To begin the activity, we first reviewed the vowels: A, E, I, O and U. I pulled out a short vowel tree and a long vowel tree and reminded them that when the vowels say their name, it is the long vowel sound. Their other sound (like /a/ as in “apple”) is the short vowel sound.

Short Vowel Rule: When there is one vowel in a word, either at the beginning or between two consonants, it usually has the short vowel sound.

Short vowels are vowel sounds that are pronounced in a short form. In RP English the short vowel sounds are those in ‘pet’, ‘pot’, ‘put’, ‘putt’, ‘pat’ and ‘pit’, and the schwa sound. They can be compared with long vowel sounds.

The long vowels in Pitman’s shorthand are: /ɑː/, /eɪ/, /iː/, /ɔː/, /oʊ/, and /uː/. The short vowels are /æ/, /ɛ/, /ɪ/, /ɒ/, /ʌ/, and /ʊ/.

The short vowels can represented by a curved symbol above the vowel: ă, ĕ, ĭ, ŏ, ŭ. The long vowels can be represented by a horizontal line above the vowel: ā, ē, ī, ō, ū.

When you spin the wheel, words containing a short “a” sound appear, including cat, hat, ax, rat, mask, ham, bag, apple, ant, can, man, and hand.

CVC – words that begin with a consonant, followed by a vowel, followed by a consonant (examples: cat, bet, bug) Words begin with the simple CVC pattern and progress to words with more than one consonant at the beginning or end of the word (examples: flag (CCVC), went (CVCC), etc.). therefore make a long sound.

The letter Y is sometimes considered a vowel because it can sound like the vowel letters A, E, or I depending on the letters around it or whether the letter Y is at the middle or end of a word. Click on the following links to hear the different sounds for the letter Y.

Even though “y” is technically a consonant, there are many more instances in which it functions as a vowel. You’ll hear it work as a long /e/ sound (as in city or party), short /i/ sound (as in cyst or symbol) or long /i/ sound (as in fly or shy) depending on the word it’s in. It can also be part of a vowel team.