eng5-W1· Welcome!· ~12 min

The alphabet & spelling

The 26 letters, the five vowels, and saying a word letter by letter.

The English alphabet has 26 letters. Five of them are vowels — A, E, I, O, U — and the other 21 are consonants. The Welcome unit asks you to copy the alphabet and colour the vowels apart from the consonants, because that difference matters again and again: it is what decides 'a' or 'an' before a noun, and it is how English words are built. Every word needs at least one vowel. Spelling aloud is a skill of its own. When someone asks 'How do you spell pencil?', you do not repeat the word — you say the letters one at a time: P-E-N-C-I-L. Some letters are easy to confuse when you hear them: G and J, M and N, B and V, I and E. When two letters are the same next to each other, English speakers often say 'double' — 'double O' in 'book'. Notice too that English and Azerbaijani do not use the same letters: English has no ə, ğ, ı, ö, ş, ü or ç, and it has letters — Q, W, X — that are rare in English words but common as names.

Key terms

alphabet — The 26 letters of English, in order from A to Z.
vowel — One of the five letters A, E, I, O, U.
consonant — Any of the other 21 letters: B, C, D, F, G and so on.
to spell — To say or write the letters of a word one by one.
double letter — Two identical letters next to each other, as in book or letter.
capital letter — The big form of a letter: A, B, C. English uses it to start a name.
Vowels and consonants
TypeHow manyThe letters
vowels5A, E, I, O, U
consonants21B, C, D, F, G, H, J, K, L, M, N, P, Q, R, S, T, V, W, X, Y, Z
total26the whole alphabet, A to Z

This is the split the Welcome unit asks you to colour.

Spelling the classroom objects
WordSpelled aloudLetters
penP-E-N3
bookB-O-O-K (B-double O-K)4
pencilP-E-N-C-I-L6
eraserE-R-A-S-E-R6
notebookN-O-T-E-B-O-O-K8
dictionaryD-I-C-T-I-O-N-A-R-Y10

Say the letters one at a time. Never repeat the whole word instead.

Letters that sound alike
PairWhy they are confusedA word for each
G / Jboth end in the same soundgreen / June
M / Nboth are said with the nosemonth / notebook
B / Vthe lips move in a similar waybook / very
I / Eeasy to swap when listeningis / eraser

When you are not sure, ask the speaker to repeat the letter.

✎Answering a spelling question
  1. 1The question: 'How do you spell notebook?'
  2. 2Step 1: do NOT say the word again: 'Notebook' is not an answer to this question.
  3. 3Step 2: say the letters, one by one: N-O-T-E-B-O-O-K
  4. 4Step 3: the double letters: You may also say 'N-O-T-E-B-double O-K'.
✎Finding the vowels in a word
  1. 1The word: eraser
  2. 2Step 1: write the letters: e - r - a - s - e - r
  3. 3Step 2: mark the vowels A, E, I, O, U: e, a, e → three vowels
  4. 4Step 3: the rest are consonants: r, s, r → three consonants
🚫Common mistake

'How do you spell pencil?' is not answered with 'Pencil.' It is answered with P-E-N-C-I-L.

⚠️Caution

English does not have the letters ə, ğ, ı, ö, ş, ü or ç. When you spell an English word, only the 26 English letters can appear.

💡Note

Y is a consonant in the alphabet, but it often does a vowel's work inside a word — as in dictionary. The five vowels you colour are still A, E, I, O, U.

💡Note

When you hear two identical letters, English speakers often say 'double': 'book' can be spelled B-double O-K.

💡Note

Knowing the vowels is not only for spelling: it is the rule that decides "a pen" but "an eraser".

Rules

  1. 1The English alphabet has 26 letters: A to Z.
  2. 2The five vowels are A, E, I, O, U. The other 21 letters are consonants.
  3. 3Every English word contains at least one vowel.
  4. 4To spell a word aloud, say the letters one by one: P-E-N-C-I-L.
  5. 5Ask with 'How do you spell …?' and answer with letters, not with the word again.
  6. 6Two identical letters together can be read as 'double': book = B-double O-K.

Practice

10 easy · 10 medium · 10 hard

Up to 10 random questions per test

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