters. Keep doing it until you are familiar with the strokes. Next, take a fresh piece of paper and try to write them down without looking at it. If you forgot, then skip to the next hiragana symbol. Once you are done, review the 5 hiragana characters and check for any mistakes in the strokes. If you can write the first 5 hiragana characters without any problems. Good! You will probably write them down in order from from あ first and follow by い to う to え and to お. But you might not be able to remember how to read them if they are randomly place. So what you should do next is, create 5 small pieces of paper and write down the 5 hiragana characters on each paper. Then randomly place them and try to read them. You will be surprise that you might not be able to memorize them completely in the first place. Once you have completely memorize the first 5 hiragana characters, go to the next set of 5 characters. (か、き、く、け、こ).Repeat this method again. Keep doing it until you have finish the whole hiragana chart.

This method is cheap because you don’t have buy the hiragana flash cards. Its better to create your own hiragana flash cards instead. But it might take some time depending on your memory ;p

Method number 2

This method is pretty fun. You will need a friend to help you. You take can any amount of hiragana characters from the chart first. Lets take the first 10 hiragana characters. Make 10 small pieces of paper and write each hiragana symbol on each paper. Let your friend receive the 10 pieces of paper where the hiragana characters are written. And he or she will randomly place them on a table. Assume that you are going to buy hiragana characters in the “market”. And you have to tell your friend which hiragana characters you want to buy. If you buy the wrong one, you will realize your mistake. By realizing your mistake, it will help you to remember the characters even better. When you are able to fully memorize the first 10 hiragana characters, start adding the next 5 to 10 characters until you have finish the whole hiragana chart

This method is very useful if you have a friend to help you. But the best would be that your friend is also interested in learning Japanese. Both of you will be able to help each other by remembering the hiragana characters much faster. And its more fun too.

Method number 3

This method is a little similar to method 2 as it also requires a friend to help. But this method would be useful if you can get a friend who has either successfully memorize the first 10 hiragana characters or has already completely memorize the hiragana chart fully. You can have up 2 or even 3 people playing this game. Everyone should be interested to learn Japanese, or else this hiragana game won’t be fun. Write down the first 10 hiragana characters on 10 separate pieces of small paper.

Then get a friend who has the best hiragana knowledge to place the written hiragana characters on the table. He or she will tell the others which hiragana characters he or she wants. The person who has the fastest hand in grabbing out the hiragana character wins. The game ends when only 1 piece of hiragana character is left on the table. The winner of the round is decided by the total number of grabbed hiragana characters.

All the 3 methods above can be apply for learning katakana characters as well.

Have fun learning!