The stroke order!
しシ んン
start at the top left, move down, pull diagonally to the top right
つツ そソ
Start at the top left, move right, pull diagonally to the bottom left(for そ, just look at the top half of the hiragana stroke to see the katakana).
If this is obvious and common knowledge, I’m sorry.
I just got so excited that I finally managed to figure out the difference between these.
Good job! I found this confusing too. I still find it confusing at times and I have to take a moment when reading katakana.
I think katakana is so tricky. Not only because some of them look alike but because of the way japanese language “transforms” an english word into a japanese one with the help of katakana.
So, good job! Being able to figure out the difference between them is important in the beginning. It won’t frustrate you later, when you get to read a text.
But be sure to read words in katakana or you’ll forget it. Remembering is great but being able to actually read and understand katakana words are better!
It’s obviously obvious and common knowledge. The least you should be able to do is reading Hiragana and Katana.
However, we all go through this confusion and it feels damn good to finally overcome it. Heck, even later you do mistakes sometimes especially when the characters are kind of pixelated or too small(in a video game for example).
Now get ready to have the same problem but with Kanji 
I also read somewhere that another way to see the differences between them is to look at whether the lines are more horizontal or vertical. ‘shi’ and ‘n’ have more horizontal lines while ‘tsu’ and ‘so’ are more vertical.
I learned that when you need “two needles to saw” the needles need to point down. so ツ and ソ must have an vertical line
This topic was automatically closed 365 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.