I tried some Chinese learning software on iPhone and a lot of them are similar. One app that catches my eye is iLearn Chinese (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/i-learn-chinese-read-write/id389073069?mt=8) because it actually explains the character origins, at least for a few hundred of them. Now those weird characters seem to be more meaningful and I can almost write some of them just after a few minutes. By the way, I was able to practice writing on the screen of my phone. It also has a Lite version which is listed under the same developer.