Japanese Lesson – Katakana 1

Hello Everyone,

Here is the first lesson around katakana. In this lesson we will learn: ア, イ, ウ, エ and オ, as well as their small size variants. Let’s go!

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From now on, I will assume that you are knowing hiragana, and apart for some exceptions, I will try to avoid using romaji and use hiragana instead to give instructions on the pronunciation of the characters. In addition since we will not yet have sufficient characters to build real Japanese words using katakana, we will limit ourselves to transcribing words from hiragana to katakana (such practice is common is Japanese to highlight a word in a sentence, like putting it in bold or capital letters in English).

Just in case (who knows ^^), here is the link to some previous hiragana lessons:

As always, get your pencil and notebook ready and let’s getting started!

Downloadable content

Empty sheet

Hiragana ア to ソ

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This katakana is pronounced like:

It has 2 strokes:

Exercices:

  • Write 10 times the character ア in a row.

This katakana is pronounced like:

It has 2 strokes:

Exercices:

  • Write 10 times the character イ in a row.
  • Write 5 times the word あい / affection / using katakana: アイ.

This katakana is pronounced like:

It has 3 strokes:

Exercices:

  • Write 10 times the character ウ in a row.
  • Write 5 times the word あう / to meet / using katakana: アウ.
  • Write 5 times the word いう / to say / using katakana: イウ.

This katakana is pronounced:

It has 3 strokes:

Exercices:

  • Write 10 times the character エ in a row.
  • Write 5 times the word いえ / home / using katakana: イエ.
  • Write 5 times the word うえ / top, above / using katakana: ウエ.

This katakana is pronounced like:

It has 3 strokes:

Exercices:

  • Write 10 times the character オ in a row.
  • Write 5 times the word あおい / blue / using katakana: アオイ.

Small アイウエオ: ァィゥェォ

There also exists half-width variants of these characters which are quite commonly used to form foreign sounds, such as “di” ディ or “fo” フォ for instance, which cannot be transcribed with the standard hiragana set of characters: アァイィウゥエェオォ.

We will see examples of the use of these characters in later lessons.

Exercice:

  • Write 2 times the characters アァイィウゥエェオォ in a row.

Learn Japanese hiragana and katakana
with WonderLang’s Kana Matsuri!

Here it is for today. Do not hesitate to repeat the exercises at will. And do not hesitate to like and share this article on social networks!

Stéphane

Next lesson: Katakana lesson 2: KA, KI, KU, KE, KO (+ dakuten derivates)

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2 thoughts on “Japanese Lesson – Katakana 1”

  1. I LOVE the lessons! x)
    I’ve been looking for something Exactly like this for a good while now, It’s really been great. 🙂 Finally a site that teaches the lessons as well as gives you excersizes to practice along the way.
    I love that the lessons themselves are simple to understand, as well as teaches key factors that are crucial in learning the Japanese language; not to mention it’s pretty fun studying as well lol. ‎‎‎‎٩(◕‿◕。)۶
    ‎(o^▽^o)

    ありがとう for putting the joy back in learning ^^.👍
    じゃ、またね! ^-^ ✌

    Sincerely:
    Chella M*

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