Today, read kyo, is one of the first words you learn in Japanese, and it is a lovely one to practise writing because it teaches you something about how the language works. It is written as a compound of two kanji, each simple, and learning to produce it from memory reinforces both characters and the word at once. Here is how.
The word and its two characters
Today is written with two kanji: the character for now, and the character for sun or day. Together they form the everyday word for today, with the special compound reading kyo. Each character on its own is simple and very common, the sort of character you will use constantly, so they are well worth being able to write. And because the word is a compound of two characters you can learn separately, writing today from memory is really writing two small, familiar shapes in order.
Writing the first character: now
The character for now is a small character with a roof-like top and a short stroke beneath. Following the stroke order conventions, you write the top part first, working top to bottom and the way the rules predict for a covering component, then the stroke below. It is only a few strokes, and the main thing to get right is the balance: the top should sit cleanly over what is beneath it. Practise it from memory rather than copying, because producing it is what makes it stick, the point at the heart of recognition versus recall.
Writing the second character: sun or day
The second character, sun or day, is one of the most fundamental in the writing system: a simple enclosure with a stroke inside, written outside before inside and closed last, following the box rule. It appears inside a huge number of other kanji, so learning to write it cleanly pays off far beyond this one word. Like the first character, produce it from memory, attend to the order, and keep the proportions even.
The two characters at a glance
今日 (today) is two simple characters with a special combined reading:
| Character | Meaning | Strokes |
|---|---|---|
| 今 | now | 4 |
| 日 | sun, day | 4 |
Eight strokes in total, and both are common N5 characters. The twist is the reading: 今日 is read きょう (kyō), a special whole-word reading rather than the sum of the two characters’ usual readings.
Putting them together
To write today, you simply write the two characters in order, left to right: now, then sun or day. That is the whole word. Writing the compound, rather than the two characters separately, is the valuable part, because you are practising the combination and the reading kyo together, not just the individual shapes. This is the same idea we cover in how to practise writing kanji compounds: real words are compounds, and practising them reinforces the characters in a meaningful context, the testing effect working on the whole package.
A worked first session
Your first session with today might go like this. You see today, kyo, and try to write it from memory. You get the sun character but fumble the now character, so you reveal the guide, study it, and write the whole word again. The second time, the next day, you get both. By the third spaced attempt, today comes out cleanly. In the process you have not learned one thing but three: the now character, the sun character, and the word they make together. That is the efficiency of compound practice, and it is why simple early words like today are such good practice material.
Build from here
Today is a perfect early brick because everything about it generalizes. The two characters appear in countless other words, the compound structure is how most vocabulary is built, and the produce-then-check loop is the method for all of kanji. Add the next common words the same way, each a compound of characters you learn from memory, and your writing grows word by word. For a single-character starting point, see how to write the kanji for water, and for the producing method, drawing kanji from memory. Kanji Write Practice is built for exactly this, free in early access.
Why the special reading is worth noticing
There is a nice lesson hidden in the word for today. Its reading, kyo, does not come from the ordinary readings of either character; it is a special reading assigned to the whole compound, the kind of irregular reading Japanese sprinkles through its most common words. This is worth noticing as a beginner because it teaches you not to expect every compound’s reading to be predictable from its parts. Some compounds read exactly as their characters suggest; others, especially very common everyday words like today, tomorrow, and yesterday, have their own special readings you simply learn as wholes. Writing the compound from memory, with its reading attached, is actually the perfect way to absorb these irregulars, because you practise the shape and the sound together as a unit rather than trying to derive one from the other. So when you drill today, you are learning two characters, a word, and a small but important fact about how Japanese readings work. That is a lot of value from one short, common word, which is exactly why early compounds make such rich practice.
