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Things to know about Ukrainian

Ukrainian is spoken primarily in Ukraine. It is an Eastern Slavonic language, and is closely related to both Russian and Belorussian.

Using Ukrainian Lessons

Ukrainian uses a Cyrillic alphabet, similar but not identical to that of Russian. Ukrainian text is written from left to right, the same as English.

Some content in this application shows the native Ukrainian characters along with the transliterations of the Ukrainian words and phrases. Others may have just native characters or just transliterations. If your content only shows native Ukrainian characters, or shows the text in native characters before the transliterations, you will need to type the Ukrainian characters in various activities and assessments. Follow the instructions below to do so.

Note: If your content only shows transliterations, or shows transliterations before native characters, see Using Transliterated Ukrainian Lessons further down.

To type Ukrainian characters:

  1. Position your cursor somewhere where you can type, and verify that the virtual keyboard layout is set to Ukrainian.
  2. Locate the character you want on the virtual keyboard, then click on it or press the corresponding key on your physical keyboard. Capital letters and certain punctuation marks, such as the question mark, are available by holding down the Shift key. A few additional characters are available by holding down the Ctrl and Alt keys at the same time. See Typing special scripts for details.
  3. If you want to type a stress mark over a Ukrainian vowel, type the vowel, then select the version with the stress mark from the list of possibilities which appears. These stress marks are not part of the standard Ukrainian spelling system, but are often used to teach pronunciation. You do not have to type the stress marks to have your answers marked as correct, but you can include them if you prefer. However, if you type a stress mark where it does not belong, your answer will be considered incorrect.

See Typing special scripts for additional typing instructions.

Using Transliterated Ukrainian Lessons

Some Ukrainian lessons in this application may be transliterated - written with the letters of the Latin alphabet. Transliterated lessons can help you master vocabulary and pronunciation before tackling a new writing system.

If your content only shows transliterations, or shows transliterations before native characters, you do not have to type actual Ukrainian characters. You can type the transliterations in any activity or assessment that requires typed answers. Transliterated Ukrainian does not require any special characters.

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