通学
つうがく · tsuugaku · JLPT N3 · noun
school
🎒🚌 通学 = pass through + study: your daily trip to school
通 (tsuu) means to pass through or travel along, as in 交通 traffic. 学 (gaku) is study, as in 学校 school. Its pair is 通勤 tsuukin, commuting to work: same 通, but 勤 means work.
通 — 辵 (辶) walk + 甬 yǒng (phonetic)
通 is a semantic-phonetic compound. The 辶 (chuò) component means 'walk' or 'movement', giving the meaning of going through or passing. 甬 (yǒng), originally depicting a hanging bell or a path, supplies the sound. Together they convey 'to pass through, communicate, connect'.
学 — hands 𦥑 + roof 冖 + child 子
Originally 學, depicting two hands manipulating something (often interpreted as counting rods or the 爻 trigram symbols) under a roof, with a child 子 below — a child learning under instruction. The simplified form 学 replaces the top with a stylized 龸. Core meaning has always been 'to study, learn'.