Week 2 · Workshop 2

How long is the vowel

Pronunciation Workshop — the vowel tells you the ending.

~35 min

What this workshop gives you

2 minutes

A second clue for when the ending of a word is too quiet to hear.

Americans often barely pronounce the last consonant of a word. So how does anyone tell cap from cab? The vowel before it.

The vowel tells you the ending

6 minutes

English stretches the vowel before a voiced ending (b, d, g, v, z, j) and shortens it before an unvoiced one (p, t, k, f, s, ch).

Word	The vowel is
cap	short vowelca-p
cab	longer vowelcaaa-b
bat	short
bad	longer
back	short
bag	longer
seat	short
seed	longer

Put two fingers on your throat and say “ssss” then “zzzz”. The buzz you feel on the z is what “voiced” means. That buzz is what stretches the vowel in front of it.

Watch: why the ending changes the vowel

8 minutes

Vowel Length Affected by Ending ConsonantRachel's English · Tap to play. Pause and replay as much as you want — replaying is the method, not cheating.

The example to hold on to: dog and dot. Same vowel on paper. Completely different length in a real mouth.

Your language and vowel length

6 minutes

For Nepali speakers

Nepali already uses vowel length to change meaning, so your ear knows how to measure a vowel. That is a real head start — but English uses it differently.

In Nepali, the length belongs to the vowel itself. In English it depends on what comes after. The same vowel is long in bad and short in bat.

So do not ask “was that a long vowel or a short vowel?” Ask “was that vowel stretched or cut off?” — and let it tell you what the ending was.

For Chinese speakers

Mandarin uses tone to separate words, not vowel length. So this cue is genuinely new — your ear has never had to measure how long a vowel lasted.

That makes it worth real practice, because it is the most reliable way to catch the endings that Mandarin does not allow: -p, -t, -k, -s, -d, -f.

Listen to bat and bad ten times. Ignore the last sound completely. Judge only how long the middle lasted. That alone will tell you the word.

General

Most languages do not use this cue. Judge the length of the vowel rather than straining to hear a final consonant that was barely said.

Watch: length is not a property of the vowel

7 minutes

EE vs. IH — Long and Short VowelsRachel's English · Tap to play. Pause and replay as much as you want — replaying is the method, not cheating.

She disagrees with how this is usually taught, and she is right. There is no such thing as a permanently long vowel. Length comes from the ending, the stress, and the position in the sentence.

Hear it, then say it

5 minutes

You hear a short, cut-off vowel. The word most likely ends in:

Now record yourself saying these pairs, stretching the second one of each:

cap / cab · bat / bad · back / bag · seat / seed · rice / rise

Play it back. If the two sound identical, stretch the second one further. Save as “Week 2 — Workshop 2”.

Next: Session 3 Back to Week 2