Hiragana BLUE Belt - with AUDIO

Listen to the audio, and select the correct hiragana:

• う

• し

• ら

• け

Answer explanation

ら is written as 'ra' in rōmaji.

Listen carefully to the 'r' line of the chart - it is not like the English /r/ sound. It sounds a little like the /l/ sound.

Listen to the audio, and select the correct hiragana:

• お

• り

• か

• な

Answer explanation

り is written as 'ri' in rōmaji.

り can be written 2 ways - as a 1-stroke character OR a 2-stroke character. The 2-stroke character is more commonly used.

The image shows り using different fonts.

Listen carefully to the 'r' line of the chart - it is not like the English /r/ sound. It sounds a little like the /l/ sound.

Listen to the audio, and select the correct hiragana:

• ろ

• ま

• ふ

• る

Answer explanation

る is written as 'ru' in rōmaji.

It sounds similar to the 'ru' part of the word 'ruby'.

Listen carefully to the 'r' line of the chart - it is not like the English /r/ sound. It sounds a little like the /l/ sound.

Listen to the audio, and select the correct hiragana:

• れ

• い

• す

• ね

Answer explanation

れ is written as 're' in rōmaji.

It sounds similar to the 're' in the word 'rest'.

Listen carefully to the 'r' line of the chart - it is not like the English /r/ sound. It sounds a little like the /l/ sound.

Listen to the audio, and select the correct hiragana:

• き

• に

• ろ

• へ

Answer explanation

ろ sounds similar to the 'ro' part of the word 'rock'.

ろ is written as 'ro' in rōmaji.

Listen carefully to the 'r' line of the chart - it is not like the English /r/ sound. It sounds a little like the /l/ sound.

Listen to the audio, and select the correct hiragana:

• も

• く

• わ

• の

Answer explanation

わ is the first character in the word 'wasabi'.

We write わ as 'wa' in rōmaji.

Listen to the audio, and select the correct hiragana:

• ほ

• め

• を

• さ

Answer explanation

を is a special character. We call it a particle.

We write を as 'wo' in romaji, but we say /o/ - a short 'o' sound, like in the word 'on'.

It is not used in words, but at the end of words. It tells us which word is the 'object' of the sentence.

It joins words together to make meaningful sentences, a little bit like the words 'a' and 'the'.

Listen to the audio, and select the correct hiragana:

• ち

• ぬ

• つ

• ん

Answer explanation

ん makes the sound /n/.

It is the only hiragana character that doesn't have a vowel sound. It is just /n/.

It is never at the start of a word - only in the middle or at the end of a word.

Words that use this hiragana are:

こんにちは！ (konnichiwa), せんせい (sensei), and よん (yon = four).