In our second kanji lesson we learn a bit more about Chinese vs Japanese readings, and the remaining kanji for the days of the week. We also karate chop boards, draw turkeys, and set someone we know on fire. Kanji introduced: 中, 上, 下, 半, 人, 入, 曜, 水, 木, 本, 火, 王, 金, and 月. Music by Kid Sense.
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2 Comments
Sensei,
In this pod cast you mentioned that the On-yomi was used for the Chinese dervied words and the Katakana was used to show pronunciation of those words, and that the On-yomi readings are typically used for word combinations. When you show examples of word combinations in the pod cast that use the On-yomi reading, you don’t write the pronunciation in Katakana. Just wondering why.
Also, these pod casts on Kanji are すごい。
Hi Shutoh,
An excellent question! (And one that I’ve been waiting for someone to ask! (^^)v )
The hiragana/katakana representation is used to differentiate between the on-yomi and kun-yomi, so for example when teaching a kanji I might write 中（チュウ、なか） and you would immediately know that チュウ is the on-yomi and なか the kun-yomi. If I’m just showing you how a word is pronounced, however, it is most common to use hiragana, so I would write 中国（ちゅうごく）. The idea is that ちゅうごく is a “native” Japanese word, so hiragana is most appropriate.
In some cases, however, you would show the reading of a compound in katakana. Doing so is normally because the kanji represent a foreign word or name. For example, 香港（ホンコン、 Hong Kong）、餃子（ギョウザ、 Chinese potstickers), 煙草（タバコ、kanji designated for this word), 仏蘭西（フランス、 France, kanji representation), etc.
Thank you for your kind words! I’m working on the Lesson 5 kanji podcast now, and should have it up some day this week.