Pronunciation 3: The Cowboys

We need a few more vowel sounds.
I've already introduced six 'short vowels' (a, e, i, o, u, u)
and five 'long vowels' (ae, ee, iy, oe, uu) - that's 11.
But we need more if we want to make the right sounds in English.

I think we need 6 more.

So let's go!

We are going to call the next two vowel sounds the “Cowboys”.
In English, both sounds are related to the letter 'o', so both of our symbols will also be related to the letter 'o'.

They are  ŏ and oy.



Cowboy #1: ŏ

ŏ is the vowel sound in cow. It even looks like a cow! (Kind of.)

There are two standard ways of spelling this sound: ´ou` and ´ow`. You can think of the ŏ as being an ´o` with a little ´u` or ´w` above it.

So the ŏ in ´cow` and ´vowel` is the same as the ŏ in ´loud` and ´sound`.

If you see a word you don`t know with ´ow` or ´ou` in it, think ŏ !

There are lots of words that don´t follow this rule - for example, ´know` (no) - we will call them ´non-standard` spelling. The system we're learning here tells us how to read and pronounce the regular or ´standard` spelling patterns. 

Note that in Romance languages (and in phonetics), the ŏ is related to the combination ´au`, which is responsible for lots of pronunciation mistakes in English.

Cowboy #2: oy

oy is the vowel sound in ´boy`  - boy

There are two standard ways of spelling this sound: ´oi` and ´oy`.

So the oy in ´boy` is the same sound as the oy in ´coin`.

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Next: Vowel Sounds 4: The R-vowels

Pronunciation 2: Long Vowels

These are the sounds in words where the vowels interact with other letters. They sound like the names of the letters when you say the English alphabet:

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

                                               

A = ae      E = ee      I = iy      O = oe      U = yuu

They are all long and soft.

The ae, ee and iy all end in a little y sound.

The oe and uu both end in a little w sound.

Notice that the letter in the alphabet, U is actually pronounced yuu, like the word, 'you'. The long sound in words is sometimes pronounced yuu and sometimes uu. For example, the word 'tune' is pronounced tyuun but the word 'flute' is pronounced fluut.

Anyway, here are some simple reference words that you can use to remember the sounds: "cake", "teeth", "kite", "boat", "tune" and "flute".

We could write the sound of these words as follows: caek, teeth, kiyt, boet, tyuun, fluut.

Please note: the symbols I'm using for the sounds are not the International Phonetic alphabet. Instead, I'm using a system called SPELL (a Semi-Phonetic system for English Language Learners.) The idea is to represent English sounds in a way that reinforces English spelling and avoids contradicting it.


Students often confuse the sounds ae, ee and iy, so a good trick is to learn the letters and their pronunciation together as a string: A-E-I-O-U = ae, ee, iy, oe, yuu

The best way to do this, as any good English teacher will tell you, is to listen to the 1983 hit by Freeez, "I. O. U. [I owe you]"

The lyrics are "A... E... A, E, I, O, U... U, I sometimes cry."

Listen to it until you can't get it out of your head or until you start crying.


The vowels make these sounds when they interact with other vowels. The sound doesn't come from one letter; it comes from the combination.

Here are some more examples:

A      E      I         O          U
ae     ee     iy      oe      uu   yuu
date  beat  wine  coat   juice
tail    seed  lie     smoke      cute

Notice that, in the words 'date', 'wine', 'smoke' and 'cute', it is the final magic e which interacts to produce the longer vowel sound.

Next: Vowel Sounds 3: The Cowboys