A selection of English ESL vowel sounds printables

Auditory perception of long vowel sound versus grapheme spelling (alphabet letters)

Long a vowel sound

This is a rhyming words exercise to help with pronunciation of vowel sounds and recognition of the  different spellings. there are 3 matching words (one blue, one green one red). Once the children (about age 8-12 but also used with adults) I have asked the children to choose one or two sets of rhyming words and write a short poem or limerick using the vocabulary. I write an example for them e.g kitty, city, pretty

there once was a lonely kitty

Who lived in a huge city

When she could

she wanted to look good

She thought she was ever so pretty



and then the kids write their own.



Rhyming words - vowel sounds

It’s an exciting time when your child first begins to speak. Saying their first words is a major milestone. It paves the way to the development of speech and language and better communication between you and your child.

	In order for this communication to develop, your child needs to be able to say individual words to build up their vocabulary. It’s only once children have done this that they can begin to combine words together. This is where the real communication begins!	

Short & Long Vowel Sounds

Students use the word bank and pictures at the bottom of the worksheet to complete the sentences using short a words. 

Short A Vowel Sound

These are vowel sound cards with words to illustrate. Each letter is shown with long and short variants and includes a card for shwa . I printed each one on a different color of card stock. Geared for adult ESL, as there are no pictures.

vowel sound wall cards

Document created along with the American Accent training PDF. 

It contains some basic vowel sounds in English to practice in different ways. 

I usually ask my groups to rap it, say it as poem or just read it.

Make sure to screen it, exagerate the sounds the first times for them to get it and adopt/adapt to your convenience!

Vowel sounds and rhymes practice

Studens to identify beginning sounds (blends) and long vowel sounds.

Beginning sounds and Vowel sounds

Students change short vowel sounds into long vowel sounds by adding another letter and then find words that match the rule

Short vowel and Long vowel sounds

This activity is to put in practice all the knowledge that we acquire during this partial , we going to practice vowel sounds and consonant sounds with two activity, each one have some literals, at the end you will have a clear idea about the previous knowledge.  

VOWELS SOUNDS AND CONSONANT SOUNDS (TRANSCRIPTIONS).

A worksheet dealing with phonetics and some of the major difficulties my students usually have (maybe the same as yours). There are 7 exercises to differentiate vowel and consonant sounds, to differentiate z and s sounds an three exercises with the ending “ed” sound of regular verbs in the past. After the students do the exercises, they’ll find the transcriptions on the second page for auto-correction. The teacher may want to check it orally after their own correction. The worksheet is completely editable / correctable to better fit your needs or your students’ vocabulary and level. Hope it’s useful. Thanks for downloading and have a nice day!

Phonics!!! – 7 different tasks [z / s sound; final ed in the past; vowel sound; th sound] with phonetic transcriptions for auto-correction or oral correction. ((2 pages)) ***editable

My own remake of the vowels sounds - inspired by jolly phonics



Read the words and point to the pictures emphasizing the vowels sounds a/e/i/u/o.



The children look at the picture box. Say the word box ask the children to listen out or the /o/ sound.

Point out that in the line of short vowels above the picture the /o/ has been circled.



The children look at the rest of the pictures and say the words for them circling the short vowel above. Also write down the words under neath the pictures. The last picture has 2 vowel sounds see if your children can pick them up!



Finally a word search containing 4 of each vowel sound to find.

Short Vowels a/e/i/o/u  RE-UPLOADED

Students need to fill the missing letter (short vowel a, e, i, o, u)

CVC words- medial sounds

Culture, intercultural communication, cross-cultural communication

Adjectives to describe feelings, emotions

Adjectives to describe personality and character

Adjectives: Gradable / Non-gradable adjectives

Articles: Definite or indefinite article (a, an or the)

BE + infinitive structures (e.g. he was to become famous)

Clauses of contrast (e.g.  although, while)

Clauses of purpose (e.g. in order to, so that, so as to)

Clauses of reason (e.g. because, because of, due to, as, since)

Cleft sentences (e.g. It's Joey we're looking for)

Comparison: Comparative adjectives and structures

Comparison: Superlative adjectives and structures

Conditional 2 (second conditional) - would

Conditionals: Conditional phrases (e.g. unless, provided that, as long as)

Conjunctions (aka connectives, e.g. and, but, or, so, then)

Contractions (shortened forms, e.g. don't, aren't, etc.)

Determiners (words that can come before nouns)

Formal and informal English (politeness or colloquial language)

Future perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Future perfect simple and continuous (progressive) tense

Future phrases (e.g. be about to, bound to, likely to, due to, set to + INF)

Homonyms (two words with the same pronunciation - homophones and homographs)

It as preparatory subject (e.g. it's raining, it's nice of you to)

Linking verbs (aka copulas, e.g. I am a student)

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how to accuse somebody of something in English

how to apologize, say sorry, forgive and express regret in English

how to ask for information and make inquiries in English

how to ask for something, make requests in English

how to blame somebody for something in English

how to defend yourself from criticism in English

how to deny or admit something in English

how to describe things or people in English

how to emphasize important things in English

how to encourage or discourage people in English

how to evaluate people or progress in English

how to express agreement /disagreement in English

how to express approval and disapproval  in English

how to express cause and effect in English

how to express interest in something in English

how to express likelihood, probability in English

how to express likes and dislikes in English

how to express sequence and chronology in English

how to express shock and disbelief in English

how to express sympathy and condolences in English

how to give permission, authorization in English

how to inform somebody about some news in English

how to interpret what was said in English

how to keep a conversation going in English

how to make guesses about something in English

how to make, accept and refuse offers in English

how to order or make a booking in English

how to persuade, convince people in English

how to praise people and express appreciation in English

how to reassure somebody of something in English

how to refuse and object to something in English

how to remind people of something in English

how to rephrase, paraphrase what was said in English

how to say thank you, express gratitude in English

Nouns: Collective nouns (team, class, family, committee)

Nouns: Proper nouns (names of people, cities, companies)

Oxymorons (phrases with words of contradictory meaning, e.g. living dead)

Participles: Past participle (e.g. HAVING DONE)

Participles: Present participle (e.g. DOING)

Parts of Speech (aka word classes, e.g. nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs)

Past perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Phonetics (pronunciation, IPA, phonetic symbols)

Plural nouns: regular plurals with S ending

Prefixes (e.g. A, UN, IM, DIS, MIS, EN, etc. )

Prepositions vs adverbs (e.g. before me, saw him before.)

Prepositions: Double prepositions (e.g. out of)

Prepositions: Participle prepositions (e.g. pending, concerning)

Prepositions: Phrase prepositions (e.g. by means of)

Present perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Present perfect simple or present continuous tense

Present simple tense: S for third person singular verbs

Present simple vs continuous (progressive) tense

Pronouns: EACH OTHER, ONE ANOTHER (reciprocal pronouns)

Pronouns: Possessive pronouns (e.g. my, mine)

Pronouns: Reflexive pronouns (e.g. myself, yourself))

Pronouns: SOMEBODY, ANYBODY, EVERYBODY, NO ONE, NOTHING, etc.

Pronouns: THIS, THAT, THESE, THOSE (demonstratives)

Pronouns: YOU and THEY to talk about people in general

Quantifiers (e.g. some, many, much, any, few, little)

Questions: WH questions (open-ended questions)

Reported speech: reported questions (indirect questions)

There is / there are / there was / there were / there will be, etc.

Verbs: Transitive or intransitive verbs (words that can or cannot stand with objects)

Working with Paragraphs: ordering, titling

Role play, miming, drama activity or improv game

Pictionary (picture dictionary) or picture matching

Writing an opinion essay (persuasive essay)

Learners who are Pre-A1 have just begun learning English and will first learn how to:<ul><li>Say the letters in the alphabet and numbers</li><li>Say hello, talk about names and age</li><li>Name the colors and dates, express likes and dislikes</li></ul>

Absolute beginners who have begun to learn the letters and numbers

Learners taking the A1 Elementary exam should be able to:<ul><li>Introduce themselves and ask and answer questions about personal details such as where he/she lives, things he/she has, people he/she knows.</li><li>Communicate using very basic phrases as long as the other person talks slowly and clearly and is prepared to help.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: common adjectives & adverbs of frequency, going to, how much/how many, imperatives, I'd like, 's – possessive, common prepositions of place and time, present simple & continuous, there is/are</li></ul>

A very basic tourist level, which is enough for buying food and a bus ticket

Learners taking the A2 Pre-intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand sentences and frequently used expressions (e.g. very basic personal and family information, shopping, local geography, employment).</li><li>Complete tasks that are routine and exchange information about familiar matters.</li><li>Describe matters of immediate need in simple terms.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: countable/uncountable nouns, adverbs of frequency, future will/going to, much/many, present perfect, past simple, past continuous, common phrasal verbs, common modals: can/should</li></ul>

A tourist who can do basic conversations about the past, present and future

Learners taking the B1 Intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand points regarding family, work, school or leisure-related topics.</li><li>Deal with most travel situations in areas where the language is spoken.</li><li>Create simple texts on topics of personal interest.</li><li>Describe experiences, events, dreams, and ambitions, as well as opinions or plans in brief.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: question tags, intensifiers: too/enough, future tenses, past tenses, modals, conditionals, wh-questions in the past</li></ul>

Learners who can deal with both familiar and routine situations, in friendly and work contexts

Learners taking the B2 Upper-intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand the main ideas of complex text on both concrete and abstract topics, including technical discussions in his/her field of specialization.</li><li>Interact with fluency and spontaneity that makes regular interaction with native speakers quite possible without difficulty for either party.</li><li>Produce clear, detailed text on a wide range of subjects and explain an opinion on a topical issue giving the advantages and disadvantages of various options.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: perfect tenses, mixed conditionals, modals in the present, phrasal verbs, reported speech, wish, relative clauses</li></ul>

The level where you can be a tour guide for your foreign friends and talk about a lot of topics, even abstract ones, with ease and fluency

Learners taking the C1 Advanced exam should be able to: Express ideas fluently and spontaneously without much obvious searching for expressions. Use language flexibly and effectively for social, academic and professional purposes. Understand a wide range of demanding, longer texts. Produce clear, well-structured, detailed text on complex subjects, using linking phrases (=words that connect ideas between sentences). Main grammar points to know: inversion, mixed conditionals, modals in the past, all passive forms, phrasal verbs (all patterns), wish/if only for regrets

Learners who can smoothly communicate in every walk of life, read long texts and write well

Learners taking the C2 Proficient exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand almost everything read or heard with ease.</li><li>Summarize information from a variety of sources into a coherent presentation.</li><li>Express themselves using precise meaning in complex scenarios.</li><li>Can express him/herself spontaneously, very fluently and precisely, differentiating finer shades of meaning even in the most complex situations</li></ul>

Get here and you are ready to study in English at university

120 Vowel sounds English ESL worksheets pdf & doc