ナ

This resembles a bent nail. It’s spelled “na” like the first two letters of “nail”, and sounds like “nah”.

二

This character looks like the sideways creases in a person's knee. Spelled "ni", it makes the same sound as "knee".

ヌ

Imagine that this is the front of a boat with a large log piercing the hull. They’ll need a new boat. This character is spelled “nu” and sounds like “new”.

ネ

Imagine that this character looks like a telephone pole with a bird’s nest on top. It’s spelled “ne” like the first two letters of “nest”.

ノ

This looks like the diagonal slash across signs like "no smoking", "no parking" etc. It sounds like "no".