Explaining Vowels
Define the difference between vowels and consonants. Tell your students that a vowel is a sound made by blowing air out of the mouth without closing your mouth or teeth. Next explain that a consonant is a sound made by moving part of the mouth, lips, tongue, or teeth. Use examples to illustrate the difference. For example, ask your students to say "e" together. Explain that their mouth, tongue, teeth, and lips did not move. Next ask them to pronounce “b.” Ask them what they did with their mouths. They should respond that they briefly closed their lips. It may take a few tries or lessons before your students understand the concept, especially if they are young. Keep going and provide plenty of different examples.
Show the 5 vowel letters in the English language. Write A, E, O, U, and I up on a whiteboard or on a piece of paper. Tell your students that these 5 letters can be combined to pronounce different sounds. As you show each vowel letter, ask the class or student to repeat after you. This will help teach them how to pronounce each vowel. Keep repeating several times for each vowel, and reinforce the lesson on different days.
Tell the students that y can sometimes act as a vowel. The letter y can present a challenge for students learning vowels. Sometimes y is a vowel and sometimes it is a consonant. Y is used as a vowel instead of a long i or long e at the end of words. Boy, pay, fly, busy, many, and my are all good examples of this. Y is a consonant when it comes at the beginning of words, such as yacht, yellow, or yes. While y is most often found as a vowel at the end of words, some older words are exceptions. This includes myth and hymn.
Describe what vowel digraphs and diphthongs are. Vowel digraphs are 2 vowel letters written together. When you pronounce these 2 letters, you make a single vowel sound, called a diphthong. There are 8 diphthongs in the English language, but there are 18 different digraphs to spell them. The different digraphs are ai, ay, ee, ea, ie, ei, oo, ou, ow, oe, oo, ue, ey, ay, oy, oi, au, and aw. Show each digraph written on a card with a picture of a word that uses that digraph. For example, show "Boy" on a card with a picture of a boy. This can help visual learners grasp the lesson. Digraphs that end in y or w tend to come at the end of words. Some words have 2 vowels in a row, but these vowels are pronounced separately. These include chaos and violet. Remind your students are not diphthongs because they are not pronounced together as 1 sound.
State that every word in the English language contains at least 1 vowel. This is helpful if your students are learning how to write or spell. Remind them that they always need a vowel if they’re spelling a word.
Pronouncing Vowels
Ask the students to repeat the vowel after you. Do 1 vowel at a time. Start by saying the vowel sound. Ask your students to repeat it after you. Do this 2-3 times or more until your students have mastered the sound before moving onto the next vowel. Speak slowly as you do this. This is especially important for non-native speakers or adult learners who may not be able to tell the difference between vowels. Repeat this exercise over several different lessons on different days to reinforce it.
Isolate the vowels in the word. Say a simple, 1 syllable word. Write it down in front of the students. Ask your students to say only the vowel in the word. Remind them not to use any consonants. For example, say the word “cat.” Ask your students to say the vowel in the word, which is a short a. It may take students a few tries before they start doing it on their own. If they’re struggling, help them out by sounding out the word. It’s important to both write and say the word so that your students start to connect the letter to the sound.
Share examples of short vowels. Short vowels typically appear at the beginning of words or sometimes in the middle. Give your students words that contain short vowels to help them recognize how they sound. Some great examples include: Short a: map, pal, cat, dad Short i: pin, mint, still, fill Short o: con, lot, dot, hop Short u: pun, nut, bun, hub Short e: pen, let, get, send
Introduce long vowels once they have mastered short ones. To help students remember the difference, tell them that a long vowel states its name. In other words, a long a is pronounced like the letter a, as in lake or tape. Some examples you can use include: Long a: bake, fake, date, state Long i: fine, mine, shine Long o: rope, dote, note Long u: mute, cute, rude, dune Long e: me, he, she, theme
State that a “silent” e at the end of a word makes the previous vowel long. Students may struggle with the difference between words like rat and rate or hop and hope. Make sure they understand that an e at the end of a word means that the first vowel before it becomes long. Use examples like hat and hate, cap and cape, dot and dote, and ball and bale. Once the students understand the concept, try giving them the words that don’t end in e, like tap, bat, and far. Ask them how it would be pronounced if you added an e at the end.
Introduce diphthongs 1 at a time. Since there are so many diphthongs and digraphs, it is best is to teach them separately. Organize diphthongs that sound alike together, and teach them in groups. Teach each group of diphthongs on different days. Show your student examples of the correct usage in each case. For example, teach oi and oy together. Remind your students that oy is often used at the end of words while oi appears in the middle of words. Use examples like toil and toy or coin and coy to show the difference between these 2 digraphs. For diphthongs that sound the same, use words and pictures to show their proper usage. For example, help students memorize the difference between meat and meet or read and reed.
Reinforcing the Lesson
Practice using vowel flash cards. Each card might show a word with the vowel highlighted. Ask the student to say the vowel and then see if they can read the whole word. If they are struggling, ask them to sound out each letter in the word. Make your own flash cards by writing down words on note cards. Make sure to use both simple vowels, such as cat and dad, and vowel digraphs, like neat and read. Add pictures to the flashcard to help students remember vocabulary. You can also buy flashcards at bookstores or anywhere school supplies are sold. Ask students to practice flash cards in groups. If you have a mixed class, be sure to put non-native speakers in groups with native speakers to help them learn more quickly.
Record students pronouncing each vowel. Use a phone, computer, or tape recorder. Afterwards, let the student listen to how they sound. If they are struggling, state the correct way to pronounce the vowel and record them again. For non-native English speakers, let them listen to a recording of a native speaker before listening to their own recording. Ask them what they notice between the native speaker’s vowels and their own.
Ask young students to play a phonics game on a computer or tablet. These games make learning fun! The program may ask students to recognize the right vowel or to match vowels with similar sounds. Some great games include: Phonics Hero Phonics Bloom Hooked on Phonics Reading Rockets
Show the students a vowel chart. A vowel chart groups words according to their vowel sounds. Words with similar vowel sounds are put together in the chart. These words are generally simple words with only 1 or 2 syllables. Find a premade chart online or make your own. Better yet, ask the students to make their own chart. Give them several words with different vowel sounds. Ask the students to organize the words by their vowel sounds.
Sing songs to help non-native speakers learn pronunciation. Songs often require that the singer lengthen the vowels as they sing. If you’re teaching an ESL class, singing can help your students master their pronunciation. Some great songs for this exercise include: Old MacDonald Row, Row, Row Your Boat Where is Short E? Apples and Bananas
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