Fricative consonants are produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together which produces friction, this air flow is called frication. Click oneach of these fricative consonants/f/ /v/ /θ/ /ð/ /s/ /z/ /ʃ/ /ʒ/ /h/ /r/ in the chart on the right and repeat these sounds as many times as you need to.The fricative song She, well-known thanks to the film Notting Hill, starring Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant, sung by Elvis Costello, was, however, composed by the Armenian Charles Aznavour, who made it number one in England in 1974.
Listen to the song on this video and do the gap-fill activity just underneath by typing the missing words as you listen.
Once finished you can do the following crossword activitywith words taken from the lyrics.
Liquid consonants /l/ /r/ are sounds where the airstream is obstructed, but not so much as to either stop it or create friction. Pronounceall or arevery slowly and hear the difference between the vowel and the liquid consonants. Some languages trill r's, of course. In American English the /r/ is considered a retroflex because of how the tongue flexes back toward the alveolar ridge (in most dialects). /l/is considered a lateral liquid because it is made by putting the tip of the tongue against the alveolar ridge, then letting the airstream flow around the sides of the tongue - laterally.
Glide consonants, also known as semivowels /j/ /w/. Sounds with little or no obstruction to the airstream in the mouth. Glides and Liquids are the closest things to vowels among the consonants - in fact, in some languages they function almost as vowels; Sanskrit, for example, has syllabic 'l' and 'r' . 1) Click on the phonemes /l/ /r/ /j/ /w/ in the consonant chart on the right before you listen to the song.
Take into account that the graphemes that stand for /j/ are:
'y' in initial position as in yellow, yes, you.
'u' and 'eu' + consonant in initial position as in university, united, Europe.
Compression in connected speech as in tell me a story /ˈtelmjəˈstɒri/
The graphemes that stand for /w/ are:
'wh' as in white, where, whiskey.
'w' as in win, wet, wish.
Compression in connected speech as in about to arrive/əˈbəʊtwəˈraɪv/
2) Do the gap- fill activity as you listen to the song by the legendary English rock band Pink Floyd. Use the clues (the liquid and glide consonants/l/ /r/ /j/ /w/ the words contain) as you need them, but remember you will lose points. You can repeat the activity as many times as you need to. Use the scroller on the right to move up or down.
3) Do the matching activity. Read the instructions before you do it.
To see the IPA phonetic symbols in the text, please ensure that you have installed a Unicode font that includes them all, for example Lucida Sans Unicode or Charis SIL (click name for free download).
This blog is mainly based on the field of phonetics addressed to teachers and students of English at all levels. The activities are interactive and can be used as lessons in class, a language lab, on-line or off-line (they can be photocopied).
