Russian uses the Cyrillic alphabet, supposedly devised in the 9th century by St. Cyril, a monk from Thessaloniki, Greece who went to Moravia located in the current Czech Republic, to convert the Slavs to Christianity. Hence the similarities between the Cyrillic alphabet and the Greek alphabet. By the 10th century the Cyrillic alphabet was adopted by the Russians along with Christianity. Later on, the alphabet was modernized by Peter the Great in the 18th century and later on in 1918 during the Bolshevik revolution. As it currently stands now, the Russian alphabet consists of 33 characters.

Russian is an inflected language meaning that the endings of nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and verbs change depending on how they are used in the sentence. In English, word order is what tells us the grammatical function of a word in a sentence. ie. "Mary hit Bob" versus "Bob hit Mary". Because Russian is inflected, word order is not as important since the grammatical function of the word is embedded in the word itself. If you're coming from an English background, these inflections can appear intimidating to learn but there are strict patterns that are followed which makes learning them easier.

Every Russian word has a single vowel that is stressed. An accent mark is placed over this vowel to show where the stress is located. Such accent marks are not used in Russian literature but are only used to help those who are starting out learning Russian.

Pronunciaton of Russian words will require some study. Many vowels are pronounced differently based on whether or not they are accented. Additionally Russian consonants can be divided into "soft" and "hard" consonants. It is advisable to pay particular attention to the Pronunciation section for developing a proper Russian accent.

Russian handwriting is quite florid. More importantly, several letters change their form quite significantly. It is not necessarily important to be able to write and read Russian handwriting, but it is advisable to practice it occasionally. Further information is in the Handwriting sections.

The next step is to learn the Russian alphabet. The alphabet has been broken down into 4 sections to help make learning it easier. These 4 sections are followed by an alphabet Practice section which will help you drill the alphabet into your long term memory. Once you have a feel for the Russian alphabet, study the Pronunciation section. This section will move your understanding from letters into actual words. Once you have a grasp of pronouncing Russian words, it's time to move onto the lessons.