Position
A Fresh Look
Heads up! Starting with this skill, the transcriptions for the Japanese characters and sentences won’t be on screen anymore. But don’t worry! You can still just tap the words to see how they’re pronounced and translated whenever you want to.
Location, location, location!
When we talk about where things are, we might say next to the table in English. In Japanese, you’d say テーブル の 隣.
椅子はテーブルの隣にあります。
The chairs are next to the table.
The chairs are next to the table.
猫はベッドの下にいます。
The cat is under the bed.
The cat is under the bed.
Remember, います is used with people and animals, while あります is used with inanimate objects!
What Bind Us
We’ve seen that counters are used to show how much of something there is, not just plain numbers. The counter 冊 is used with bound items, such as books, magazines, dictionaries, and so on!
Remember, start with the thing you’re talking about, add が, then say the number, and finally end with the verb.
本が六冊あります。
Hon ga rokusatsu arimasu.
There are six books.
Hon ga rokusatsu arimasu.
There are six books.
Keep in mind that numbers sometimes change their pronunciation a bit!
| one (book) | 一冊 issatsu |
| seven (books) | 七冊 nanasatsu |
| eight (books) | 八冊 hassatsu |
| nine (books) | 九冊 kyūsatsu |
| ten (books) | 十冊 jussatsu |
Katakana
In katakana, there are a few characters that look pretty similar! For example, シ and ツ. How can you tell them apart?
シ has two lines going down from the upper left to the lower right at a 45° angle. When writing, the curve beneath those two lines starts at the bottom left and then works its way up.
ツ begins with two more vertical lines. Then the curve underneath those two lines starts at the upper right and goes down to the lower left!