Long vowel sounds with examples

Long Vowel Sounds: Word Lists & Activities

Phonics | Spelling

ByDelilah Orpi

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In this post, I’m breaking down long vowel sounds (or long vowel words) to help you teach them when working with struggling readers and spellers.

Looking for long vowel word lists? Download all 5 of my pdf long vowel sounds word lists in my freebies library by joining my email list below.

What is a long vowel sound?

Long vowel sounds are vowels that are pronounced the same as their name. You’ll often hear teachers say that long vowels “say their name”.

Long vowels are very common but they can be tricky because there are so many spellings for each long vowel sound.

There are actually 4 ways to make long vowel sounds:

Vowels at the end of a syllable make the long sound. For example, in the words me and halo (ha-lo) the vowels are all at the end of a syllable so they make the long sound.
Silent e makes the previous vowel long. The words bike and phone have a silent e at the end that makes the previous vowel long.
Vowel teams can make the long sound. Vowel teams work together to make one sound, and usually, it’s a long vowel sound. For example, boat and meat both have vowel teams that make the long sound.
I or O can be long when they come before two consonants. In words like cold and mind, i and o make a long vowel sound.

Long Vowel Words

Long vowel sound words are words that have vowels that say their name. Below are a few examples:

Long a – baby, cake, rain, day, they, weigh
Long e – me, eve, hear, meet, piece, candy
Long i – silent, bike, light, my
Long o – go, home, toe, boat, snow
Long u – music, mule, pew, feud

Long A Sound

The long a sound can be represented by 8 different spelling patterns:

a – baby
a_e – cake
ai – rain
ay – play
ei – reindeer
eigh – weight
ea – steak
ey – they

Learn more about teaching the long a sound here, and check out my Long A Words Activities & Worksheets for printable activities.

Long E Sound

The long e sound can be represented by 8 different spelling patterns:

e – be
e_e – eve
ee – meet
ea – beach
ei – protein
ie – piece
ey – key
y – candy

For ideas, tips, and tricks when teaching the long e sound, read this post all about teaching the long e vowel sound, and check out my Long E Words Activities & Worksheets for printable activities.

Long I Sound

The long i sound can be represented by 6 different spelling patterns:

i – silent
i_e – shine
ie – pie
igh – light
y – my
y_e – type

You can learn more about teaching the long I sound in this post. And check out my Long I Worksheets set in my shop for printable activities on the long i sound.

Long O Sound

The long o sound can be represented by 5 different spelling patterns:

o – go
o_e – phone
oe – toe
oa – boat
ow – snow

You can learn more about teaching long o words and check out my long o worksheets.

Long U Sound

The long u has two sounds: yoo (/y/ /oo/) and oo (/oo/).

The long u sound can be represented by 7 different spelling patterns:

u – music
u_e – mule
ue – rescue
eu – feud
ew – few
oo – food
ou – soup

Learn more about teaching the long u sound here.

Tips for teaching the long vowel sounds

Teach one spelling pattern at a time!

I don’t mean one vowel sound, but just one spelling pattern. So for example, if you’re working on long a, you would work on the spelling pattern a silent e (cake, same, cave) until students have mastered it, then move on to ai, and so on. You should not be teaching multiple spelling patterns together, even though they make the same sound.

I know that most programs out there combine all the long vowel sound spelling patterns into one lesson, especially in spelling lists, but this does not work for struggling readers. You need to break it down for them and only do one at a time.

Teach the syllable types.

Because syllables have a lot to do with whether vowels make the short or long sound, if students do not already know the 6 syllable types then teach them along with the long vowel sound.

Here are resources for each syllable type:

closed syllable
open syllable
final silent e syllable
vowel team syllable
r combination syllable
consonant le syllable

Use a variety of activities to practice each spelling pattern.

Games, dictation, word sorts, memory or matching with flashcards, word hunts, textured writing, body spelling, and bingo are all fun ways to practice the long vowel sounds.

The main activity that is often overlooked is dictation. It seems so simple but the task involves listening to a word, deciding on the spelling, and transferring that info to written form. These are all skills that struggling readers need to practice.

Teach the spelling generalizations.

Some of the long vowel spelling patterns are spelling rules that make it easy to remember.

For example, ai is usually found at the beginning or middle of a syllable, and ay is usually found at the end of a syllable. [Examples: rain, aim, play, daytime]

Here is another example with long o: oa is usually found at the beginning or middle of a word, and ow is usually found at the end. [Examples: boat, coach, snow]

Long Vowel Word List

I made these word lists to help teach the long vowels. I find it handy to have these on hand when playing phonics games or planning activities for long vowel lessons.

Grab them for free below!

Visit my Teachers Pay Teachers shop to see all my literacy products.

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Delilah Orpi

Delilah Orpi is the founder of Thrive Literacy Corner. She has a Bachelor's degree in Special Education, a Master's degree in TESOL, and is a member of the International Dyslexia Association. She is an experienced educator and literacy specialist trained in Orton Gillingham and Lindamood Bell. Delilah creates literacy resources for educators and parents and writes to create awareness about dyslexia and effective literacy instruction based on the science of reading.

Examples of Long Vowel Words

A long vowel is a vowel sound that is pronounced the same way as the name of the letter itself. For example, the long U sound is pronounced like "yoo," as would be the case in words like "lure" and "tube." By contrast, the short U sound is pronounced more like "uh," as in words like "cub" and "tub."

Long vowel words, then, are words that contain a long vowel sound. It's important to note that the spelling of a word and the way it sounds don't always match up so perfectly. Words like "few" and "beauty" also contain the long U sound. Similarly, the long A sound in "bake" and "gate" can also be spelled like "ay" (as in "pay") or "ai" (as in "paid"), among other variations.

To understand this further, let's look at some more examples of long vowel words.

Long Vowel Words Chart

Now that you understand long vowels, check out this Vowel Words chart to find vowels with each of the long vowel pronounciation sounds:

Longvowelwordsexamples

Click to View & Download

Long Vowel Words in Sentences

A great way to understand how long vowel words work is to see them in action in full sentences.

Long A Words

The long A sound is featured in the words in bold.

Can you bake me a cake?
There's no way I'm going to pay for that.
At this rate, they'll never come home.
Jenny does it for the fame and fortune.
Did you hear about the raid on the executive's office?

Long E Words

The long E sound is featured in the words in bold.

To be or not to be. That is the question.
Pete plans to see her again soon.
The gymnast excels on the high beam.
The behavior was deemed inappropriate by the ethics board.
That was quite the scene at the deli.

Long I Words

The long I sound is featured in the words in bold.

Sara and I are going to the movies.
The pine needles are everywhere!
You'll find the jam in the bread aisle.
Take a right turn at the next intersection.
Everything is going to be just fine.

Long O Words

The long O sound is featured in the words in bold.

The Lone Ranger is a famous fictional character.
The country road isn't paved.
Herbert was so excited, he started jumping up and down.
Can you fetch me a hoe from the garden shed?
The tow truck arrived just in time.

Long U Words

The long U sound is featured in the words in bold.

The rude waitress still hasn't taken our order.
Have you seen the Statue of Liberty?
The Duke and Duchess of York visited recently.
With a queue like that, we can expect a very long wait.
There he is, right on cue.

Read and Read

The English language is filled with all sorts of confusing words and even letters, like when "y" works as a vowel. The word "read" can rhyme with "fed" (short E sound), but it can also rhyme with "seed" (long E sound), depending on which verb tense you're trying to use with "read." As you continue to brush up on your knowledge of vowels and how they work, why not study words that end in a silent E? There are a lot of them! For something more creative, check out these assonance examples too.

Long and short vowels in English

Longitude is one of the characteristics of a vowel sound, which shows the relative duration of its sound compared to other sounds.

Longitude can be positional and phonemic. In the first case, the duration of the vowel depends on the position in the word and stress, while this characteristic does not affect the meaning. The phonemic length of a vowel has a semantic function, that is, depending on the length of the sound, the meaning of the word changes. nine0003

Length of vowel sounds in English

In Russian, the length of vowel sounds does not affect the meaning of words and changes only depending on stress. In English, vowels differ not only in positional but also in phonemic length. This means that long and short sounds, similar in other characteristics, represent different phonemes. Words that differ only in these phonemes have different meanings: ship - sheep , fit - feet , pull - pool . Therefore, it is so important to pronounce long and short sounds correctly.

In transcription, long vowels are indicated with a colon: [i:], [α:], [ɔ:], [u:], [ә:]. In some cases, long vowels in an unstressed position are reduced and become semi-long, which in transcription is indicated by one dot from above: [α ].

The long vowels listed above are opposed to short vowels, forming the following pairs in English:

[i:] - [ı]
[uː] - [u]
[ɔ:] - [ɒ]
[α:] - [ʌ]
[ә:] - [ə]

The pronunciation of long and short English vowels often causes difficulties for Russian learners of English, since in Russian vowels do not have phonemic longitude, and we are not used to distinguishing the length of a vowel sound by ear. We often do not hear the difference between long and short vowels when listening to English speech. It is still not clear how long you need to draw a sound when speaking, so very unnatural, or almost inaudible, or too long vowels are obtained. It is impossible to correctly pronounce short and long sounds so that a native speaker hears the difference, even if you diligently shorten short vowels and stretch out long ones. nine0003

Sometimes it seems that native speakers themselves do not know the difference between short and long sounds, they seem to pronounce them the same way - but they themselves understand each other. But it's not. Let's see what are the differences between long and short English vowels, how to learn to hear them and how to train their pronunciation.

Differences between long and short English sounds

It is logical to assume that if vowels are called long or short, they differ in sound length. This is the main difference between them, but not the only one. It is important to understand that long and short sounds have other differences, which consist in articulatory features. This means that the sounds are not just of different lengths, they are also different in sound. And most often it is these articulatory features that determine the length of the vowel sound: the duration of the sound depends on the position of the tongue and the tension of the vocal apparatus. nine0003

Long and short English vowels differ in such a characteristic as tension. Long vowels are tense, in English they are also called tense . When they are pronounced, the root of the tongue seems to be tense, under tension. The sound is pronounced, bright, rich, clear.

Short vowels are called lax – relaxed. The tongue in the region of the root is relaxed, the vowel sound is articulated quickly, easily, without additional effort, as if bursting. It turns out short, inconspicuous, faded and fuzzy. nine0003

Qualitative differences in sounds in different pairs of English vowels range from pronounced to almost imperceptible. It is easy to notice the difference between long and short sounds a: pay attention to how the words cart and cut are pronounced, they differ not only in duration, but also in sound. But the differences between long and short u are almost imperceptible: pool and pull sound very similar, only slightly different in length. The Scots generally pronounce them the same way, differing only in context. nine0003

In addition, the duration of the pronunciation of vowels is also affected by positional longitude - for example, stressed or unstressed position in a word. As a result, a short vowel sound in one word may sound longer than a long sound in another word.

Thus, it is not enough to rely only on the subjective duration of a vowel sound. All the features of short and long vowels described above must be taken into account when learning English. It remains to understand how to master the pronunciation of long and short sounds in practice. nine0003

How to learn to pronounce long and short English vowels

The main mistake foreigners make when pronouncing long and short English sounds is focusing only on duration. But with this approach, it is intuitively incomprehensible where the boundary between a long and a short sound passes: you can’t measure the length of a sound with a stopwatch. When trying to artificially lengthen or shorten a vowel, the sounds are unnaturally short or drawn out. nine0003

To learn how to pronounce long and short English sounds, you need to forget about the usual terminology "long" and "short". Try not to think about the duration of the sound at all. To correctly pronounce long and short vowels, you need to focus on their articulation, and not on duration. If we correctly reproduce the pronunciation of the vowel, then the duration will turn out to be correct automatically. Remember that long vowels require more tension at the root of the tongue, while short ones are pronounced without additional effort, easily and without tension. nine0003

Pay attention to how native speakers pronounce vowels - don't watch how long they draw them out, but watch the pronunciation, the articulation, the quality of the sound. Repeat, imitate, practice. For practice, it is best to use video lessons or a conversation with a native speaker, since audio materials do not make it possible to see articulation.

It is best to train long and short sounds not separately, but as part of words. First, this way you will note the influence of positional longitude on the duration of the sound in specific examples. Secondly, just as words are best learned in context, sounds are also best learned in the environment. nine0003

Practice pronunciation of long and short vowels in pairs of words to notice the difference between sounds, for example:

Sport – hot
Arm-cut
See-hit
Food-put
Fur – ago

When you learn how to pronounce long and short vowels correctly in English, it will become easy to distinguish between them in speech. When listening to speech, forget about the differences in duration, pay attention to the qualitative differences in sounds - how intensely the vowel is pronounced, how bright or faded it sounds, how pairs of sounds differ from each other, except for duration. nine0003

Sounds in English: pronunciation, transcription 🗣️

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It happens that you speak English with a foreigner, but he does not understand you. And then you find out that the letter “a” alone can be pronounced in six different ways. We understand English sounds in order to sound correctly and speak the same language with foreigners.

In the English language, the number of words that are not pronounced at all as they are written is very large - this is the result of historical changes and the standardization of written English in the 17th century. Knowing how English sounds are read, you can almost always read even the most intricate word. nine0003

The English alphabet has 26 letters, 20 vowels and 23 consonants. The more you delve into the English language, the more difficult words you will meet along the way. The science of phonetics will come in handy here, just in time. And we will share life hacks on the study of this topic.

Transcription of English sounds

In order to study all possible variations of sounds, linguists have developed an alphabet that contains special characters. This alphabet was called International Phonetic Alphabet (International Phonetic Alphabet).

These symbols are used in modern transcriptions of English words. Transcription, by the way, is a graphic representation of sounds. Indicate the transcription in square brackets.

Let's look at the examples below, how one letter can be read in two different ways. The difference in pronunciation can depend on the type of syllable, the position of the letter in the word, and whether the vowel is stressed. nine0003

In the word type (print / type), the letter y is in an open syllable and therefore reads as [aɪ].
In the word copy (copy / copy), the letter y is in an unstressed syllable at the end of the word and therefore reads like [i].

However, it is worth trying to learn the pronunciation of sounds and various combinations of sounds. There is no division into short and long consonants in Russian. In English, the incorrect pronunciation of such vowels leads to significant changes in the meaning of the word. nine0003

So, for example, confusing the short and long sound [i] (read as “and” in the Russian word “game”), you can accidentally say “I boarded a sheep” - I boarded a sheep [ʃ iː p], and not "I boarded a ship" - I boarded a ship [ʃ ɪ p].

English proficiency test

This English proficiency test was compiled by the Skysmart online school tutors. They prepared interesting and relevant tasks on modern topics to make the test both useful and interesting

General Table of English Consonants and Vowels (IPA)

Below is a table of all known English phonemes. The vowels are in the gray area and the consonants are in the yellow area. Short and long vowels are indicated on a light gray background, and diphthongs - sounds consisting of two elements - are located on a dark gray background.

All consonants are on a yellow background and are distinguished by font color. Voiceless consonants ( voiceless/unvoiced ) are marked in gray, and voiced ones ( voiced ) - black.

How many English words do you already know?

Let's define your vocabulary - without complex questions and with the help of smart algorithms.

Classification of sounds in English

In English, sounds are divided into two groups: vowels and consonants. Let's take a look at them.

Another effective way to quickly memorize English sounds is to sign up for English lessons for children 8 years old online at Skysmart School. nine0003

Vowel sounds of the English language

From the school curriculum of the Russian language, we remember that the main characteristic of vowel sounds is their melodiousness. This is due to the fact that when pronouncing a vowel sound, the air passing through the vocal cords vibrates and the sound freely leaves the oral cavity without encountering any obstacles in its path. Here is the rule for pronunciation of vowels:

Vowel	IPA	Word examples	Vowel	IPA	Word examples
/a/	æ	c a t	/oo/	-	l oo k, w ou ld, p u t
/e/	and	p e g, br ea d	/ar/	ɑ:	c ar t, f a st (regional)
/i/	ɪ	p i g , g i ve	/ur/	ɜ:	b ur n, f ir st, t er m, h ear d, w or k
/o/	nine0128 ɒ	l o g, w a nt	/au/	ɔ:	t or n, d oor , w ar n, h au l, l aw , c a ll
/u/	-	pl u g, l o ve	/er/	ə	wood e n, circ u s, sist er
/ae/	eɪ	p ai n, d ay , g a t e , st a tion	/ow/	a'	d ow n, sh ou t
/ee/	i:	sw ee t, h ea t, th ie f, th e s e	/oi/	ɔɪ	c oi n, b oy
/ie/	aɪ	tr ie d, l igh t, m y , shin e , m i nd	/air/	eə	st air s, b ear , h are
/oe/	or nine0210	r oa d, bl ow , b o ne, c o ld	/ear/	ɪə	f ear , b eer , h ere
/ue/	u:	m oo n, bl ue , gr ew , t u ne	/ure/	ʊə	p ure , c u re

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Consonant sounds of the English language

When articulating a sound, the air flow encounters obstacles in its path formed by the organs of speech: tongue, lips, teeth and alveoli. Passing through these barriers, air passes through the gap and noise is created. nine0003

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th en

Consonant	IPA	Word examples	Consonant	IPA	Word examples
/b/	b	b aby	/r/	r	r abbit, wr ong
/d/	d	d og	/s/	s	s un, mou se , c ity, sc ience
/f/	f	f ield, ph oto	/t/	t	t ap
/g/	g nine0210	g ame	/v/	v	v an
/h/	h	h at	/w/	w	w as
/j/	-	ju dg e, g iant, bar ge	/y/		and es
/k/	k	c oo k , q ui ck , mi x , Ch ris	/z/	z	z ebra, plea se , i s
/l/	l	l amb	/th/	to
/m/	m	m onkey, co mb	/th/	θ	th in
/n/	n	n ut, kn ife, gn at	/ch/	-	ch ip, wa tch
/ng/	ŋ	ri ng , si n k	/sh/	ʃ	nine0128 sh ip, mi ss ion, ch ef
/p/	p	p a p er	/	-	trea s ure

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