Hindi classes for kids, online

Traditional Hindi teaching assumes your child already recognises the sounds because someone in the home is making them. For a child growing up outside India this assumption does not exist, which is why so many first attempts fail: the child is asked to connect a written shape to a sound she has never had to distinguish from others.

So the work starts with sound. Short and long vowels first, because the difference between them underlies every matra. Only after that comes the shape, then the matra, then full words. It takes more time at the start and much less time afterwards. It is why a child who struggled with Hindi once can often succeed the second time she learns it properly.

This is a real and practical problem worth addressing: if you cannot read Devanagari, you cannot tell whether a page of homework is correct. The standard advice - sit with your child and go through it - becomes impossible to follow.

Two things help. Our free Hindi tests explain every answer thoroughly, so you can mark your child's work even though you cannot read the script. And after every class you receive a short note in English describing what was covered and where your child got stuck - not just a tick in an app.

This is the most searched question about Hindi learning, and there is a straightforward answer. Order matters far more than which book you use, because each step can only be learned once the previous one is solid.

1. The sounds, before any letter. Can your child distinguish between short and long vowels—between kal and kaal? If not, matras will be guesswork later, because a matra is a written mark for precisely that distinction.
2. Swar and vyanjan—the varnamala. Vowels first, then consonants, in small groups rather than all at once. A wall chart of fifty-two letters teaches recognition of the poster, not of the individual letters.
3. One matra at a time. आ first, because it's the simplest and the most common. Then इ and ई—this is where most children get stuck, because ि is written before the letter it's spoken after.
4. Two-letter words. The first genuine reading experience. This is when a child stops decoding individual shapes and begins extracting meaning from the page.
5. Sentences, then passages. Only once words are automatic, because a child still sounding out letters has no mental capacity left for understanding.

Our free online tests follow exactly this progression and explain every answer as you work through them: swar and vyanjan, then the first matras, then u, oo, e, ai, o, and au matras, then joined letters and reading comprehension. Each test also downloads as a printable PDF.

More parents ask about matras than about almost anything else in Hindi, and almost always it is the same two that cause the problem.

छोटी इ की मात्रा (ि) is written before the letter it is spoken after. This single rule breaks what a child has just learned—reading left to right, in sequence. Say it aloud once, explicitly, rather than letting them figure it out: di is written दि, and the little hook belongs to the द even though it appears in front of it.

Short versus long is heard, not seen. A child who cannot hear the difference between इ and ई will never select correctly between ि and ी, no matter how many worksheets they complete. If your child is guessing, return to saying the word slowly and listening for length—that is a listening problem, not a writing problem.

The Class 1 Hindi tests cover one matra at a time for exactly this reason, with a completed example at the top of every exercise showing one already done and explaining why.

There is no single right age, but what your child needs differs at each stage.

Four and five. Focus on sounds and speaking. Reading can come later. A child this age who hears Hindi at home and is read to in Hindi will arrive at school years ahead in script knowledge, without ever having been formally taught.

Six to eight. This is the ideal window for learning the script, because your child already understands how reading works in English and is applying an existing skill rather than starting from scratch.

Nine and above. Perfectly possible, and often quicker - an older child can learn the rule and start using it right away. What matters at this age is that your child has their own reason to learn, because what motivates younger children (parental encouragement) no longer works on its own.

Google's search auto-complete for "with fees" attached to tutoring searches reveals how many providers hide pricing. Our rates appear in full on the fees page, including the rate for families paying from outside India.

Your child's first class is completely free and no card details are required to book it. After that single class, if the honest assessment is that your child needs something different from what we provide, we will tell you directly.