ひらがな 6!? Ok, I know that you gotta be thinking to yourself, “Now Arcsis, I thought you said there where 46 hiragana. How can we be on to lesson 6? You lied to me!”
If you got that impression, you’re not alone. I felt the same way when I discovered there were more than 46.

There really are 46 basic hiragana, but then there’s variations on those. You don’t need to learn to write any new ones, only what they mean when to add a tenten or a maru. (These were what I was taught to call them. In Kana de Manga, they’re called a dakuten & handakuten)

So what is a tenten? It’s the 2 little lines on the top right that make ka turn into ga

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And Maru actually means circle. So adding a maru to ha makes pa.

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Lets take a look at the 5 lines that change, shall we?

There are several lines that change-

The K line changes to G with tenten:
[Pronounced GA GIE GOO GEH GO]

が  ぎ  ぐ  げ  ご
ga gi gu ge go

Sa Line changes to Z with tenten:
[Pronounced ZA JEE ZOO ZEH ZO]

ざ  じ  ず  ぜ  ぞ
za ji* zu ze zo    <–(Note that じ(ji) is irregular)

Ta Line changes to D with tenten:
[Pronounced DA JEE ZOO DEH DO]

だ  ぢ  ず  で  ど
da ji* zu* de do    <–(Note that ぢ(ji) & ず(zu) are irregular)

Now, there are 2 changes for the ha line-
one with a tenten to make it ba,
& one with the maru to make it pa.

Ba Line:
[Pronounced BA BEE BOO BEH BO]

ば  び  ぶ  べ  ぼ
ba bi bu be bo

Pa Line:
[Pronounced PA PEE POO PEH PO]

ぱ  ぴ  ぷ ぺ  ぽ
pa pi pu pe po

That’s it! be sure to practice & check out this vid on how to draw them!