These are important pages to look at.

The hiragana has been displayed using four

different fonts and it gives you an opportunity to see what strokes are important and
what is just decorative.

There are only 46 hiragana characters to learn, which you will notice is a lot less than
the number of syllables you learned in Module 1. Later you will learn how to take
those symbols and add marks to change the sound. You will also notice that the chart
on the Hiragana Tutor page reads from right to left. Many of the charts are written
that way because Japanese is traditionally read from top to bottom and right to left.
Newspapers are still written that way. However, it can also be written in the Western
style, left to right and top to bottom. Many documents use the Western style
because it is easier to incorporate foreign words into the sentences.
HIRAGANA FONT