English Alphabetic Code with the International Phonetic Alphabet
The English language has a fascinating history – but this has resulted in a complex alphabetic code for the writing system whereby the 26 letters of the alphabet
represent the 44 or so smallest sounds identifiable in English speech in three complicated ways:
1. one sound (phoneme) can be represented by one, two, three or four letters: e.g. /a/ a in apple, /f/ ph in photograph, /igh/ igh in night, /oa/ ough in dough
2. one sound can be represented by multiple spelling alternatives (graphemes): e.g. /oa/: o, oa, ow, oe, o-e, eau, ough
3. one grapheme (letter or letter group) can represent multiple sounds: e.g. ‘ough’: /oa/ though, /or/ thought, long /oo/ through, /ou/ plough, /u/ thorough
On this Alphabetic Code Chart, the units of sound (phonemes or combined phonemes) are shown in slash marks. Vowel sounds are shown in red and consonant sounds
are shown in blue. The vowel sounds provide the main volume and depth in spoken words whereas the consonant sounds are generally much quieter and sometimes very
high-pitched such as /s/ and /t/. Teachers need to teach the separate units of sounds carefully, avoiding the added ‘schwa’ or “uh” sound: e.g. “sss” not “suh”; “t” not “tuh”.
units of sound simple code complex code graphemes or spelling alternatives
+ IPA symbols key words + key words which are code for the sounds information
/a/ a The Synthetic Phonics
/ / Teaching Principles apple
/e/ e -ea -ai Teach the KNOWLEDGE of the
alphabetic code; that is, the / / egg head said again letter/s-sound correspondences.
/i/ i -y Teach the THREE CORE SKILLS:
/ / insect cymbals 1. DECODING: Sound out and
/o/ o wa qua alt blend all-through-the-printed-word for reading unknown words.
/ / octopus watch qualify salt
2. ENCODING: Orally segment
/u/ u o -ou -ough (identify) the sounds all-through-the-
/ / spoken-word for spelling; then select umbrella son touch thoroughfare the correct graphemes AS CODE
/ai/ ai -ay a -ae a-e FOR the identified sounds in that particular word.
first aid tray table sundae cakes 3. HANDWRITING: Hold the
/e / -ey -ea eigh -aigh pencil with the tripod grip and form
correctly the 26 upper case and 26 prey break eight straight lower case letters on writing lines.
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/ee/ ee ea e e-e Teach a simple code (basic or transparent) first; that is, mainly one
spelling for each sound at a rate of eel eat emu concrete two to five letter/s-sound
/i:/ -ey -ie -ine correspondences per week. The
simple code is part of the complex key chief sardines code – a first step towards
between teaching the alphabetic code.
/i and ee/ -y -ey -ie Keep the simple code revised and sunny monkey movie begin to introduce spelling and
/igh/ -igh -ie i -y i-e ei pronunciation alternatives of the complex code (extended,
/a / night tie behind fly bike eider duck advanced or opaque code) at a rate
appropriate to the age, stage and
/oa/ oa ow o -oe o-e ability of the learners.
oak tree bow yo-yo oboe rope APPLICATION
/ / Provide a -ough cumulative bank of words, -eau sentences and texts at code level:
1. to model blending, segmenting
dough plateau for spelling, and handwriting
/y+oo/ -ue u u-e ew eu 2. for each learner to practise his or her growing skills of blending, /j/ + /u:/ barbecue unicorn tube new pneumatic segmenting and handwriting
increasingly independently.
short /oo/ -oo -oul -u Provide cumulative, decodable
/ / reading books at code level. book should push
/oo/ oo -ue u-e -ew -ui ‘Two-pronged’ long teaching approach
moon blue flute crew fruit Teach a systematic, planned
synthetic phonics programme /u:/ -ou -o -ough alongside incidental teaching of
any letter/s-sound correspondences soup move through as required for differentiation, wider
/oi/ reading and spelling and for the oi oy wider curriculum - for individuals,
/ / groups and whole classes. ointment toy
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/ou/ ou ow -ough Accents Teaching the English alphabetic
/a / code is not an ‘exact science’ and ouch ! owl plough accents need to be taken into
/ar/ ar a alm -alf -alves account at all times along with the notion of ‘tweaking’ (modifying) /ɑ:/ artist father palm half calves pronunciation when decoding to
/or/ reach the correct target word or or oar -oor ore -our preferred pronunciation.
/ :/ fork
oars door snore four Schwa effect for reading
aw au -al war quar Modifying pronunciation also helps to raise awareness of the schwa or /aw/ dawn sauce chalk wardrobe quarter effect (unstressed syllables) whereby,
dependent upon in reality, a sound close to /u/ is the
regional or augh ough spoken translation of the written
national accents code in words such as ‘sofa’ (sofu), caught thought ‘faster’ (fastu), ‘little’ (littul),
/ur/ /er/ ‘around’ (uround). This is common. or er ir ur ear wor
/ :/ Schwa effect for spelling mermaid birthday nurse earth world Be aware of the schwa effect when
‘schwa /er/’
-er -our -re -ar -or segmenting spoken words for or ‘schwa /u/’ spelling.
/ / mixer humour theatre collar sailor
The ability to spell accurately relies
/air/ air -are -ear -ere on a growing awareness of
/ / spelling alternatives and hair hare bear where knowledge of spelling word
/eer/ eer ear -ere -ier banks (words with the same spelling and sound). This knowledge
/ / takes much longer to acquire. deer ears adhere cashier Emphasise the process for spelling of
/oor/ -oor -ure SOUND-TO-PRINT rather than
relying on visual memory and recall / / poor sure of letter order and letter names.
/y oor/ + -ure Decoding is the reverse process:
/j/ / / PRINT-TO-SOUND. + pure
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units of sound simple code complex code graphemes or spelling alternatives
+ IPA symbols information key words + key words which are code for the sounds
/b/ b -bb bu The notion of a ‘code’
/b/ Root all the teaching for decoding bat rabbit building and encoding in the CODE - that is,
/k/ k c -ck ch qu que the relationship between the sounds of speech and their spelling
/k/ kit cat duck chameleon bouquet plaque alternatives (the graphemes). This
/d/ means avoiding the following ideas: d -dd -ed
/d/ *that letters ‘say’ sounds - they say dig puddle rained nothing, they simply prompt us to
/f/ f -ff ph -gh generate the sounds either ‘aloud’ or silently ‘in our heads’
/f/ feathers cliff photograph laugh
*that there are ‘silent’ letters as in
/g/ g -gg gu gh -gue ‘kn’, ‘wr’, ‘mb’, ‘gn’ and so on –
/g/ girl juggle guitar ghost catalogue these are simply further graphemes which ARE CODE FOR the sounds –
/h/ h wh this is consistent, for example, with saying that the grapheme ‘igh’ is
/h/ code for the /igh/ sound (we don’t hat who suggest that ‘gh’ are ‘silent letters’
/j/ j -ge ge gi gy -dge in the grapheme ‘igh’)
/d / jug cabbage gerbil giraffe gymnast fridge *that the end letter ‘e’ of split
digraphs a-e, e-e, i-e, o-e and u-e
/l/ l -ll “make the preceding vowel SAY ITS
/l/ NAME” – this is inconsistent with ladder shell modern synthetic phonics teaching
/u l/ -le -il -al -el rooted in the ‘alphabetic code’. +
/ l/ kettle pencil hospital camel To work out ‘the code’, start
from a whole spoken word said
/m/ m -mm -me -mb -mn slowly. Orally segment the word
into its sounds and map those onto /m/ map hammer welcome thumb columns the graphemes in the written word.
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/n/ n -nn kn gn -ne THE SUB-SKILLS OF THE
/n/ THREE CORE SKILLS net bonnet knot gnome engine
/ng/ -ng -n DECODING SUB-SKILLS:
Without print – hear the / / gong jungle individual sounds of a word and
/ng k/ ‘discern’ the word (= oral + -nk -nc blending): hear /z/ /i/ /p/, say “zip”;
/ / hear /k/ /oa/ /t/, say “coat” + /k/ ink uncle With print – see the graphemes
/p/ p -pp and say the sounds to automaticity; see s, say /s/; see oa, say /oa/; see
/p/ pan puppet ph, say /f/
/k+w/ qu -kw Use capital letter resources – not
/k/ /w/ just lower case letters. Capital + queen awkward letters ARE THE SAME CODE AS
/r/ r -rr wr rh lower case letters.
/ / ENCODING SUB-SKILLS: rat arrow write rhinoceros Without print – hear the whole
/s/ s -ss -ce ce ci cy spoken word said slowly, train the learner to split the word into its
snake glass palace cents city bicycle constituent sounds from beginning
/s/ to end (= oral segmenting): “zip” -se sc -st- ps “/z/ /i/ /p/”; “coat” “/k/ /oa/ /t/” (with
no print, you can use any sounds) house scissors castle pseudonym -use the left hand, palm facing to
/t/ t -tt -ed pt -bt tally the separate sounds onto the thumb and fingers from left to right
/t/ tent letter skipped pterodactyl debt With print – select grapheme tiles
or magnetic letters, or write the
/v/ v -ve letters, to spell the sounds identified
/v/ [Use manipulatives, such as violin dove grapheme tiles, at the basic code
/w/ stage for young learners as they get w wh -u to grips with handwriting skills –
/w/ then focus on handwriting to spell.] web wheel penguin
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/k s/ -x -ks -cks -kes -cs HANDWRITING SUB-SKILLS: + Demonstrate the correct tripod hold
/k/ + /s/ – for young learners say, “Froggy fox plurals: books ducks cakes I love picnics.
legs with the log under” – pinch /g+z/ -x -gs -ggs -gues the pencil with thumb and forefinger just above where the cone end /g/ + /z/ exam plurals: pegs eggs catalogues slopes, make a fist and place the
/y/ middle finger beneath the pencil to y form the tripod hold, or grip, (small
/j/ hands struggle to ‘grip’ fat pencils yawn or marker pens, use regular-sized
/z/ z -zz -s -se -ze x pencils) Air write, finger-trace and copy-
/z/ zebra jazz fries cheese breeze xylophone write graphemes whilst saying
the sound – this is ‘multi-sensory’
/ch/ ch -tch /ch+u/ -ture linking sounds to shapes and
/t / /t / / / handwriting the shapes (e.g. say /ch/ chairs patch + picture for ‘ch’ – not /k/ /h/)
/sh/ sh ch -ti -ci -ssi Mini whiteboards are suitable for quick-fire ‘show me’ activities;
/ / sheep chef for handwriting practice – use station magician admission paper and pencil routines sitting
unvoiced /th/ th voiced /th/ th with good posture at desks, paper
slanted, spare hand holding paper /θ/ thistle / / there steady
BE VIGILANT for learners hooking
/zh/ -si -s -z g -ge their wrists around and writing
/ / ‘above’ the words on the page – television treasure azure (blue) courgette collage ensure they write ‘below’ the words.
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