I wrote a computer program to help learn to read Hiragana and Katakana. It won't teach you any words or grammar, but being able to sounds words out is a good first step.
The program is presented a bit like a game. There's a target character at the top of the screen, so you find it and click on it. Then there's a new target character, rinse and repeat. You can right-click to switch between Hiragana and Katakana modes, or hit spacebar to display stats on how many times you've clicked each character and your average speed (to help you identify which ones you're having trouble with).
The characters you click on are invisible until you mouse over them. This might seem daunting at first, but it actually has several benefits to learning. Stick with it, use this program and in a few short hours you'll have 2 of the 3 Japanese alphabets memorized pretty much forever.
Download links are here:
Windows x32: Hira_Kata_Trainer Win32
Windows x64: Hira_Kata_Trainer Win64
(the x64 version is recommended if at all possible)
Tell me what you think, or if you find any bugs.
The program is presented a bit like a game. There's a target character at the top of the screen, so you find it and click on it. Then there's a new target character, rinse and repeat. You can right-click to switch between Hiragana and Katakana modes, or hit spacebar to display stats on how many times you've clicked each character and your average speed (to help you identify which ones you're having trouble with).
The characters you click on are invisible until you mouse over them. This might seem daunting at first, but it actually has several benefits to learning. Stick with it, use this program and in a few short hours you'll have 2 of the 3 Japanese alphabets memorized pretty much forever.
Download links are here:
Windows x32: Hira_Kata_Trainer Win32
Windows x64: Hira_Kata_Trainer Win64
(the x64 version is recommended if at all possible)
Tell me what you think, or if you find any bugs.