Small Kana

chiisai kana 小さいかな, are smaller versions of normal-sized aa あぁ. Another name for the small kana would be sutegana 捨て仮名, although that term may sometimes refer to the 

The small kana aren't simply written smaller as an stylistic choice, they have purpose and

Functions

The small kana are always different from the normal-sized kana. Don't think they are the same, ever, because they are not.

The small ya, yu and yo ゃゅょ are used to form compound kana such as niya にや written with normal-sized syllables.

The small a, i, u, e, o ァィゥェォ are often found in loan-words and express the diphthongs of their foreign pronunciations that aren't found in normal Japanese (fairu ファイル, "file"). They're also used in fading screams in manga, etc.: EEEeeeeeeeeeee... えええぇぇぇぇぇぇぇぇぇぇー.

The gakkou がっこう), and is pronounced completely differently from the normal tsu つ.

The small ke ヶin , and sometimes ka ヵ, abbreviate the ka 箇 counter, most commonly found in counting months (example: ikkagetsu 一ヶ月, "one month").

Besides the above, there are other less common small kana, such as wa ゎ, which affect the pronunciation of words slightly.

How to Type

There are multiple methods to input the small kana with an IME.

The method that works all the time is using a small kana prefix. This is often the L or X key. So typing la or xa creates ぁ. Typing ltsu creates っ. Typing lya lyu lyo creates ゃゅょ. (I prefer the L because I think I'm typing little ya).

For the small tsu, literally typing a consonant twice creates it to represent a double consonant: tte って.

Other small kana may be mapped to some combinations of letters. For example (in the IME I'm using): fa ふぁ, dhi でぃ, tyi ちぃ, etc.

The "small" kana, often called小さいかな, are smaller versions of normal-sized kana , for example:あぁ. Another name for the small kana would be捨て仮名, although that term may sometimes refer to the okurigana 送り仮名 instead.The small kana aren't simply written smaller as an stylistic choice, they have purpose and function in the Japanese language, and you don't even need to change the font size to type them The small kana aredifferent from the normal-sized kana. Don't think they are the same, ever, because they are not.The smallandゃゅょ are used to form compound kana such as nya にゃ , which is pronounced as a diphthong (syllable with two vowels) and is different fromにや written with normal-sized syllables.The smallァィゥェォ are often found in loan-words and express the diphthongs of their foreign pronunciations that aren't found in normal Japanese (ファイル, "file"). They're also used in fading screams in manga, etc.:えええぇぇぇぇぇぇぇぇぇぇー.The small tsu っ expresses double consonants (example:がっこう), and is pronounced completely differently from the normalつ.The smallヶin, and sometimesヵ, abbreviate the箇 counter, most commonly found in counting months (example:一ヶ月, "one month").Besides the above, there are other less common small kana, such asゎ, which affect the pronunciation of words slightly.