What is IPA? A good friend of mine started to read one of my blog posts the other day and said, "I saw these squiggles, /waɪ ɪz ðɪs soʊ kənˈfjuzɪŋ/, and I wasn't sure if they were supposed to be there or if there was something wrong," like a formatting error or something. I started to explain what they were, but decided she can't be the only one who finds them puzzling. The IPA symbols looked like a foreign language to me just a few years ago, so I thought it might be good to talk a bit about it here. IPA symbols, now called the International Phonetic Alphabet, is an abbreviation for the International Phonetic Association symbols. Somewhere along the way, the symbols started to be called an alphabet, but the symbols are not an alphabet. They are a set of symbols created to represent one-to-one correspondence with the "sounds" of any language; really, though, it’s what happens in your mouth when you talk--the way air flows (or does not), where your tongue is in your mouth, how your lips are shaped, and whether your use your voice (or not). This is the gist of it, and it's not just about what you hear. Think about playing the game of telephone. When you hear and pass on a word or sentence to the next person, by the time it gets to the last person, we all know it is often not what the first person said at all. The phonemes /m/ and /n/ and /t/ and /p/, for example, are difficult to differentiate by ear. They are often misheard, and the reason we say <t> as in <Tom> or <p> as in <park> when we're telling someone how to spell something on the actual telephone. My Fair Lady and the Linguist The primary function of IPA symbols is to allow anyone to be able to accurately represent the pronunciation of a word, without reference to its spelling. You can even differentiate someone's accent when reading a transcription! It's really very useful and akin to those dictionary pronunciations we learned as kids, but way better. Think of Professor Higgins when he was transcribing Eliza Doolittle's cockney accent, about two minutes into this video. He was using an early form of IPA. How to Use IPA with Structured Word Inquiry That's cool, you say, but why do I need to know how to use it? For one reason, IPA is a useful tool for using Structured Word Inquiry to answer the 4th question: "What graphemes function coherently here?" Looking at the symbols is a critical first step to expanding the understanding of phonemes beyond the one-to-one letter-sound relationship that students grow up immersed in with a phonics-first approach. Why is that important? When we teach, <s>, /s/, <snake> (letter, sound, word/picture cue) in kindergarten, and a student encounters words such as <is>, <sugar>, or <vision>, they're confused. If we represent these words in IPA, then it becomes obvious pretty quickly that the grapheme (single letter, in this case) <s> can represent more than one phoneme--as in /sneɪk/, /ɪz/, /ˈʃʊɡər/, /ˈvɪʒən/. Notice the /ɛɪ/? That's the "long <a> sound." Say it slowly. You can feel your mouth shift in this diphthong, so it is represented with those sequential symbols. To Show Pronunciation Change with Prefixes & Suffixes Additionally, In base elements like <sign>, we learn that, while the pronunciation of the element shifts when affixes are added, the meaning of the base stays the same--so the spelling of the base stays the same.
To Show How Shifts in Stress Affect Pronunciation Here is a way of visually demonstrating changes in pronunciation of the graphemes when the base is affixed and/or when the stress shifts:
The Word <been> and the 4 Questions The word <been> represents a conundrum with students. Why is it spelled that way? It's not an exception, but rather a great opportunity to show that meaning and structure are critical to spelling. Here is an example of how I investigate <been> with students using the 4 questions of Structured Word Inquiry (see slideshow for question details). 1. Meaning: <been> is a form of the verb <be>. I want to <be>; I have <been>. 2. It is built <be + en>. The first <e> in <been> is part of the morpheme <be> (a free base element). The second <e> is part of the suffix <-en> used grammatically to shift the verb tense. Wait, what? Yes, we have evidence of the suffix in <take/ + en--> taken> and <bit(t) + en--> bitten>. These two words also demonstrate the suffixing conventions of replacing the final, nonsyllabic <e> and doubling the final consonant when a vowel suffix is added to a base with a single consonant preceded by a vowel. 3. Its relatives include <be>, <being>, <become>, <befriend>. The base <be> can be affixed and used to make compound words. The matrix below was made with mini-matrix maker. 4. What are the graphemes that function coherently here? The phonemes in the base <be> function as expected /bi/, (with the "long <e>" sound in a short word), but the pronunciation has nothing to do with the use of the vowels in the word <been>. The phonemes in <been>, in this case, do not help with the spelling at all. It’s all about the meaning and structure. Depending on your accent, <been> could be transcribed into IPA in several ways:
This is SO useful when introducing students to the seemingly "crazy" spelling of <been>. Imagine trying to spell it by sounding it out. You might get <bin>, <ben>, <bayen>, or <bean>. You might get lucky and spell it <been>, too. But IPA symbols help differentiate between pronunciation and spelling. Here is a link to a pronunciation guide for each of the symbols and word examples with British and American English differentiation: Antimoon, and here is a recording from the UCLA's linguistics department. Why Use IPA in the Primary Grades? So, why do I use IPA symbols in the primary grades? In a public school, I was asked once how students are supposed to learn the alphabet and IPA symbols at the same time? Imagine if we did! Schools in other countries (especially with multilingual communities) use IPA. Language learners use IPA to help with pronunciation. One of my favorite websites to learn about pronouncing American English is Rachel's English. She has all manner of interesting lessons as well as an online English Academy. Here is a link to Why We Need the IPA. It's well worth a look! For additional examples, take a look at these words with the same graphemes <o> and <th>: <love> /lʌv/--the <o> is represented with /ʌ/ <move> /muv/ the <o> is represented with /u/ <think> /θɪnk/ the <th> is represented with the unvoiced /θ/ <mother> /mʌðɚ/ the <th> is represented with voiced /ð/ and the <er> is a combined schwa and /r/ or /ɚ/ IPA was very useful when I was trying to help 2nd-grade English language learners understand the grapheme <ch>. Having learned <ch> in isolation in the classroom as in the word <chop> or /tʃ/, it was easier to explain the <ch> spelling of words of French origin as in <chef> or <machine> with /ʃɛf/ and /mə'ʃin/ and the words of Greek (Hellenic) origin as in <school> and <chemistry> with /skul/ and /'kɛməstri/. My Favorite Way to Introduce Students to IPA By far, the most memorable use of IPA was with a class of 4th graders. I wrote their names in IPA (only), and they used an IPA decoder to figure out whose names were whose. I wrote the class names on chart paper which I kept up all year, and I added to it as students came in during the school year. I got this idea from Mrs. Steven’s Classroom Blog. Students noticed and remembered the symbols simply by interacting with them. The students whose names were always mispronounced gained the most, however. With IPA symbols, it was easy to introduce new students with difficult-to-decode names, and their names were learned and pronounced correctly from that day forward. I’ve also heard this question. "Do you teach the symbols like handwriting?" No. I may hand-write them for students to see, but I almost always type the symbols using the Type IPA site or copy and paste from the Mactionary (the dictionary on my MacBook Pro). You can use dictionary settings to change the pronunciation guide to IPA. Students don't have to learn to write in IPA because it's more about identifying a pronunciation and seeing whether there is a phoneme-grapheme correspondence, or demonstrating how the pronunciation shifts when the word has affixes. So What Does /waɪ ɪz ðɪs soʊ kənˈfjuzɪŋ/ Mean? So, if you're interested in IPA, you can take a class or pore over the websites I've included. Or just appreciate that the squiggles have a purpose in life. Finally, let's get back to the original question. What do these squiggles mean? /waɪ ɪz ðɪs soʊ kənˈfjuzɪŋ/. This is IPA for "Why is this so confusing?" Hopefully, it looks more familiar now, and you're intrigued enough to play around with IPA or explore more deeply!
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