Vowels and Consonants

Pronunciation versus Communication (continued)

Let’s take a moment to consider two common sounds that can lead to a breakdown of effective communication if mispronounced, short i /I/ and long e /i/. Imagine, there you are as the teacher in front of the class pronouncing words such as this, ship, fit, and mitt. Isabella, your newest ELL from a Spanish language background actually hears: these, sheep, feet, and meet. The reason for this is due to the fact that Isabella is only able to hear the front, high sound /i/ that exists in Spanish. She cannot hear the lax and short articulation of the English /I/ because this sound does not exist in her first language. Because she does not have the prior knowledge to immediately recognize it, she cannot say it yet. In order to gain command of this new sound, Isabella will have to program it into her mental schema. This requires accessing the fundamental language learning faculties (that were developed when she learned her first language) and reconfiguring them to include this new sound. The skill to discriminate (hear) a sound must occur before producing (speaking) it is possible.

One effective strategy for helping students to discriminate between sounds is through multi-sensory association. If, for example, we show Isabella the color pink while we repeat the sound /I/ in the word pink, followed the color green while we repeat the sound /i/ in the word green, she will begin to associate the short i /I/ sound with the sound in the word pink as well as the color itself. Likewise, she will begin to associate the sound of long e /i/ with the vowel sound in green as well as the color green. This type of multisensory activity activates both hearing and sight and creates multiple mental pathways to the new learning and helps students to discriminate the difference in these two phonemes (i and /I/). This activity can be modified to teach the discrimination of other sounds as well.

Click on the projector to view an example of a Color Response Card activity that helps ELLs develop the short i /i/ and long e /I/ sound.

CONSONANTS

Consonants are classified according to the cavity through which the air escapes the mouth (oral) or the nose (nasal) and the place and manner of articulation. For example, where and how the airstream is interrupted and the presence or absence of vocal cord vibration (voiced or voiceless).

Nasal and oral sounds are produced when the soft palate rises or lowers (see chart below), thus opening or closing one of the two cavities. All vowels are oral in English and Spanish; however, French and Portuguese have nasal vowels. English consonants /m/, /n/ and /ŋ/ are the only nasal phonemes in English. Spanish has a palatal /ŋ/ in words as señor.

If we travel from the front part of the mouth towards the back, we find the following places of articulation: Bilabial, labio-dental, dental, alveolar, palatal, velar, and glottal. Manner of articulation is based on the way the air is managed inside the mouth. It can be held, then let go explosively, stop or plosives or; the organs involved in the interruption can narrow, then open abruptly, letting the air go quickly, affricates; the narrowing is kept and the air escapes with friction, fricatives; the air escapes through the sides of the mouth lateral; or the tongue moves toward the hard palate while the tip slightly moves backward towards the velum or soft palate, retroflex.

Click here to view an illustration of our consonant system.