Hard and Soft Consonant Sounds is a set of twenty cards that are an excellent teaching material for teaching reading and developing a child's understanding of terms such as “soft” and “hard” sounds. These cards can be used with equal success for home grammar lessons and for teaching classes in kindergartens and early childhood development schools. We offer you a color version of the cards. Soft consonants are colored green, hard consonants are blue. By printing them on a color printer and pre-cutting them, you can use them to demonstrate hard and soft sounds.
According to the hardness and softness of the sound, the consonants form fifteen pairs: [b] - [b'], [c] - [v'], [g] - [g'], [d] - [d'], [z] - [z'], [p] - [p'], [f] - [f'], [k] - [k'], [t] - [t'], [s] - [s'], [m] - [m'], [n] - [n'], [p] - [p'], [l] - [l'] and [x] - [x']. For example, the letter “R” in different words can be pronounced hard – “fish” and softly – “river”. To indicate softness, a special icon is used: [‘].
But there are sounds that have no pair for softness. For example: [y'], [h'], [sh'] are always soft, and [zh], [w], [ts] are always hard. All other nouns are soft if they are followed by the vowels i, yu, ё, e, i or ь, and hard if they are paired with other vowels and consonants.
On our website, parents and kindergarten teachers can download Hard and Soft Consonant Sounds cards for free. There are other sets of cards that will help you prepare your child for school yourself.
Phonetics is a capricious lady, although interesting. It's no secret that all sounds in the Russian language are divided into consonants and vowels. The former, in turn, are divided into voiced and voiceless, soft and hard. This classification is based on the way we pronounce sounds and the characteristics of our articulatory apparatus. So how can you tell them all apart?
What exactly is the matter?
1st grade begins to study soft and hard consonant sounds at the very beginning of the Russian language course. But in order to distinguish some phonemes from others, you must first understand what the difference is between them and vowels.
Vowel sounds are pronounced only with the voice. You can sing them, stretch them out - this is exactly how teachers explain to children at school. When the air leaving the lungs passes through the trachea, larynx, and oral cavity, it does not encounter any obstacles. When we talk about consonants, to pronounce them you need to use your lips, teeth and tongue - they all participate in the process, so to speak.
Comparing consonants and vowels by their sound, we notice the following trend: when vowels, as mentioned above, are sounded only with the help of one voice, then the consonants still contain noise created by the interference that the air has to encounter when pronouncing them. This is their main difference. Unvoiced sounds are pronounced only with this very noise, while in voiced sounds a voice is also added to it. Compare, for example, the pronunciation of the words “grotto” and “mole” or “house” and “tom”. In both cases, the first letters are the letters of hard consonants, voiced and unvoiced, respectively.
“Let's go back to our sheep!”
Now that we already know a little about the differences in consonants, let's move on to our main topic.
The best way to learn is by example, right? And again let's turn to the comparison: let's say the following pairs of words:
Racket rack, bun bureau, mother - ball, vine - ice, tower - view.
There is some difference in the way we pronounce consonants. Is not it? It is determined by vowel sounds that come after consonants. The words are specially selected so that the sounds we need are in the same position in all examples. In this case, they show all their diversity. Say it again, slowly. Do you feel how the tongue, in those words where the consonants sound softer, does not rest against the palate, but seems to relax and become flat? This can be considered the main feature that our hard consonants have during articulation.
Theory
Well, now let's move on to a specific theory. Hard consonants - a table that will consist of two parts. The first thing you need to remember is that the hardness or softness of a sound is determined by its neighboring vowel. When after the letter there is a, o, y, s , then the sound it denotes will definitely be hard (mitten, stomp, lips, played), and if there are e, e, yu, i, and , the consonant will sound softer (blizzard, doggie, mint, Kyiv). Thus, we can say that there is no point in memorizing all hard consonants. Almost all of them are paired. This property was shown in the first row of words, where we learned to distinguish between hard and soft sounds. Therefore, everything depends on this very vowel.
Unpaired consonants
Another question is how to deal with unpaired consonants. There are very few of these in Russian: w, w, c . No matter how hard you try, you won't be able to say them softly. Even if after them those vowels that are usually used with soft consonants are written: ramrod - rustling - chic, creepy - liquid - tin, price - circus - king. These consonants are contrasted with unpaired h, sch, th , which will sound soft in all cases: chock - thicket - cleaning, cheeks - squint - crushed stone, yot - yogurt.
Break the system!
In this situation, you need to understand that the rule of following a vowel with them does not apply to unpaired hard consonant sounds. The table, which can be compiled for better assimilation of the material, will in any case consist of two parts - paired ones, the equivalent of which can always be found by changing the vowel, and unpaired ones, living by their own rules.
Let's remember
Now let's move on to methods of studying and memorizing. 1st grade remembers hard consonants reluctantly - it’s too boring. But there is always a way to increase efficiency by getting the student interested in an unusual form of work, even with material that is so theoretical and unnecessary, at first glance. Various pictures, diagrams, drawings and games with word choice will come to our aid.
Let's make cards, perhaps. You will need two sheets of colored paper or colored cardboard. The main thing is that they are contrasting. We cut out identical clouds, balls, figures - whatever comes to your mind. Then we connect the two figures with glue so that these very contrasting sides are on the outside. And then, with the participation of your little assistant, on one side we write vowels that are friendly with soft consonants, and on the other - with hard consonants. In order not to forget anything at all, you can also place unpaired and paired ones next to each other, respectively. When everything is at hand, it is much easier.
Next, we draw something that can help create an association - a brick on cardboard with hard sounds written on it, and a feather with soft phonemes. Or something else like that. Having a concrete example before his eyes, the student will certainly learn the information better. Later, for reinforcement, you can ask your student to highlight hard and soft sounds in written words in different colors - red and blue, for example, so that you can easily check his homework.
Material at hand
To prepare the signs mentioned above, you still need to have some kind of material. Hard consonant sounds - a table that you can rely on to make sure you don’t get confused. For convenience, it contains paired and unpaired sounds in terms of hardness and softness. By the way, if we want to indicate the softness of a sound, in phonetic transcription, for example, an apostrophe is placed after it.
In this table, all phonemes at the top are hard. Below are their soft counterparts. True, we have three cases when the sound does not have a pair. This means it is never soft.
Let's remember further
Shall we continue to practice? Let's give more examples of words where the same consonant sound appears in a hard or soft position. One more nuance. In addition to those very vowels that influence a consonant, it can be softened or made hard by a soft and hard sign, respectively. Let's not forget about this in our next task.
Beaver - white, blizzard - goalkeeper, city - helium, entrance - clerk, giraffe, winter - teeth, whale cat, horse - lemonade, zhmenya - sea, Neptune - rhinoceros, steamboat - break, decision-novel, owl - family, cake - theme, film-photography, halva - diagram, chicken, hat.
Determine the words from the presented pair that demonstrate soft or hard consonants. As you can see, the letters used to designate them are still the same. Please note that in some words, hardness and softness are influenced not only by vowels, but also by consonants that stand next to our sound. In addition, you can also ask your child to come up with examples for unpaired consonants, so that he can see for himself that they are only hard. Still, one’s own experience is a much more vivid confirmation than any memorized theory.
One more game
To study the topic of soft and hard consonants, you can offer the student another game like this. It's very simple. In front of him is a series of words, from which only hard consonants need to be written out. And then, inserting vowels into them, come up with some word. For example, there are a number of words: pickles - footman - knives. We write out the consonants: s, l, n, add vowels. And the first thing that comes to mind is the short but capacious word “elephant”. Shall we continue?
- Edit - will - crowbar(signed out pr, v, l ).
- Tomato - role - swamp(signed out t, r, t ).
- Bittern - dormouse - hay(signed out in, with, n ).
Conclusion
In conclusion, I would like to remind you that under no circumstances should you say “hard consonants.” Only sounds are like that. And their designations are absolutely the same as in the case of soft ones (this was clear from the table above). Now that you have all the material in your hands, all that remains is to practice. On the Internet you can find a huge number of different games and exercises for determining the type of consonants. And, of course, you can re-read the material on the topic “Hard consonant sounds” several more times - the table presented in the article will help systematize all our knowledge. It will be much easier to repeat with her.
Do not forget to give new examples for each paired and unpaired sound, so that our student himself learns to compare the different sounds of consonant phonemes. It sometimes depends not only on the subsequent vowel or soft and hard sign, but also on neighboring consonants, which, depending on their hardness or softness, can also influence the original sound. It's not as complicated as it seems. More games and practice - and everything will definitely work out.
In the Russian language, voiced and voiceless consonants are distinguished by the participation/non-participation of the voice in the formation of the consonant sound.
The following consonants are voiced: [b], [b'], [c], [c'], [d], [d'], [d], [d'], [g], [h], [h'], [ th'], [l], [l'], [m], [m'], [n], [n'], [p], [p'].
The sound [zh’], found in the speech of individuals in the words yeast, reins and some others, is also voiced.
The following consonants are voiceless: [ k], [k'], [p], [p'], [s], [s'], [t], [t'], [f], [f'], [x], [x '] [ts], [h'], [w], [w'].
To remember which consonants are unvoiced, there is a mnemonic rule (rule for memorization): in the phrase “Styopka, do you want a shetz?” - “Fi!” contains all voiceless consonants.
There are 11 pairs of consonants contrasted in deafness / voicedness: [b] - [p], [b'] - [p'], [v] - [f], [v'] - [f'], [g] - [k], [g'] - [k'], [d] - [t], [d'] - [t'], [z] - [s], [z'] - [s'], [g] – [w]. The listed sounds are, respectively, either voiced pairs or voiceless pairs.
The remaining consonants are characterized as unpaired. Voiced unpaired ones include [й'], [l], [l'], [m], [m'], [n], [n'], [р], [р'], and unpaired unpaired sounds include sounds [x], [x'], [ts], [h'], [w'].
But the appearance of a dull or voiced sound can be predetermined by its position in the word. Such deafness/voiceness turns out to be dependent, “forced,” and the positions in which this occurs are considered weak in deafness/voiceness.
Voiced pairs are deafened (or rather, changed to voiceless)
1) at the absolute end of the word: pond [rod];
2) in front of the deaf: booth [booth].
Voiceless paired consonants standing before voiced ones, except [v], [v'], [th'], [l], [l'], [m], [m'], [n], [n'], [р], [р'], are voiced, that is, they change to voiced: threshing [malad'ba].
Today, almost all children know letters and the alphabet already in early childhood. However, it is recommended to learn letters without naming the letters as they sound in the alphabet. Letters must be taught with sounds. When talking about the letter “B”, it is necessary to call it [b], and not “be”. This is necessary so that it will be easier for the child to combine letters into syllables and words.
However, the world of sounds does not end there. And when the baby grows up, he will have to master such concepts as vowel sounds, hard, soft, paired, voiceless and voiced consonants. I invite you to talk today about such different sounds. We will talk about this in a fairy-tale form, in a form closest to children's perception. I invite you to phonetic tale . This is an expanded version of the tale of sounds, presented in.
So, friendly letters live in a hospitable place. And sounds created a large Kingdom called Phonetics.
Kingdom of sounds - Phonetics
In the kingdom of sounds of the Russian language Phonetics we lived together and got along vowels And consonants sounds. Each sound had its own house. For vowels, the houses were painted red, and for consonants, blue. But the roofs of all the houses were white and changed on their own when the sounds visited each other.
Total in the kingdom 42 inhabitants: 6 vowel sounds [a], [e], [o], [u], [i], [s] and 36 consonants. They lived amicably and often visited each other. And every time they visited each other, magic happened: as soon as they held hands, new sounds were created for new words.
Vowel sounds loved to be sung. Therefore, there was always music playing in their houses. But with consonant sounds it was not possible to sing at all. But they were very pliable and always “agreed” with the vowels in everything. At the same time, they could become hard or soft . For example, the sound [p]. In a word "saw" sounds soft, but in words "dust"- firmly. And all because the sound [i] softened the [p], and the sound [s], on the contrary, made it harder.
This is how consonant sounds, joining hands with vowels, become soft or hard at their request.
However, there were also “naughty” sounds in the kingdom. And although they lived in blue houses and were called consonants, they did not want to change in any way. And this happened on the day when, sitting idly on benches, they argued about who was more important: vowels or consonants. And sounds [and],[w] And [ts] decided to become independent and not obey anyone, especially vowel sounds. They proclaimed themselves to be hard sounds that would never, under any circumstances, become soft! And to prove their firm decision, they painted the white roofs of their houses dark blue.
But compliant and non-conflicting sounds [sch],[th] And [h] They were very upset and afraid that the balance of the ratio of sounds in the kingdom would be upset and decided to remain soft forever. And so that all the residents of Phonetics knew about this, they painted the roofs of their houses green.
However, soon 2 more inhabitants appeared in the kingdom of Phonetics - soft and hard signs. But they did not violate the unity of the sound world. The soft sign helped the consonants become soft, and the hard sign helped the consonants become hard. They built themselves white houses and everyone lived peacefully and amicably.
But the inhabitants of the Kingdom of Phonetics were famous not only for their hard and soft characters. Many of them had and still have their own special preferences. Some sounds loved the sound of falling leaves, while others loved the sound of rain. They even built separate quarters for themselves so that in one the bell always rings loudly, and in the other, as if under a dome, it is dull and noisy... This is how they appeared voiced and voiceless consonants . And a river flows between the blocks.
So the sounds [r], [l], [m], [n], [y], [b], [g], [v], [d], [z], [z] settled in the quarter with the bell . And in a quiet quarter - [p], [f], [t], [w], [s], [k], [x], [ts], [h], [sch]. And some letters became so friendly that they connected their houses with bridges. So there is a bridge between the sounds p-b, f-v, t-d, sh-zh, s-z and k-g. This paired consonants .
This is how the amazing Kingdom of Phonetics lives. The sounds visit each other, change, adjust, make noise, shout, sing... They have fun. And in this fun words are born, from them the sentences that make up our speech. By the way, speech happens... However, we’ll talk about this another time.
How to learn soft and hard consonants
These are the complex relationships between sounds. To make it easier for my son to draw phonetic diagrams of words, he and I made very convenient clouds. Using them, it is very easy to determine the hardness or softness of consonant sounds.
Read about how we taught hard and soft consonants using clouds.
How to distinguish between voiced and voiceless consonants
And a very simple technique helped us make it easier for the child to distinguish between voiced and voiceless consonants. When naming the sound, press your palm to your neck. If the sound is ringing, then vibration (tremor) of the vocal cords is felt. If the sound is dull, there will be no vibration.
For the same purposes, we used the picture with houses and bridges across the river, which you saw above.
Enjoy your acquaintance with the world of Phonetics!
All the best!
We invite you to watch a fascinating video on our video channel "Workshop on the Rainbow"
Undoubtedly, when parents send a small child to first grade, the child may encounter new and unforeseen difficulties. He receives most of the knowledge from his teacher, but not everything can be assimilated and remain in his head forever. The problem may be that the child is still too young to have time to “grab” everything at once.
Such barriers can be given in many subjects and topics. And no, these are not only exact sciences, such as mathematics and natural history. Russian can also be overwhelming for many children, as it is one of the most difficult languages in the world!
As you know, everything big begins with small things, and children, as a rule, begin to study Russian with sounds, which in turn are classified into soft or hard consonants, stressed consonants and unstressed ones. This topic includes many aspects, the study of which is extremely necessary so that every child can perfectly know the basics of the Russian language.
First of all, for a student to begin to study sounds and their features, he needs to become familiar with the letters, which in their own way are divided into consonants and vowels. You also need to know that there are as many as 33 letters in the alphabet, of which only 21 are consonant sounds in the Russian language, which in pronunciation can give 36 different sound pronunciations.
Consonants are always classified. There are hard and soft consonants, voiceless or voiced, sonorant and noisy, paired or unpaired. At the same time, the voiceless and voiced consonants of the word being defined depend on the pronunciation. They consist of noise and voice. Thus, dull sounds are formed with the help of noise and give only deafness, while the latter are distinguished by the presence of sonority due to the voice.
There are fewer vowel sounds; there are only 10 of them in the alphabet, giving only six sounds. They can be shock or unstressed. When the future first grader has already become familiar with and has mastered this material well, we begin to improve the skill so that the student can easily distinguish a soft consonant sound from a hard one.
At the same time, you need to learn to distinguish using different signs, because simply memorizing does not always help. There are cases when a consonant sound in a word can sound either soft or hard, but there are exceptions. Now let's start learning the rules.
Before what vowel?
Which vowels are soft and which are hard? Let's try to figure it out. The first rule sounds like this: “In the case when a consonant is followed by one of the following vowels - a, o, u, e, s - then the sound will always be hard. And “e, yu, ya, e” always makes consonants soft.” As a result, the last all consonant soft words are given. For example, let’s take the word “mother”.
After the consonant “m” comes the vowel “a”, which makes the sound hard, and in the word “uncle” the sounds “ya - ya” make the consonant “d” soft. If children learn this simple rule and learn to use it, subsequent determination of the softness or hardness of a sound will not be difficult for them.
To reinforce the material “Hard and soft consonant sounds” even better, give children similar exercises that reinforce these rules. We advise you to start with the simplest words.
Two consonants in a row
In the case of subsequent consonants, we figured it out without difficulty, but what to do when two consonants are in a row and how to determine the characteristics of the sound in this case? Another rule applies here. Such cases always mean that the consonant will always be firm. Only soft consonants do not appear in this rule.
- As an example, you can take the word “pen”. After “ch” comes the sound “k”, and the child must understand that “ch” will automatically become a hard sound, since the next “k” is a consonant.
- Take your time when explaining to your child these simple, but important and sometimes confusing rules. Monitor whether the child understands, ask questions and don’t be lazy to explain several times.
Indication of hardness and softness in writing
Traditionally, all sound recordings are made through transcription. So, in transcription, if the sound is soft, we put an apostrophe after it, which looks like a comma on top. Showing: `. For example, take the letter “b”. In the word “lamb” there is a hard sound, its sound recording is as follows: [b], and in the word “white” it is already [b`]. In the word “ice”, only “l” and “d” will be soft. That is, in essence, the child writes the same letter, but it, in turn, has different pronunciations.
In transcriptions and in writing, a similar moment can be indicated differently, that is, in two ways:
- In the case when soft consonants in Russian appear at the end of a word or before another consonant (in most cases a hard one), softness is indicated by a soft sign, the transcription is an apostrophe. For example, “horse”, “ash”
- If after a consonant there is a softening vowel (which one, see above in the rule), then it is with its help that the softness of consonant sounds is indicated. For example: “chalk”, “sang”, “luk” - the first sounds are always soft.
It is important to know that you should not ignore the fact that any method of indicating the softness of a sound applies only to those who have a pair in hardness. This means that, for example, in the words “tush” and “mascara” the soft sign in the second case only indicates that the given object/phenomenon/creature belongs to the feminine gender. Similar words are: “pike”, “sew”, “drink”, “thicket”.
Constant hardness and softness of a consonant sound
You need to know that there are sounds that, regardless of position, rule or even exception, do not change their position. These are “zh, sh, ts” - they are always hard, and “ch, shch, th” are invariably soft, where zh, sh, ch, shch are hissing consonant sounds.
But it can be difficult for children to remember this aspect well, and then the parent can easily prepare a reminder in a notebook, which will look something like this: zh, sh, ts, ch`, sch`, й`or just underline the last three letters.
“Soft” words
This can be called words in which all soft consonant sounds are soft. There are a huge number of them. For example: “frost”, “glasses”, “skullcaps”, “fun”, “predators”, “squint” - these are words with soft consonants.
- A very exciting and educational activity not only for the child, but also for the parent, will be the search for similar new words in which all the consonants are soft.
- If you have any difficulties, please contact our help! “Pikes”, “uncle”, “blizzard”, “aunt”, “rulers”, “fives”, “ten”, “lilac”, “dates”, “nannies”, “cherry”, “ten” - words, where all consonants are soft. Also play in reverse: we look for all the consonants in the words that are now hard.
Learning by playing
Some sources and reference books recommend focusing on educational games. That is, a child who is carried away by such an activity does not notice how he grasps and learns difficult material. An example of such a game could be the familiar “Find a Pair”.
All that is necessary is to give the child words with hard sounds, and he must come up with another word in response, but with soft ones. This is how you can easily and naturally learn soft consonant sounds in 1st grade!