Щ щ — shcha
«shcha» is a consonant of Ukrainian, the “Ukrainian Cyrillic” script, read as “shch as in "fresh cheese"”. Two sounds in one letter, sh right into ch: borshch — the soup — is spelled with it and says its name. For example, in the word “борщ” — borscht. The Ukrainian alphabet has 33 letters in total. Never a long soft sh: this letter always breaks into sh plus ch, back to back. It appears, for example, in the word “ще один” — one more.
In short
| Character | Щ щ |
| Name | shcha |
| Sound | shch as in "fresh cheese" |
| What it is | a consonant |
In our course the character comes 30th of 33, its neighbours in the course are ш and ь, appears in 80 words of this site.
How it sounds
Two sounds in one letter, sh right into ch: borshch — the soup — is spelled with it and says its name
The character in a word
A lone character is hard to remember: memory holds on to meaning, and a letter has none. The word it stands in provides that anchor.
- борщborscht
The character in the “two familiar shapes that lie” group
The letters are letters you know; the sounds are not. The h-looking letter is a breathy voiced sound with no English twin, while the hard g of "go" hides behind a rare letter of its own. And the shch letter is always two sounds: sh plus ch.
Words with this character
How to remember this character
A single letter is the hardest thing to remember: memory has nothing to hold on to — a character has no meaning. A three-step loop works: see the character, try to recall the sound (for «shcha» it is “shch as in "fresh cheese"”, as in the word “борщ”), see the right answer.
And come back to it the next day, not in an hour: a check a day or two later beats a check the same day. Nobody holds the whole alphabet — 33 letters — at once.
- It is better to test yourself the next day than at the end of the same session. That is why a word comes back to you tomorrow.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · g = 0.82 when tested a day or two later, against 0.56 on the same day.
- Studying a little every day gets more into your head than spending the same total time in one sitting.checked many timesDonovan & Radosevich, 1999, Journal of Applied Psychology 84(5) · 63 studies compared, difference d = 0.46 — a sizeable figure for a learning effect.
Frequently asked
How does the Ukrainian character щ read?
As “shch as in "fresh cheese"” — it is a consonant of the “Ukrainian Cyrillic” script. Two sounds in one letter, sh right into ch: borshch — the soup — is spelled with it and says its name. For example, in the word “борщ” — borscht.
What is the letter щ called?
Shcha. A character's name and its sound are different things in the Ukrainian script: it is called “shcha” and reads as “shch as in "fresh cheese"”. Learn the second one: the name only helps when the alphabet is recited aloud.
What can щ be confused with?
Never a long soft sh: this letter always breaks into sh plus ch, back to back. Similar characters are best studied side by side and deliberately compared: learned on different days, they stay separate and get mixed up at their first meeting inside a word.