Sounds with “a”, “o”, “i”
Sounds with “a”
Read the rules for short & long “A”
a → /æ/ in words with a + consonant.: cat
a → /eɪ/ in words with a + consonant + e, y or i: make
Listen carefully and repeat. Copy the speaker.
Listen and repeat
cat — Kate
mat — mate
mad — made
plan — plane
back — bake
Practice
Sounds with “o”
Read the rules for short & long “O”
o → /ɒ/ in words with o + consonants: pot, hog
o → /əʊ/ in words with o + consonants + e: home, Rome
o → /əʊ/ when o is at the end of a syllable: go, potato
Listen carefully and repeat. Copy the speaker.
rod – rode
hop – hope
not – note
dot – dote
got – go
cock – coke
Practice
Sounds with “i”
Read the rules for short and long “i”
The sound /ɪ/ can be represented by the following spelling:
i: begin, pity, his, ink, little
y: crystal, synonym, typical
u: busy
o: women
The sound /i:/ can be represented by the following spelling:
ea: team, breathe, reach, peace, tease
ee: employee, between, feel, steel, week, guarantee
ie: achieve, piece, niece
e + finale, delete, theme
i: police
eo: people
e: region
Listen carefully and repeat. Copy the speaker.
chip – cheap; fill – feel; fit – feet – feat; grin – green; hill -heal – heel; itch – each; list – least; ship – sheep; skim – scheme; whip – weep
Practice
Schwa sound /ə/
Schwa /ə/ is the most common sound in English. You can hear it in almost every word — in unstressed syllables. It can be spelled with any vowel letter. It can be found in a lot of unstressed function words: of, to, and, the (before consonants), etc.
Listen carefully and repeat. Copy the speaker.
Repeat after the speaker:
schwa sound — ə
assurance — əˈʃʊərəns
convince — kənˈvɪns
assist — əˈsɪst
Practice
Now your turn!
Record yourself saying these words: rot – wrote, dip – deep, crack – cake, still – steel, hop – hope, fat – fate, fill – feel, bit – beat, rid – read, pack – pace, rat – rate, pop – pope.
