Learning a language with a new alphabet
A new script is the first wall in Japanese, Korean, Arabic, Russian, Hindi or Thai. Until you can read it, every word is a shape to memorise. Here is how the app gets you over it, and what it does not teach.
A new script is the first wall in Japanese, Korean, Arabic, Russian, Hindi or Thai. Until you can read it, every word is a shape to memorise. Here is how the app gets you over it, and what it does not teach.
Short answer
Yes. Alphabet lessons teach the script from zero, a few letters at a time: how each one sounds, explained in your own language and compared with a sound you already make, with audio, real example words and a short quiz. There is a course for every one of the 57 languages, including Cyrillic, Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, Devanagari, Thai and Korean Hangul. For Japanese the course covers hiragana and katakana, and for Chinese pinyin and the four tones; kanji and Chinese characters are not part of it.
Until you can read the script, every new word is a picture to memorise rather than something you can sound out, and you cannot tell how anything is said without audio.
Explanations of the sounds often assume you read English. 'Like the s in measure' only helps if English is your language; a Thai or Hindi speaker needs a comparison with a sound from their own.
A course for the script itself, then the rest of the app at the lowest level.
Alphabet lessons teach letters, not Japanese kanji or Chinese characters. For Japanese you learn hiragana and katakana; for Chinese, pinyin and the four tones. Reading characters fluently is a long project that no alphabet course shortcuts.
There is no handwriting practice: the lessons teach you to recognise the letters and their sounds, not to write them by hand. The Serbian course teaches Cyrillic only, not the Latin alphabet Serbian also uses. Speaking questions need the microphone and a phone that can recognise the language; without them, the quiz sticks to tapping and typing.
About ten minutes a day, inside the free allowances.
It depends on the script. Korean Hangul is small and regular, and most people read it within a few hours to a few days. Greek takes a few days, Cyrillic a week or two, and Japanese kana a couple of weeks for each of the two scripts. In NativePal a course runs from 3 packs (Māori) to 19 (Japanese), and one pack a day is a comfortable pace.
Every script of the 57 languages: Cyrillic (Russian, Ukrainian, Bulgarian, Serbian, Macedonian, Belarusian, Kazakh), Greek, Arabic and Urdu, Hebrew, Devanagari (Hindi, Marathi, Nepali), Bengali, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Thai, Korean Hangul, Japanese hiragana and katakana, and Chinese pinyin with its tones. Latin-script languages have courses too.
No. Every sound is explained in your own language, the one you chose for the app, and compared with sounds from that language, not from English.
You will be able to sound out hiragana and katakana, including furigana and loanwords. Everyday Japanese also uses kanji, which the course does not teach; you meet them word by word in reading lessons, where every word can be tapped.
Yes. Every alphabet lesson is free and can be reread as often as you like. The free plan includes one alphabet quiz a day; premium removes the limit.
Alphabet lessons for all 57 languages, explained in your own language.
Free to start. No account needed.