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I'm a new learner of a day & am confused by my Japanese learning app that puts au & ue together with a, i, u, e, o under a section called Japanese vowels. Other places say there is only 5 vowels so why is my app including au & ue as vowels?

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    Do you have a screenshot?
    – naruto
    Jul 21, 2020 at 1:11
  • @naruto don't know how to add one but i got a screenshot. on mobile.
    – verve
    Jul 21, 2020 at 1:13
  • If you're on a phone you should see "Add Picture" button on top of the question editor. Please tap "edit" to begin editing your question.
    – naruto
    Jul 21, 2020 at 1:14
  • nope, on the android app no such thing
    – verve
    Jul 21, 2020 at 1:16
  • What about the name of the app? Something else to work with?
    – Leebo
    Jul 21, 2020 at 3:13

2 Answers 2

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Short answer: No, あう and うえ are not "Japanese vowels". You are right, Japanese has only 5 vowels, あ, い, う, え and お.

The app you are referring to in the comments is Skritter, not Skitter.

The lesson "hiragana" contains different sets of vocabulary words to learn along hiragana, and they are classified in groups. I think it's just silly that they decided to group the words "au" あう and "ue" うえ along with the vowels in a particular group, its misleading:

enter image description here

あう and うえ are just Japanese words that happen to be formed by vowels only, but they are no vowels itself. If you click on the section Japanese vowels, you will find that whereas あ, い, う, え, お are marked as just "hiragana", あう and うえ are listed with their meanings as a word, namely "to meet" and "up, above":

enter image description here

I believe that the (poor) reason why they decided to place the words あう and うえ with the vowels is that they are formed by only hiragana vowels, but I think this approach is prone to confuse the beginner. Moreover, there are other words formed by vowels only (い "stomach", え "picture") that are not in that group, so I don't see the point on grouping あう and うえ along with the vowels... All the other words presented in the lesson seem to be grouped by consonants (S category, T category and so on).

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    very confusing to a beginner! glad i asked the question cause moving foward in the app will just be more confusing. they charge 20 dollars a month to use their app but couldn't even explain the weird groupings. to me as a brand new learner i thought "oh these must be special vowels that have meaning somehow". also, appreciate the posted the images a lot.
    – verve
    Jul 22, 2020 at 2:40
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Follow these steps to add an image to your question from your android mobile phone:

  1. Access japanese.stackexchange.com from Google Chrome Android:

  2. Go to your question an click on "edit"

enter image description here

  1. Click on "Add picture"

enter image description here

  1. (Arrow #1 in the screenshot below) Click on "Click here to upload tour image"
  2. Browse your phone and select the screenshot you took
  3. (Arrow #2 in the screenshot below) Click on "Add Picture"

enter image description here

  1. Save your edit

Once you have uploaded your screenshot the community might be able to help you.


Edit: you can upload a picture from the application also. See:

  1. Once you are in your question, click on "edit"

enter image description here

  1. The text editor will open. Click anywhere on the text, and the edit buttons will appear.
  2. Click on the small button with camera icon to upload an image

enter image description here


Second edit:

You can also get the Stack Exchange app to ask you to open a page in Chrome or Stack Exchange instead of opening ot directly in the app, if it helps:

  1. Go to Settings enter image description here

  2. Go to Apps enter image description here

  3. Go to Apps enter image description here

  4. Type "Stack" and click on the result Stack Exchange enter image description here

  5. Click on "Open supported links in the app" and make sure that "Ask every time" is selected. enter image description here

Then, the next time you try to edit the question from Chrome, the system will ask you to choose. Choose Chrome (not the app) and follow the steps I posted above.

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  • thanks for steps but every time i try to use the website on chrome android it auto-opens the app no matter what i try. always stuck using only the app.
    – verve
    Jul 21, 2020 at 11:06
  • @verve I added the steps for uploading a picture from the app. Can you try it please?
    – jarmanso7
    Jul 21, 2020 at 11:16
  • it says "something went wrong etc. try again" in a red bar on top of this app over & over again when uploading pic. this app needs an update.
    – verve
    Jul 21, 2020 at 16:02
  • @verve Yes, I encountered this problem too. That's why I posted yet an alternative solution. Can you read an apply my second edit?
    – jarmanso7
    Jul 21, 2020 at 16:03
  • my note 9 os 9 doesn't have that setting after going into Apps & clicking on it
    – verve
    Jul 21, 2020 at 16:05

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