# Common words where W is a vowel **URL:** \ **Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\ **Created:** [April 28, 2011, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052 "2011-04-28T16:41:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/81 "2011-05-03T03:14:03Z")
> [@guizot](#): > > And yet you turned out to be a highly proficient reader early on, right? That’s my point above: _despite these “mistakes” that elementary teachers make, children who really want to read figure it out anyway_… My teachers didn’t make all those mistakes. 😛 Some of this is along the lines of ‘zero is nothing’ or ‘black is lack of color’. Its kind of a starting point for conceptual thinking. _ **if they have comprehensible and systematic input as guidance, along with encouragement to provide motivation** _. (If they don’t see reading valued–especially at home–they’re at a serious disadvantage, and pure phonics alone can’t make up for that.)\*\* I’m the only reader in my immediate family. Reading was demanded at school. :o > [@](#): > > To go back to one of the particulars:Most people don’t seem to realize that “sounding out” has one big fundamental flaw, because you cannot produce an onset consonant without some kind of vowel after it. Usually what people use are the unstressed vowels /ǝ/ or /ɪ/. However, neither of those is the actual vowel in the word “cat,” for instance. The word is not /kǝæt/, though that is what happens when you “sound it out.” Yup, that’s what I was saying. > [@](#): > > Nevertheless, this doesn’t trip up most learners. It tripped up my son. ☹ It wasn’t until Hebrew reading started that he ‘caught on’ to the vowel concept. > [@](#): > > They hear the word naturally spoken, or see it in a picture book, and if it’s properly contextualized lexically, they figure it out. From then on, “cat” becomes a sight word and “sounding it out” was just a red herring. Cat should never be a ‘sight word’. _Cat_ can be read. > [@](#): > > Phonic approaches to decoding text work much better when onsets are grouped with rimes in the same way that the Japanese or Korean syllabaries are. It’s okay that the letters change–kids can handle that. Explain…? Should Would Could ? Bat Cat Rat Sat ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/82 "2011-05-03T03:17:41Z")
[QUOTE] > [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I don’t think most people realize that the _sh_ in _shine_ is not simply a combination of _s & h_ or that the _ch_ in _church_ is not simply _c_ +_h_. And even people who realize that miss the fact that the _th_ of _then_ is not not the _th_ of _thin_. And don’t get me started on _ng_. > > I blame the Electric Company. > > Well, that’s not true. Not completely. But kids are taught (at least we were when I was a lad) to “sound out” words by saying “c” + “h” + “arm” = _charm_, and so forth. Is isn’t it “this is what makes (or can make) the _chuh_ sound”, instead of c+h=Ch? I mean, chai and chai are two different things if the latter is Hebrew. > [@](#): > > I’m sure it causes no end of confusionn. Of course. But you can still teach kiddos how to read. Reading is not like speaking. Kids will figure out language on their own. But reading is this man-made system of complex rules that requires a combination of certain cognitive developments before a student can ‘get the rules’. I think there is a _right_ way and a _wrong_ way to teach ‘phonics’. imho, my son’s school does it the wrong way. “Sight words” are now described as _commonly used words_ in children’s books. When I was a kid, a “sight word” was one that followed no rule. 😕 Most of his ‘sight words’ are words that he would be able to know if he just knew that certain combinations of letters make sounds. Cripes. No wonder my high school students suck at reading. I wasn’t taught the way I described in “common mistakes”. It was a starting point, but a preschool starting point. And from then on, it was ‘phonics’ (old school, I guess – sounds) and spelling tests. werked fer me ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/83 "2011-05-03T03:33:32Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > ut then, I’m a Canuck, so it may be part of that “aboot” stuff you guys always mention. Yes, this is the accent feature known as Canadian raising; for speakers with this feature, the diphthongs “ow” or “aye”, when followed by a voiceless consonant, are rendered using a different starting position than otherwise (roughly something like the difference between “ah” and “uh”). As it happens, many parts of the U.S. also have this phenomenon for the “aye” diphthong but not the “ow” diphthong, so to potentially observe an analogous effect to what **Northern Piper** describes, try comparing the vowels of “lie” and “lice”. The rest of this thread is in desperate need of commentary from at least one linguist. ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/84 "2011-05-03T03:48:08Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > You spell cat with a _k_? [Adam Savage]“Well there’s your problem.” [/Savage] > > Sounding out the letters is a common starting place, it just doesn’t always work because some sounds use letter combinations (th), many letters have multiple sounds (c, g, vowels), etc. 😛 ci:? :smack: imho sounding out letters is where you \*should \*start, provided you do it correctly. And then start grouping together letters that make ‘vowel’ sounds, consonant combos (like ck), the rules of y, and things like [what’s up with c and g](http://www.learningstation.com/home/resources/Phonics,%20Spelling,%20and%20Vocabulary/Spelling%2010-12/Consonant%20sounds-1.pdf)? Teaching my son some _y_ and _e_rules improved his reading (and spelling) a ton. I’m not kidding. Total transformation within a week. Now “bunny” is “bunny” instead of “bune”. “My” is “my” instead of “mi”. “Little” is “little” instead of “litl”. Sure, he has to think about it, but his reading ‘speed’ and decoding has improved dramatically. Every letter needs to be ‘read’, but not every letter ‘says its name’. I wouldn’t spell my name JoyAqnn, because the _q_ has no purpose. I am sure there are plenty of words with erroneous letters, but you get what I mean. I’m not a genius or a master linguist and I \*hate \*phonetics studies because I can’t always hear things! I feel sorry for deaf children who are in speech therapy. And the IPA confuses me. ☹ I don’t mind dissecting parts of speech and analyzing the purposes of grammar rules, but I’m more interested in neurolinguistics or degrees of 'socio’linguistics. I love teaching ESL – but that’s because I love my Hispanic community. I’m a licensed social studies teacher. I also dislike being around pint-size people (besides my own). :dubious: I guess I assumed that my son’s teachers knew what they were doing. $14k/yr tuition, ffs. It’s not their fault that teaching trends go in circles, but I was really worried about my son. What are were doing is nothing like how I was taught, but I figured it “worked” on everyone. It’s possible that they are implicating it wrong, but I hate it. Hate it. Hate it. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/85 "2011-05-03T05:18:47Z")
> [@CitizenPained](#): > > . _Cat_ can be read. So? What do you mean by “read,” then? Just because a word “can be read” is no reason why it shouldn’t become a sight word. That’s the whole goal. “Sight words” aren’t just for kids learning. The eye of a competent adult reader takes in on average three words _in an instant_. We don’t read words one by one–we read them in chunks. Proficient readers process language more in the rear of the brain, where comprehension is less temporally bound than speech is. > [@CitizenPained](#): > > Explain…? > … > Bat > Cat > Rat > Sat More like bat bit bite _and_ go dough hoe 고 도 호 ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 10:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/86 "2011-05-03T10:28:09Z")
> [@guizot](#): > > So? What do you mean by “read,” then? Just because a word “can be read” is no reason why it shouldn’t become a sight word. That’s the whole goal. “Sight words” aren’t just for kids learning. The eye of a competent adult reader takes in on average three words _in an instant_. We don’t read words one by one–we read them in chunks. Proficient readers process language more in the rear of the brain, where comprehension is less temporally bound than speech is. When I say, “all words _can_ be read”, I don’t mean, “every letter should be sounded out” by emerging readers. I also don’t think that all words should be separately parsed as readers become more competent. As you pointed out, that’s not only silly, but antithetical to how the brain works. I’ve read so much that I ‘speed read’ with efficiency (err–in my native language). I’m not talking about the ‘eye of a competent adult reader’. I’m talking about the cognitive processes of a five year old. I started teaching my son vowel ‘sounds’ by groups. For example, E: ea ee y A: ai ey eigh O: ow oa ough I: ie y igh u/oo: oo/oo (foot v. root) ui But I don’t say, "All right. Here are all possible combinations for the sounds of “A” in one weekend. It’s more like: nay say stay lay and rain gain and sane lane etc., but I won’t do _all sounds for A_ before I move on to _all sounds for E_. He’d throw the book at me. So what is your approach to teaching kindergarteners how to read, exactly? How is handing parents a 90 word list of ‘commonly used words’ as ‘sight words’ good teaching practice? Whoopeeedoo. My son could recognize “she” and couldn’t recognize the “sh” sound in “ship”. 😕 edit: I made up a jeopardy game with some new written sound combos he learned, ‘short vowel’ sounds, ‘y’ in E v. I and the like. no, i don’t use the IPA with a 6 year old. (: but there was a section on ‘what’s the rule?’ - that’s what later contributes to the ‘fast reading’ of adults. i can sound out a new word because i know ‘the rules’. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 11:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/87 "2011-05-03T11:40:09Z")
> [@Indistinguishable](#): > > Yes, this is the accent feature known as Canadian raising; … (roughly something like the difference between “ah” and “uh”). If it’s a Canadian thing, shouldn’t that be "the difference between ‘eh’ and ‘uh’ "? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![tim314](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim314/32/3468_2.png) [@tim314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tim314)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/88 "2011-05-03T16:59:13Z")
Does [pwn](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pwn) count as English? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/89 "2011-05-03T17:49:13Z")
Probably, but that’s definitely a special case. For one, unlike almost all other language, it exists primarily as a written word, rather than spoken, and it’s not even completely unambiguous how it’s pronounced (though the consensus seems to be forming on “pone”). For another, one can make the case that W isn’t the vowel of that word (or at most, is only part of a diphthong), but that the actual primary vowel is represented by P (whose normal sound is one of the few in English which can absolutely never be a vowel). ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/90 "2011-05-03T17:55:57Z")
“pwn” is a very special case, in that its entire existence (according to the most popular theory) originates as a typo. You can’t really discuss “pwn” without looking at “own”, whose digraph \ is clearly the correspondent of the same “low”, “tow”, “grow” /oU/ diphthong used in the common pronunciation of “pwn”. ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/91 "2011-05-03T19:33:35Z")
I can’t wait until a linguist publishes a great read on netspeak. It’s almost like the absence of vowels in ‘pwn’ indicates that it is not to be spoken. i was born l33t ---
**Author:** ![Powers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Powers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Powers)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/92 "2011-05-03T22:35:21Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > What you do see is a silent /w/ before l (as in _crawl_ and _bawl_); a silent _w_ before _r_, as in _wreck_; and a silent _h_, as in your example. The ‘w’ in “crawl” and “bawl” is not silent, nor is the “h” in “what”. Powers &8^] ---
**Author:** ![Powers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Powers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Powers)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/93 "2011-05-03T22:36:42Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > But kids are taught (at least we were when I was a lad) to “sound out” words by saying “c” + “h” + “arm” = _charm_, and so forth. Well don’t blame the _Electric Company_ for that. =) Their focus was specifically on consonant blends and diphthongs. Powers &8^] ---
**Author:** ![Powers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Powers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Powers)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/94 "2011-05-03T22:38:52Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I’ve no proof of this, but I strongly suspect that kids would do a lot better in science if we just told them the truth to begin with, so they could develop the proper intuition: Not the _whole_ truth, obviously, since they won’t have the appropriate background, but leave out the incorrect pieces in the simplifications. And you’re a Physics teacher? So you think it’s a good idea to talk about friction and air resistance when introducing F=ma to your first-semester students? Powers &8^] ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2011, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/95 "2011-05-03T22:42:18Z")
> [@Powers](#): > > The ‘w’ in “crawl” and “bawl” is not silent, nor is the “h” in “what”. > Powers &8^] Whether the _h_ is silent in _what_ depends on one’s accent, methinks. Perhaps Northerners and Welshmen pronounce that word as /hwɒt/, but we don’t put up with that sort of silliness here in the South. As for _bawl_ & _crawl_, here in the South (i.e., in civilized lands, where _sir_ is not an insult, _you_ is not plural, and grits are easily available), both words are pronounced to rhyme with _ball_, whose vowel is not a diphthong. I think it reasonable to say that our pronunciation (i.e., the correct one) treats _w_ as a silent letter. But this may be less clear to persons who hail from places without sweet tea constantly on hand. > [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I don’t think most people realize that the _sh_ in _shine_ is not simply a combination of _s & h_ or that the _ch_ in _church_ is not simply _c_ +_h_. And even people who realize that miss the fact that the _th_ of _then_ is not not the _th_ of _thin_. And don’t get me started on _ng_. > > I blame the Electric Company. > [@Powers](#): > > Well don’t blame the _Electric Company_ for that. =) Their focus was specifically on consonant blends and diphthongs. > Powers &8^] I was jesting, sirrah. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/96 "2011-05-04T16:33:07Z")
> [@Powers](#): > > The ‘w’ in “crawl” and “bawl” is not silent… Again, let me repeat: _ **All** _ letters are silent. The W in “bawl” helps to distinguish it from “ball” when reading print, but it doesn’t represent any difference in SAE pronunciation. Really what the “W” really does is remind us that the word has Latin origins. The difference in the spelling of these two words (_ball_ and _bawl_) demonstrates exactly why Cecil’s answer is at best meaningless. To say that W is a “vowel” because it’s written directly after the “A” makes as much sense as saying that the “G” and the “H” in “straight” are vowels. ---
**Author:** ![Powers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Powers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Powers)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/97 "2011-05-04T20:31:18Z")
> [@guizot](#): > > Again, let me repeat: _ **All** _ letters are silent. I was writing colloquially. Is there a word you would have preferred I use instead to indicate that the ‘w’ changes the pronunciation of the word? (And, I hasten to add, I was merely paralleling Skald’s original usage of “silent” to indicate that the letter doesn’t affect the pronunciation. So get off my case!) Powers &8^] ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/98 "2011-05-04T21:28:41Z")
> [@Powers](#): > > And you’re a Physics teacher? So you think it’s a good idea to talk about friction and air resistance when introducing F=ma to your first-semester students? Yeah, why not? Teachers say things like “An object in motion tends to stay in motion” and “An object’s weight does not affect the speed at which it falls”, and students might think in response “Huh? That makes no sense; it doesn’t seem to jibe with what I know and daily perceive of the world.” Might as well nip that confusion in the bud by explaining, at some introductory level, how friction and air resistance account for the apparent discrepancies; you don’t have to go into the actual equations of friction and air resistance in order to say “These are phenomena that exist which roughly behave like so-and-so but which we are going to ignore in our models of the world for now”. ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2011, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/99 "2011-05-04T21:34:48Z")
(In fact, so far as I can recall, every intro physics course I ever took _did_ start that way… The reason we’re all so aware that intro physics courses tend to ignore friction and air resistance in their mathematical models is because they generally also take care to explicitly note that they’re ignoring friction and air resistance in their mathematical models, which of course means they’ve bothered to talk about, at at least some level, the concepts) ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2011, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052/100 "2011-05-05T01:15:42Z")
> [@Powers](#): > > Is there a word you would have preferred I use instead to indicate that the ‘w’ changes the pronunciation of the word? The W doesn’t change anything. People say the word as they naturally do, and this is not driven by the spelling. We use letters in print to represent the way we talk, more or less, and in English sometimes it’s less. Often the “less” occasions are when origins of a word are carried over orthographically and the historic changes of the pronunciation of the word aren’t reflected by corresponding changes in the spelling. There are some few people who _do_ alter their natural speech because of what they see in print. The technical term for this is “hypercorrection”–more commonly known as _ **affectation** _. (People hypercorrect with grammar, too, when they say things like “Between you and I,” etc.) But this is not representative of the language itself. This mistaken notion that the letters somehow drive the pronunciation of a language is what I meant by saying “all letters are silent.” Language is speech, first. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-words-where-w-is-a-vowel/580052.md?page=6)