English Spelling Should be More Phonetic
The interest in the scientific description of sound has led to the invention of the International Phonetic Association (IPA) in 1888. IPA is an association to develop a phonetic alphabet to symbolise the sound of all languages. According to Fromkin, Rodman, Hyams. (2003), the use of Roman alphabet in the English writing system had inspired the IPA to utilise many Roman letters in the invention of phonetic symbols. Unlike ordinary letters that may or may not represent the same sounds in the same or different languages, these alphabetic characters have a consistent value (Fromkin et al., 2003).
According to the phonetic transcription which is governed by the principle, “One Sound, One Symbol”, there should be a list of 26 distinct sounds in English alphabet since there are only 26 letters in English alphabet which can be further divided into consonants and vowels. However, there are 42 different phonemes for the 26 letters in the English alphabet. There are 15 vowel sounds and 27 consonant sounds in English language. The 15 vowels are /i/, /ɪ/, /e/, /ɛ/, /æ/, /ʊ/, /uː/, /ʌ/, /o/,/ɔ/, /a/, /ə/, /aj/, /aw/,and /ɔj/ while the consonants are /p/, /b/, /f/, /v/, /m/, /w/, / /, /ð/, /t/, /d/, /s/, /z/, /n/, /l/, /r/, /tʃ/, /dʒ/, /ʃ/, /ʒ/, /j/,/k/, /g/, /ŋ/,/ h/, /?/ and /hw/ (Fromkin et al., 2003).
Hilton & Hyder (1992) stated that some English words are not spelt as they are pronounced; the pronunciation can also vary according to one’s regional accents as well as from one English-speaking country to another. Cases where English words are not spelt as pronounced can be seen in words like business, /bIznəs/ and what, /wɒt/. Rubba (2003) stated that it is important to remember that an IPA symbol always has the same sound which differs from English spelling. For example, the English letter s has various sound values in English spelling, for instance the words that are pronounced as /s/ like 'so', 'bus' and the /z/ of words like 'easy', 'busy'. In IPA, the s in English letter always represents the sound /s/ in 'see', and 'bus'. The sounds represented by the letter s in 'easy', 'busy', are transcribed phonetically with /z/. Thus, this clearly shows that the English spelling has violates the principles of the phonetic transcription, “One Sound, One symbol” (Rubba, 2003).
It is always a problem for English learners since they often find it hard when they discover some English words that do not actually follow the “One Sound, One Symbol” principle.
In an experiment, around 350 Chicagoans, were recorded reading the following paragraph, titled “Too Hot for Hockey”, this script was written specifically to force readers to vocalize vowels “that reveal how closely key sounds resemble the accent's dominant traits” (Wbez). The paragraph is as follows:
the spelling of certain words can seem illogical and may have no other similar spelling in
Lila is a second grade student who participated in a Primary Spelling Inventory and the reflection of her results are as follows. After her spelling inventory was finalized I noted that the student spelled ten of the twenty-six words correctly giving her a power score of 10/26. Most of the words that she mastered was in the Late emergent and early of Letter Name Alphabetic stage. I also noted that Lila accomplished 36 features out of 56 total features during her spelling inventory. Based on the results of the Primary Spelling Inventory the orthographic features that Lila recognizes are the consonants, short vowel, blends, and is familiar with diagraphs. Although she mastered blends which falls in the late Letter Name-Alphabetic stage she failed to master diagraphs which is the middle stage.
African American English also has different sound systems than Standard English although not all sounds are different. An example is variation in the use of consonants. As an example, when two consonants appear at the end of the word, they are often reduced examples include t in the word west which is reduced to wes as in wes side instead of west side. Exceptions to this case have been noted to occur especially when the next word begins with a vowel as in west in west
In the Vietnamese language, there is a range of 19 to 21 consonant phonemes, which differs in result of how a word is pronounced. A consonant such as “/p/” only comes about when a word is borrowed from the French language. Other consonants experience more pronunciation such as “/tʰ/”, which occurs when there is an exhale of air that is followed by the words release. The Vietnamese language is also made up of 72 vowels. Technically, there are 12 vowels in the Vietnamese language. However, the language consists of six tones which therefore leads to a total of 72 distinct vowels. (Thompson 2013).
One of the first steps of learning to read is understanding how letters and sounds correspond to each other. (Goldin-Meadow, S., & Mayberry, R. I, 2001, p.222) During preschool, grapheme-phoneme knowledge is a predictor of a discrepancy in reading later on in school. (Beal-Alvarez, J. S., Lederberg, A. R., & Easterbrooks, S. R, 2012, p.39) Students who are deaf are missing the phoneme part of grapheme-phoneme correspond...
In the partial alphabetic phase individuals pay attention to different letters in a word in order to attempt its pronunciation, usually the first and final letters of a word are focused on, Ehri referred to this as ‘phonetic cue reading’. This is a skill which along with others which shows phonological awareness.
There are simple sounds that make up the overall pronunciation of the word. These individual sounds are described as phonemes. Knowing what letters make what sound lead There are a lot of methods that would help a child who is hearing impaired to learn how to read. One process is that they would create mental images of sounds to help them remember what words are spelled certain ways and vice versa. Another way is called visual phonics. This is a way that students are hearing impaired can not only see the sound but have a visual
These three groups were then asked to complete three different tasks. The first was to repeat and segment 20 different words (5 consonant-vowel-consonant, 5 CCVC, 5 CVCC, and 5 CCVCC) and two overall scores were administered to the participants. Both scores were out of a maximum of 20 points; the first score was based on giving 1 point for each correctly analyzed word, and the second score was based on giving 1 point for correctly analyzing medial vowels.
As explained phonological awareness develops through a gradual process of refinement of sounds, starting with broad distinctions between general sounds, moving ultimately towards fine gradations of phonemes (Barratt-Pugh, Rivalland, Hamer & Adams, 2005a). Studies David Hornsby and Lorraine Wilson from suggesting that children learn phonic before they learn how to read and write. Children at young ages explore the relationships in sound and letter, this leads there phonics to a graphic symbol.
New languages are always overwhelming.English is difficult language to learn, especially if it isn’t practiced often. The english language includes rules that can be frustrating to get a grip of. Many International students face the fear of not being understood or not pronouncing something correct...
The vowels “I” sound in pin and “e” sound in pen may sound with the same vowel sound if it is preceded by a nasal sounds (n or m)
1.2. PHONOLOGICAL BACKGROUND. This part of the first section presents the inventory of Hasawi phonemes as a good reference for Results section.
All languages have vast variety of speech sound. Phonology have essentials terms in which each of them show the difference between how phonology is differ than phonetics as its not responsible for how to articulate. These phonological terms known as : phoneme , allophone, clear & dark l , syllabic l, minimal pairs , assimilation ,linking r , intrusive r, aspiration , consonant structure & syllable structure. A phoneme is a meaningful sound which shows the difference between two sounds which can change the meaning of word like : . Although allophones are the variation of same sound but they don’t change the meaning of it like < pin / spin >. However