Why is it that they teach us in school which letters are vowels and which are consonants? Do we ever need to know that “whoa, an ‘e’ is a vowel, I better watch out”? The only time this info is useful is on Wheel of Fortune. Also the letter ‘y’ is sometimes a vowel. Why not make it always a vowel and then it goes back to my original question - Why do we need to know vowels from consonants?
A vowel sound is a sound made by an open larynx, and a consonant sound a sound made by a constricted larynx. For practical purposes, you won’t need to know the difference, probably, but it’ll help you divide a word into syllables.
As for Y, it’s sometimes a consonant and sometimes a vowel, because the letter represents different sounds. In the world “yellow”, for example, the letter represents a sound made with the throat closed. In a word like “syllable”, the throat is open.
I would also guess that it helps a little in teaching people how to read. If you explain to a child the difference between a “long” and a “short” A sound, then they learn to be wary of how and when the pronounciation changes. Mostly it’s a recognition thing, since a lot of languages have a lot of irregular words, but it helps to be able to say to a child that the "a"sound in “gas” is like the one in “hat”, but not like the one in “late”.
Just a WAG, but based on how my grade school teachers taught, someone must have thought it was useful at some point in time! I know my mother still uses it as a teacher, and she’s one of those people always trying different things if she finds that something doesn’t seem to work.
Why do we need to know math? Why not just use a calculator all the time, and why know history or geography or how to spell. Why know about government or current events or grammar or any of that stuff they teach in school. None of it is necessary, since no one graduating from high school these days has the slightest notion about any of these things and they are the ones that know what is important.
Perhaps that isn’t true, but tell me that there isn’t reason to make this assumption.
I understand all the answers given, but I still stand that there is no need to know which letters are consonants and which are vowels.
The whole short A long A issue can be taught as that: Sometimes the A is long, sometimes short, just like the letter C can sound differently. That is taught when learning the alphabet, but I still do not know why it is necessary to know which letters are vowels and which are not.
I will wager a guess. Vowels all have certain rules that govern them (like they have long and short sounds, if the word ends in ‘e’ it is a long sound). When you have a group that all have the same properties it is eaier to learn them as a group than the learn the special properties of each one individually.
It helps to distinguish vowels and consonants because you know you can’t string a whole bunch of vowels or a whole bunch of consonants together - you have to some of each. The consonant/vowel distinction makes words easier to understand. It’s particularly useful when you’re trying to write words you hear, when you are looking at a string of letters and wondering if it’s a word, or when you are playing a game like hangman or Wheel of Fortune.
I think this is a good example of bad teaching. As mentioned above, knowing what a vowel is helps in reading. It is also helpful when learning foreign languages. The problem is that teachers too often teach only that aeiou are vowels along with the part-timer y; they fail to teach what a vowel actually is. This is akin to teaching the first 10 prime numbers without revealing what a prime number actually is.
The larynx has nothing to do with it. A vowel involves a “relatively free” passage of breath. Most consonants interrupt or interfere with the passage of breath in some way (exceptions: the nasals n, m, and ng).
Here is an Onion article which helps to illustrate the importance of vowels and distinguishing them from consonants.