English phonetics and phonology - Worksheet 1

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1. Human speech organs

In the spaces provided, fill in the names of the human speech
organs numbered in the diagram.
1. ____________________(upper) lip
2. ____________________(upper) teeth
3. ____________________alveolar ridge
4. ____________________hard palate
5. ____________________velum (soft palate)
6. ____________________uvula
7. ____________________epiglottis
8. ____________________lip
9. ____________________tip/apex
10. ___________________blade/lamina
11. ___________________back/dorsum
12. ___________________oral cavity
13. ___________________nasal cavity
14. ___________________glottis-vocal folds/vocal cords
English phonetics and phonology - Worksheet 1
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2. Airstream Mechanism

Fill in the blanks in the following passage with the words provided (some words
may be used more than once):

voiced clicks ejectives velaric voiceless glottalic pulmonic plosives implosives

There are three principle airstream mechanisms: the _____pulmonic______

airstream mechanism, the ____glottalic________ airstream mechanism, and the
___velaric_________ airstream mechanism. In normal utterances in all the
languages of the world, the airstream is always flowing outward if the
_____pulmonic___________ airstream mechanism is involved. Stops made with
this mechanism are called ____plosives__________. The only mechanism that is
used in some languages to produce some sounds with inward going air and some
sounds with outward going air is the ____glottalic_______airstream mechanism.
Stops made with this mechanism acting ingressively are called _implosives____.
Stops made with this mechanism acting egressively are called
_____ejectives_________. The mechanism that is used in language to produce
sounds only with inward going air is the ____velaric______ airstream mechanism.
Stops made with this mechanism are called ____clicks_________. Stops may vary
in their voice onset time. In this respect, [b,d,g] are ______voiced_______ stops,
[p,t,k] are ___voiceless_____stops.

Syllables and their parts

Words can be cut up into units called syllables.

Humans seem to need syllables as a way of
English phonetics and phonology - Worksheet 1
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segmenting the stream of speech and giving it a

rhythm of strong and weak beats, as we hear in
music. Syllables dont serve any meaning-
signalling function in language; they exist only
to make speech easier for the brain to process. A
word contains at least one syllable.
Most speakers of english have no trouble
dividing a word up into its component syllables.
Sometimes how a particular word is divided
might vary from one individual to another, but a
division is always easy and always possible.
Here are some words divided into their
component syllables ( a period is used to mark
the end of a syllable)
Tomato= to.ma.to
Window= win.dow

Pan ban
Lap lab
Sip zip
Race raise