Credit: Mikko Kapanen The more actively you process the language you’re studying, the more you learn. If your learning is automatic and passive, what you study is less likely to stick. Therefore, it’s important to …
Recent changes to Skritter’s newsletter mailing list
Each month, we send out a newsletter with information about things you probably don’t want to miss. Normally, the newsletter includes summaries of important blog posts and language challenges from our social media channels. There’s …
Hacking the most difficult Chinese characters (with examples)
Which characters do you find most difficult to remember? The answer to that question will of course vary between learners. Personally I remember finding 疑 really hard. The best way of learning these tricky characters …
Skritter goes virtual*
Writing Chinese and Japanese has been a difficult and time-consuming task for thousands of years, and the learning tools have stayed roughly the same throughout history. Since the turn of the century, however, research into …
Understanding Chinese characters: Components and radicals
It’s common for beginners and sometimes even more advanced students to lack an understanding of how Chinese characters are structured. This includes misconceptions about components and radicals. In this article, I’m going to address some …
Japanese tongue twisters （早口言葉）
Tongue twisters, or 早口言葉 (はやぐちことば), translating literally to “fast mouth words”, are quite a lot of fun in Japanese and also a great way to practice speaking speed. There are a lot of common 早口 …
Can you pronounce these Chinese words correctly?
Chinese pronunciation is systematic and relatively simple, especially when it comes to spelling (Pinyin). In theory, it’s possible to teach a class of beginners almost everything they need in a week. Naturally, it will take …
Common mistakes when writing Characters
Just starting to learn how to write Chinese characters? Or thinking about taking up the brush and starting to learn? Then this article is just for you! We asked Cōngmíng, one of our most experienced …
Standard references for Skritter Chinese
Even though Skritter is mainly a language learning tool and not a dictionary, we still run into the same problems that dictionary editors and compilers do. There might be many different ways of writing, pronouncing …
JLPT N5-N1 Lists
The JLPT N5 through N1 lists are now updated and available for study! These together cover a total of roughly 8,500 words and 2,200 kanji, guiding you all the way from the easiest exam (N5), …