English spelling and pronunciation can feel unpredictable - but a lot of it actually follows patterns. This mini-course covers 12 of the most common ones: things like a silent "e" that changes a vowel's sound, two vowels that team up to make one sound, and letters that are written but never spoken.
This is the first mini-course in "The Sounds of English Language in Patterns and Examples."
The 12 patterns
- Short Vowels
- Silent E
- Vowel Teams
- Final Y
- The IGH Family
- Vowel Clues
- Common Consonant Teams
- Soft Letters
- Silent Letters
- R-Controlled Vowels
- The Unpredictable Ones
- Suffix Endings (-ed / -s)
Three ways to practice
Learn Patterns
Watch the letters move. Each pattern gets its own short animation showing which letters team up, which ones stay silent, and which one changes its sound. Good for understanding why a word is spelled and said the way it is.
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Study Patterns
Train your ear. Listen to real recordings of words and quickly tap the pattern you hear. Fast, sound-only practice - no reading involved.
Open
Practice Patterns
Play a game. A puzzle game (inspired by the classic "Color Lines") where typing or saying a word matching a pattern unlocks a ball so you can move it. Line up 5 of the same color to clear them and score.
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How it all fits together
All three apps use the same 12 patterns and the same set of real, recorded words (spoken in both US and UK English), so what you practice in one carries over to the others. Every pattern also has its own short written guide - look for the "?" button next to a pattern's name in any of the three apps to open it.