Red green blue vowels consonants hard soft. Hard and soft consonants

The transition from kindergarten to first grade is not only an important and joyful event in a child’s life, but also a lot of stress, because at school children are forced to receive and assimilate a large amount of information in a short time. However, not every topic can be easily mastered by a new student. For example, some first-graders find it difficult to learn to distinguish between hard and soft consonant sounds in the short period of time indicated in the 1st grade curriculum.

In this case, parents should come to the aid of the student. But it is difficult for fathers and mothers who do not have a pedagogical education to independently explain the difference in sounds to their baby. Let's try to look at the basic principles that will make this much easier.

Division into vowels and consonants

First of all, the child must learn that all letters, except for the soft and hard signs, represent certain sounds. While learning the alphabet, you need to help your child remember that sounds are divided into vowels and consonants. It is important to explain to the first grader that neither Kommersant, nor b have nothing to do with vowels or consonants. They are only helpers that make a consonant soft or hard.

How to help your child learn to distinguish between soft and hard consonant sounds

When a child learns that there are 21 consonant letters in the Russian language, and remembers each of them (b, v, g, d, zh, z, j, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, f, x, ts, ch, sh, shch), you can safely tell him that there are hard and soft consonants.

We should start with exceptions by telling the story of 6 stubborn letters: These letters don’t want to change for anything in the world. For example, there are always soft consonants, which never become solid, no matter what letter follows them. There are also their complete opposites always hard consonants who don't want to get softer.

Thus, you can draw a table with your first grader that will help him remember that there are invariably soft and hard consonant sounds. Allow your child to keep it in front of his eyes the first time he completes tasks until he remembers the contents of the table well.

Soft and hard consonant sounds (table)

Always soft sounds in Russian	Always hard sounds in Russian
[H'], [Sh'], [Y']	[C], [F], [W]

Next, it should be said that soft consonants in the Russian language are formed:

• if it is followed by a soft sign, for example, LION CUB ([l’]);
• in cases where after a consonant (except always hard ones) there are vowels such as E, Yo, I, Yu, I, for example, BUFFIN ([n'], [g']), HONEY ([m']), PEOPLE ([l']), BALL ([m']).

Before proceeding further, check whether the student remembers 3 important rules:

1. how to determine softness or hardness by vowel,
2. what sounds are always soft,
3. only the sound, not the letter, is soft or hard.

For example, ask your child: is the letter CH soft or hard in the words SCARECROW and MAN?

Next, the baby should learn more about hard consonant sounds and what they become like when they are in front of:

• a solid sign, for example, ENTRANCE ([d]);
• vowels A, O, U, Y, E: DOLL ([k], [l]), SMOKE ([d]), HOUSE ([d]);
• consonant sound: CAKE ([p]);
• and also at the end of a word, if the sound is not one of those that is always soft: BALL ([p]).

For better perception, you need to speak aloud to your child a couple of words, one of which will have a soft consonant sound, and the other a hard one:

[b] - [b’]	ball - squirrel
[in] - [in’]	wolf - fork
[g] - [g’]	year - weight
[d] - [d’]	home - kids
[z] - [z’]	umbrella - winter
[k] - [k’]	cat - whale
[l] - [l’]	lotto - summer
[mm']	flour - bowl
[n] - [n’]	nose - bottom
[p] - [p’]	dust - dog
[r] - [r’]	genus - series
[s] - [s’]	rash - network
[t] - [t’]	pelvis - shooting range
[f] - [f’]	background – eagle owl
[x] - [x’]	move - hit

A first grader must remember that a sound is soft or hard, since it is followed by a certain vowel.

Additional signs by which a consonant sound can be classified into one category or another

A certain combination of organs of the articulatory apparatus is responsible for the pronunciation of each sound. Children can be taught how to easily recognize soft and hard consonants by the position of their lips.

If, while pronouncing syllables, a child smiles, that is, the corners of his lips move to the sides, then such syllables contain soft consonant sounds. If, when pronouncing the syllable “to have fun,” you don’t want to, then a hard consonant will come across the baby’s path. This will make learning soft and hard sounds easier and more fun.

How to teach a child to distinguish between hard and soft sounds

How to introduce a first grader to hard and soft consonant sounds in a playful way?

1. After writing down pairs of words that include soft and hard consonants, you can ask your child to highlight certain sounds with the following colors:

• vowels – red;
• hard consonants – in blue;
• soft sounds - green.

1. Parents can name words for their children by asking them to identify the hard and soft consonant sounds in them by ear. For the first attempts, you should select three-letter words starting with a consonant. As the child’s skills in identifying soft and hard sounds improve, the length of words needs to be increased, and the task must also be made more complex, starting words with a vowel and including hard or soft signs in them.

1. You can modify the previous game by changing roles. Let the student come up with words ordered by the parent. For example, the elder will ask you to name a word of five letters, while the first must be a vowel, and the presence of a soft consonant B is required. The answer may be - RESULT or WRAP. By showing imagination, you can make the task even more difficult. For example, name words by category (food, sports, travel, summer, etc.).

1. You can also play using various kinds of objects. Balls, colored cubes, jump ropes, and cards with numbers are great for learning the classification of consonant sounds. The latter can be used in the case when a first-grader needs to determine which sound in a word is soft or, conversely, hard, or how many different sounds there are in a given word. You can throw the ball, calling the required sound, and jump on the rope if you make a mistake.

1. An interesting educational game can be played with cubes of four colors: red, blue, green, yellow. Each cube is needed in a quantity of several pieces, because it is easy to guess what sounds they will represent. Yellow color is an additional color, one that was not described earlier, will mean a hard or soft sign.

There are many variations of this game, below are just the main ones:

• The driver lays out a diagram of the word from the cubes, and the player selects the appropriate word from it. Thus, the scheme: “GREEN – RED – BLUE – GREEN – RED – GREEN – YELLOW” corresponds to the word “BEAR”. You can make the task more difficult or easier by reducing or increasing the number of cubes or colors. The main factor is that the first grader takes not only the place of the player, but also the driver, that is, he performs the task of both selecting a word and drawing it up schematically.

• You can add a rating to the game, using the sum of points scored to determine the winner at the end of the competition. Determining in turn the roles of the driver and the guesser, guess the word, and give a certain number of points for each color of the cube. For guessing the letter indicated by the yellow cube, count five points, because in its place there can only be two letters; for the sound hidden under green and blue colors - fifteen each; and for the vowel indicated by the red cube - ten. Soft and hard consonants add up to 36 sounds, so finding them is more difficult than lower vowels.

• As in the previous game, you can add a distinction by category here. However, here it will be more of a hint than a complication. After narrowing the search range, the word will be found easier and faster.

1. For children just starting their journey in the phonetics of the Russian language, you should select a game program that is somewhat simpler than the previous ones. For example, you can list various objects located in the apartment in order to use such a clear example to explain which of the sounds in a word is soft and which is hard. In such an activity, preference is given not only to the clarity of the subject, but also to speaking out loud. If there is a board in the room, it is best to write the word on it, dividing it into syllables and determining the gradation of sounds with the child. You can also use a regular sheet of paper for writing, then with the help of colored pencils it will be possible to use the color designation that is offered in the previous game.

1. The next game is best played in a group of several children. Depending on the skills of the other students, the first player names a word of any length and complexity, the next participant spells out this word, naming the degree of each consonant sound (whether it is soft or hard). Having indicated everything correctly, the player comes up with a word of the same difficulty for the next one, and so on in a circle. The person who answers incorrectly leaves the game, and the last remaining participant becomes the winner.

1. As soon as it becomes clear that your elementary school student has become familiar with the basics of parsing consonant sounds, you can move on to the most serious task: composing a fairy tale from words chosen by dad or mom. Having made a diagram of colors and putting these schemes into sentences, the adult, with hints, helps the child come up with a short story similar to the word “BEAR” compiled above. The scheme should be prepared and thought out in advance, which adds certain difficulties and time costs, however, as practice shows, first-graders love this game the most.

Use these games and exercises not only during studying at home, but also while walking, traveling on the bus, etc. And soon your child will distinguish between hard and soft consonant sounds in 1st grade no worse than his classmates.

Hard and soft consonants - Shishkina school

Consonant sounds sound different in different words. Somewhere it’s hard, and somewhere it’s soft. In this lesson we will learn to distinguish between soft and hard consonant sounds and to indicate the softness of consonant sounds in writing with the letters I, E, E, Yu, I and b. Let's find out which consonants form hard-soft pairs, and which are only hard or only soft.

If you ask what can be soft, probably everyone will immediately say: bread, sofa, scarf, pillow. But stone, ice, wood are hard. Yes, but it turns out that the sounds of Russian speech, consonants, can be hard and soft.

Say the words several times in turn: CAT - WHALE.

Compare the first consonants. When pronouncing the sound in the word KIT, the middle part of the tongue rises to the palate, the passage through which air flows narrows, and a sound is obtained, which scientists conventionally call soft. And the opposite sound was called - solid.

It is important to listen to the sounds of spoken words. If you say the word NOS otherwise - with a hard first sound, we get a completely different word - NOSE.

Let's listen and watch the movement of our tongue:

row - sound [p’] - rad - sound [p]

hatch - sound [l’] - bow - sound [l]

crumpled - sound [m’] - small - sound [m]

Sounds can be written (conventionally) using icons. Musical sounds are written in notes, and speech sounds are written in letters, but in special square brackets - in transcription. In order not to confuse hard and soft sounds when reading the transcription, scientists agreed to show the softness of the sound with an icon very similar to a comma, only they put it on top.

Most consonant sounds form pairs based on softness and hardness:

[b]	[b’]
[V]	[V']
[G]	[G']
[d]	[d’]
[h]	[z’]
[To]	[To']
[l]	[l’]
[m]	[m’]
[n]	[n’]
[P]	[P']
[R]	[R']
[With]	[With']
[T]	[T']
[f]	[f’]
[X]	[X']

Some consonants are only hard or only soft. They do not form pairs in terms of hardness/softness:

— Only hard consonants: [zh], [w], [ts];

— Only soft consonants: [th’], [h’], [w’].

In writing, the hardness of consonant sounds is indicated by the vowels A, O, U, Y, E, and the softness of consonant sounds is indicated by the vowels E, Yo, I, Yu, Ya.

There are words with soft consonant sounds at the end of words or in the middle of words before other consonant sounds. Listen to the words: salt, horse, notebook, coat, ring, letter. Then a soft sign will come to the rescue. Even his name suggests - a sign soft, for soft consonants.

How to act when writing words:

- I hear a hard consonant sound - after it I write the letters in place of the vowel sound: A, O, U, Y, E.

- I hear a soft consonant sound before a vowel sound - I denote its softness with vowels: E, Yo, I, Yu, Ya.

- I hear a soft sound at the end of a word or before a consonant sound - I show softness b.

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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.

Usually, children do not have serious difficulties understanding the difference between vowels and consonants. But we should dwell in more detail on hard and soft consonants.

How to teach children to distinguish between hard and soft consonants

The very first thing you need to teach your child: consonant sounds can be hard and soft, but not letters.

Typical error:
Children confuse sounds and letters. We remember that a sound sounds, and a letter is an icon, it is written. A letter cannot be hard or soft; only a consonant sound can be hard or soft in pronunciation.

Sometimes children can easily learn to distinguish soft and hard sounds by ear.
But it happens that this is difficult, and in this case signs will come to the rescue by which you can distinguish hard sounds from soft ones.

Distinctive features of soft and hard sounds

What sound comes after a consonant:

• If after a consonant sound there is a vowel a, o, u, e, s, then the consonant is hard.
• If after a consonant there is a vowel and, e, yu, i, then the consonant is soft.

Working on examples:
In the words “mama” and “nora” the consonants are hard, because they are followed by “a” and “o”.
In the words “fly” and “nanny” the consonants are soft because they are followed by “e”, “i”, “ya”.

• If after a consonant another consonant sounds, then the first consonant will be hard.
• There are sounds that can only be hard and sounds that can only be soft, no matter what sound is heard or what letter is written after them.

Always hard sounds - zh, sh, ts.
Always soft - th, h, shch.
A common way to learn these sounds is a simple technique: we write the letters that convey these sounds on a line, and emphasize “th, ch, sch.” The underscore symbolizes the cushion on which the soft sounds sit. The pad is soft, which means the sounds are soft.

Soft sign and hard sign

• If there is a consonant at the end of a word and the letter “b” after it, then the consonant is soft.

This rule is easy to apply if the child sees the written word, but it will not help if the child performs the task by ear.

Movement of the tongue when pronouncing soft and hard sounds

When pronouncing a soft sound, the tongue moves slightly forward, approaching (or touching) the palate with its middle.
When pronouncing hard sounds, the tongue does not move forward.

Table of signs of hard and soft sounds

Solid:

1. Before a, o, y, e, y.
2. At the end of a word before a consonant.
3. F, c, w.

Soft:

1. Before the vowels e, e, i, yu, i.
2. If after a consonant there is a soft sign (dust, measles).
3. Y, h, sch.

A picture or simply a list of thematic words is shown, and the task is given to choose words with soft or hard consonants. For example:

Voiced and voiceless consonants

There are 11 pairs of voiced/voiceless consonants in the Russian language.
The phonetic difference between voiced and voiceless consonants lies in the tension of the vocal cords. Voiceless sounds are pronounced with the help of noise, without straining the ligaments. Voiced sounds are pronounced by voice and are caused by vibration of the vocal cords, because air comes out of the larynx noisily.

Mnemonic technique for memorizing voiceless sounds:
Learn the phrase: “Styopka, do you want some cheek? - Fi! All consonant sounds here are unvoiced.

Examples of tasks for children

Tasks for training the differences between paired consonants can be compiled for each pair according to the following principle (using the example of the D/T pair):

Tasks for distinguishing a pair of consonants G/K

Ability to distinguish between soft and hard consonants. Obviously, you don’t need to memorize them, but learn to hear them. And for this, the child needs to be told how exactly these sounds are made - this will greatly facilitate his understanding.

Always soft and always hard consonants

Not all consonants in our language are both hard and soft. First, you need your child to remember those of them that are only hard: Zh, Sh, Ts, and also always soft: Ch, Shch, Y. To do this, you can, for example, make a memorial plaque, where the hard ones will always be drawn above blue bricks, and always soft ones - over green pillows (the choice of color is based on how these sounds are designated in the lower grades).

If a child constantly sees this picture, which you put in his workbook or hang above him, then he will quickly remember these consonants.

How vowels “command” consonants

Then you explain to your child that other consonants can be either soft or hard. But the neighboring letters will help suggest this. If after our consonant there is another consonant, then ours is hard. For example: table. What comes after the C sound? So this is a hard consonant.

Vowel sounds “command” the consonant standing in front what it should be. If these are vowels: A, O, U, E, Y, then there are only hard consonants in front of them. And if it is: I, E, Yu, I, E, then it is soft. The softness of the previous consonant is also indicated by

Educational games

To make it easier for your child to remember this, try playing with him. Invite him to place the outer side of his index finger to the palate and pronounce the syllables containing soft and hard consonants in turn. For example: TA - TYA, NA - NYA. Thanks to this, the child will be able to remember exactly how a consonant sound is produced. He will understand that when a soft consonant is formed, the tongue seems to move forward, and its back rises slightly towards the palate. But when hard consonants are pronounced, this does not happen.

Throw the ball to the child, naming a syllable with a hard consonant, and let him return the ball to you, having already pronounced it with a soft one. For example: LA - LA, LO - LE, LY - LI, etc.

At school, students are asked to distinguish hard and soft consonants using blue and green colors. Blue ones are hard and green ones are soft. Cut out a few red, blue and green squares and have them make a word mosaic. The child will display vowel sounds in red, hard consonants in blue, and soft consonants in green. For this, take small words of one or two syllables: fish, elephant, branch, chalk and so on.

Play the “chain of words” game. You pronounce a word ending with a syllable with a hard or soft consonant, and the child names the next word that begins with this syllable. Remembering to determine out loud which consonant, hard or soft, was in this syllable: winds - fish - bagels - cinema etc.

If you methodically explain to your child the difference between hard and soft consonants, this will help him navigate more easily in the future, when studying many of the features of the spelling of the Russian language. Good luck to you!