wa / わ
The first of the W row — two strokes 'wa' that anchor rivers, gardens, and the word for 'I'.
Pronunciation
The character わ represents the syllable 'wa', a soft 'w' followed by 'a' as in 'father'. It is the first character of the わ-row. The particle は is also pronounced 'wa' when used as the topic marker — but the character わ is distinct from は. Take care: わ shares its left side with ね and れ.
わ opens the W row and shows up in everyday vocabulary — 私 (watashi, "I"), 川 (kawa, "river"), 庭 (niwa, "garden"), 笑う (warau, "to laugh"). Be careful: わ looks confusingly similar to ね and れ — all three share the same left-side vertical anchor. The difference is the right side: わ flows openly to the lower right with no loop and no hook, ね closes into a tight loop, and れ hooks back up to the upper right.
How to write わ
Trace わ on the canvas at the top of the page. Animated arrows show each stroke's direction; trace along them and the stroke fills in. Each numbered step below explains what that stroke does.
A short vertical stroke on the left — straight or with a faint inward curve. Same opening as ね and れ.
A long flowing stroke that begins at the upper right, drops down past the bottom of the first vertical, then sweeps openly to the lower right with a smooth tail. Unlike ね (closed loop) and れ (upward hook), わ just flows out and ends. That open flow is what marks わ.
Origin
Hiragana わ evolved from the cursive form of the kanji 和 (wa) — meaning "harmony" or "Japan-style." The kanji's left radical (禾, grain) compressed into the small left vertical; the right radical (口, mouth) flowed into the open looping right-side body of わ.
Common words starting with わ
Printable practice sheet
Print this worksheet to practice writing わ by hand — the top row shows the stroke order to trace, then fill the blank squares.
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