Phonics or Phonics Sounds: Fundamentals of Language

Almost all the alphabetic languages are taught through phonics. Phonics is a method that is used to teach reading and writing of the alphabet of a particular language. No language can stand alone without phonics that is why it is also referred to as decoding words. It reflects a very strong bonding between the sound of a certain language that one utters and alphabet one writes. It focuses on the sound of a word and the composition of letters within that word. In other words, it is a teaching program for students that helps them learning-to-read.

It is a matter of debate that if a teacher starts teaching reading, without a good introduction of phonics for kindergarten as a proper subject is very harmful to children. That is the reason once a child starts reading without the knowledge of phonics the much-awaited results cannot be achieved. Awaited results can only be achieved when there is synchronization between a program and its implementation. Further, that can be strengthened through techniques of instruction, management of classroom according to curriculum and grouping of students. 

Phonics can be taught in different ways. There are a variety of approaches that could be followed in order to teach phonics. These approaches can be categorized as learning individual sounds – M-A-T (three-letter word), OW-N-ER (five-letter word, but sounds like a three-letter word), rhyming words – CAT, RAT, HAT, etc., and consonant blends – BL – in BLOG, BLACK, BLOOD, etc. These approaches blend together and make a strong methodology for reading and writing an alphabetic language.  

From the point of view of improvisation in language, English adopted a large number of words from various other languages that exist in different parts of the world. This approach not only enriched its vocabulary but also diversified its culture. Their approach of absorbing words into their vocabulary gave them global exposure and English became the most popular language in the world, however, this is not the most spoken language. That is the reason we see different pronunciation of a word. For example, if a word from any language of India is included in English, then an English person will pronounce it in a different way in comparison to the person, who knows this word since its childhood.

Here we will discuss the patterns of English language that keep continuously changing and enhancing with different things that are found in its global surroundings. Look at these two letters – ee – sometimes, or most of the time, they stand for the sound – i, ie, ei or ea.  The words in which these letters are used are spoken with various sounds across the world. That variation in pronunciation takes the English language into the group of rules that are set to understand it.

Phonics Patterns of Vowels

Short Vowels: We all know that there are five vowels – a, e, i, o, and u. These vowels are pronounced for a very short period of time in a particular word. Look at the following words:

·        C-A-T (A – short vowel sound)

·        B-E-T (E – short vowel sound)

·        S-I-T (I – short vowel sound)

Long Vowels: We can understand the meaning of these vowels by their names. It is just opposite to short vowels where the pronunciation takes a very short space of time, whereas, in long vowels, it takes a bit longer space of time while pronouncing a particular word. Look at the following words:

·        SEE (S-E-E  – EE – long vowel sound)

·        MINE (M-I-N-E  – I – long vowel sound)

·        NO (N-O  – O – long vowel sound)

One thing that should be kept in mind that long vowels have the same sounds as the names of the letters. To be more elaborative, if you say the name of that letter, you will get a long vowel.

• Alphabet Phonics is the bases of language that help children understand the association between writing letters and the sounds they produce. Its instructions are taught in such a way that children start recognizing words and sounds, for example, letter – n will produce the sound – n as in the case of words like the nose, new, etc.
• The purpose of each subject should be to help and understand students its fundamentals. Phonics plays a very important role when it is implemented in a very comprehensive way at the level of kindergarten so that a proper letter-sound relationship could be understood by a child. Its implementation makes sure that a child starts recognizing a word then its spelling and further starts working on comprehension, regardless the grade in which he/she is studying.
  
• When we utter something, we produce a sound and when we produce a sound it takes the form of a language in which we converse with other people, whether they are living around us or living across the globe. It becomes the bases of our mutual understanding through which we share our feelings. This entire process is known as Phonological Awareness. It is referred to as an oral language, whereas phonics is referred to as a printed form of sounds. Phonological awareness and phonics awareness both are completely different skills. It is seen that a few children have some weaknesses in phonological awareness and some have problems with phonics awareness. But the possibility of having problems at both ends, whether it is phonological awareness or phonics awareness is very little. A child cannot have problems with both things at the same point in time.  Let’s understand this issue with an example, a child knows the sound produced by a letter, but he/she is not able to form a word, this is phonological awareness. But when a child orally mixes sounds and starts reading sit for set, lit for let, pit for pet, etc., then he/she is having phonetics problem.