Classwork Series and Exercises {English Language – JSS3: Phonemes, Phonetics and Tenses

English Language JSS3 First Term

Week 3

Contents:

Phonemes

Phonetics: Long and short vowels

Tenses

Phonemes

A phoneme is a unit of sound in speech. A phoneme doesn’t have any inherent meaning by itself, but when you put phonemes together, they can make words. A phoneme is the smallest sound unit in a language that is capable of conveying a distinct meaning. A phoneme of a language or dialect is an abstraction of a speech sound or of a group of different sounds which are all perceived to have the same function by speakers of that particular language or dialect. For example, the English word “through” consists of three phonemes: the initial “th” sound, the “r” sound, and an “oo” vowel sound. Notice that the phonemes in this and many other English words do not always correspond directly to the letters used to spell them (English orthography is not as strongly phonemic as that of certain other language.

There are about 44 phonemes, or sound units, in English, thanks to the many ways that the 26 letters of the alphabet can be used and arranged. For instance, the phoneme or sound /f/ can be spelled using the letters f, ff, or ph.

Vowel Phonemes			Consonant Phonemes
01		pit	21		pit
02		pet	22		bit
03		pat	23		time
04		pot	24		door
05		luck	25		cat
06		good	26		get
07		ago	27		fan
08		meat	28		van
09		car	29		think
10		door	30		that
11		girl	31		send
12		too	32		zip
13		day	33		man
14		sky	34		nice
15		boy	35		ring
16		beer	36		leg
17		bear	37		rat
18		tour	38		wet
19		go	39		hat
20		cow	40		yet
			41		shop
			42		leisure
			43		chop
			44		jump

Phonetics: Long and short vowels

English distinguishes between the following sounds. Get the sounds wrong and it can affect the meaning. The main difference between these pairs of sounds is in their length. Listen and repeat

Short vowels	Long vowels
/æ/ – hat, cat	/ɑ:/ – heart
/i/ – hit, ship	/i:/ – heat
/ɒ/ – shot, dog	/ɔ:/ – short
/Ʊ/ – put	/u:/ – boot
/ʌ/ – bud, bus	/ᴈ:/ – bird

we have practised these sounds before in earlier classes but in this class, you don’t just learn the sound but the symbol that goes with which sound. Note that  the colon (:) after each of the long sounds denotes length.

Look at the list below and pick out which one has a different vowel sound from the other

A	B	C	D
Spit	Kit	Feet	Fit
Ham	Heart	Harm	Laugh
Shot	Spot	What	Fought
Shirt	Hurt	Front	Skirt
Food	Foot	Boot	Flute

Using Phonetic Symbols

Here is a list of examples of how the long and short vowel sounds can be spelt. Listen and repeat:

/æ/ – Most words spell this sound with the letter ‘a’:  man, stand, fan etc But not the word plait
/ɑ:/ – This sound also uses the letter ‘a’ sometimes followed by ‘r’ or ‘l’: father, class, cart, start, half, palm, etc. But note: laugh, guard and heart.

/i/ – Often spelt with the letter ‘i’: sit, stick, brick. But note: houses, enough, become, English, rhythm, sorry, many, lady, cities, private, orange, manage, busy, business, women, Monday. 

/i:/ – be, she, street, these, sea, police, machine, niece, believe, ceiling, receive.

/ʌ/ – sun, son, one, some, young, flood, does.

/ᴈ:/ – term, learn, early, bird, girl, journey, world. Note too: colonel (sounds like kernel)

/ɒ/ – cost, hobby, watch, quality

/ɔ:/- sport, talk, walk, water, saw, four, fought, board, quarter, warn, taught, door, sure.

/Ʊ/ – put, push, sugar, wood, could, sgould, woman

/u:/ – do, who, soon, food, soup, through, tune, beautiful, true, stew, fruit, nuisance.

Practice:

1. Which of these sounds contain the  /ɒ/ sound?

a. swan

b. guard

c. young

d. stone

2. the /ɔ:/ sound?

a. palm

b. what

c. talk

d. world

3. the /ɑ:/ sound

a. quality

b. caught

c. laugh

d. talk

English Tenses

Read the examples in the table below:

Name of Tense	Example	Use
The Present Simple	We usually go to town on Saturdays	To talk about things the happen regularly or normally
The Present Continuous	We are studying the verbs at the moment I am going to a party next week	To talk about things happening at the time of speaking Also used to talk about events planned for the future
The Present Perfect	We have been at this school for two years Have you heard the news?	To describe actions that begun in the past and continuing in the present To describe actions occurring at an indefinite time in the past and still relevant
The Past Simple	Last year we were in a different room We won last year	To talk about events, actions or situations in the past that are now finished. These events may be recent or distant.
The Past Continuous	When I arrived today, the teacher was calling the roll	To describe actions or situations that were in progress at some time in the past
The Past Perfect	When I arrived this morning, the teacher had already called the roll	To show which of two events happened first in the past. (We can say it is used to describe  ‘an earlier past’)

Describing Emotions

Some verbs are not words of action: they express a state of being. Exampes include be, become and feel. Often, these verbs are followed by an adjective. In these examples, this pattern is used to talk about emotions:

Subject	Verb	Adjective
Tola	Felt	Unhappy
	Felt	sad

Often a preposition and an object follow the adjective as in the examples which follow:

Subject	Verb	Adjective	Preposition	Object
Timon	Was	Happy	With	Ade
They	Felt	Shocked	At	Her response

Different adjectives are followed by different prepositions. Here is a list of some common examples:

Adjectives	Prepositions
Alarmed, embarrassed	At
Happy, pleased	With, by
Resentful, certain	Of
Worried, anxious	About

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