母 means mom. Why is the radical called window? We’re made to learn a new definition for a character that has a predefined definition already… Its annoying and unnecessary. Currently we call the マ radical mama. Why not just make it ma, the way you actually read it as a katakana.
On a similar note, the definition of radical 刀 is sword, but the definition of the vocabulary 刀 is katana. Why not just make both katana??
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WaniKani’s radical names are used for mnemonic components in later kanji. You’re free to call the radical what you wish (there’s a place to add user synonyms, which are answers that WaniKani will also accept as correct) but you may need to come up with your own mnemonics later on.
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Okay I get that, that’s the whole gimmick of wanikani. But the stories around the radicals are already so ridiculous I feel they could easily have replaced window with mom. On your second point, if I call the radical what I want, I get the answer wrong. Which is what I just did with 母, prompting this post 笑
Except you can add a user synonym and then you’ll be marked correct.
In any case, they’re not the same anyway. The window radical is 毋, while the kanji is 母. The former has a vertical line while the latter has two drops.
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Aye, you need to teach it to WaniKani first.
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I just figured out how to add synonyms. Thanks homie
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And wow I didnt even realize the difference. You are totally right, they are different. So actually I will keep it as window. I missed that tiny difference. Thanks.
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It’s totally cool to make synonyms for radicals! You might have to tweak later kanji mnemonics that rely on it. For example (totally making this up) there might be a kanji where the mnemonic is “you open a WINDOW to see a GAMBLER losing all his money”, and you’ll need to adjust it accordingly to match the mnemonic you’ve chosen.
“my MOTHER was a GAMBLER” ezpz笑.
Another user pointed out to me that the window radical is structurally different from the mom kanji so its a moot point anyway
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LOL yup that one works! honestly some of the mnemonics are so silly. 
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Well, 母 can also be written with a vertical line, like in 海
The difference was that in 母(or 每) the last strokes are horizontal, dot, dot (or horizontal then vertical in semicursive)、 while for 毋 (poison, ドク) it is vertical then horizontal
…
but it seems that in official Japanese stroke order they deaided to change it for new forms, so 每 has traditional order while 毎 follows 毋 stroke order.
Do you have a source for that?
i mean, as a component.
Like in 毎 (was 每)
The official Joyo list has this:
(Not sure what this means for other kanji that have this kind of component though)
Like for 母 itself, there’s no such mention:
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How about other kanji that are typically written like 母, such as 苺?
Unfortunately 苺 isn’t a Joyo kanji 
Well, uh… I knew that. This, however, is a travesty.
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Yeah, I noticed that when I searched which is why I was asking for a source. It seems like maybe 母 is the old form and 毋 is a modern form that just happened to not be used for 母 itself.
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Or it could be a simple process of “kanji with more strokes got simplified, but 母 is already simple enough so we’ll leave it as it is”. It seems that there are calligraphy styles where the two strokes get united though:
Not sure what to do with this information.
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If you’re interested in the history behind Kanjis I can recommend this website:
It has some really good and helpful information on a good amount of Kanji, for example:
