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Alphabet & Pronunciation
English alphabet, vowels, key consonants, silent letters, and basic pronunciation rules
a, e, i, o, u
English has 5 vowels; each can be short or long
ay, ee, eye, oh, yoo
b, c, d, f, g, h, j...
21 consonants; their letter names differ from their spoken sounds
bee, see, dee, ef, jee, aych...
short a — /æ/
cat, man, hat, apple — short a vowel sound
/æ/ — cat, man
long a — /eɪ/
cake, name, late, day — long a vowel sound
/eɪ/ — cake, name
th — /θ/ and /ð/
"think", "three" = voiceless /θ/; "the", "this" = voiced /ð/
/θ/ think / /ð/ the
Silent letters
knife [nayf], write [rayt], know [noh] — k and w are silent
-tion / -sion suffixes
nation, action = -shun; vision, television = -zhun
-shun / -zhun
ch — /tʃ/
church, chicken, choose — ch is always /tʃ/ in native words
/tʃ/ — church, chicken
Word stress: first syllable
TA-ble, HA-ppy, WIN-dow — most 2-syllable nouns stress syllable 1
Hello / Good morning / Goodbye
Greetings change by time of day: morning, afternoon, evening, night
heh-LOH / good MOR-ning / good-BYE
