• a + consonant = /&/, e.g.: man, bat, fat, bad, sad, sat, flash, damn
  
  
• e + consonant = /E/, e.g.: bed, pet, get, best, help, hell, well
  
  
• i + consonant = /I/, e.g.: it, is, did, his, hit, fit, sing, fix
  
  
• o + consonant = /Q/, e.g.: dog, pot, boss, box, dot, spot, lock, lost
  
  
• u + consonant = /U/, e.g.: put, pull, full, push
• u + consonant = /V/, e.g.: bus, but, cut, club

However, if the consonant is an /r/, then the previous vowel is long —usually an /3;/—, and the "r" is not pronounced in British English:

• a + r = /A;/, e.g.: car, bar, star, far, park, dark, marks
  
  
• e + r = /3;/, e.g.: her, term, germ, certain
  
  
• i + r = /3;/, e.g.: first, girl, sir, birth, dirt
  
  
• o + r = /3;/, e.g.: word, world, work
• o + r = /O;/, e.g.: door, floor, for, fork
  
  
• u + r = /3;/, e.g.: turn, fur, burn, turkey

Finally, in unstressed syllables of longer words, most vowels become /@/, the main exception being /I/:

• unstressed a + consonant = /@/, e.g.: woman
• unstressed e + consonant = /@/, e.g.: policemen
• unstressed i + consonant = /I/, e.g.: summit
• unstressed o + consonant = /@/, e.g.: carrot
• unstressed u + consonant = /@/, e.g.: album

There is a second general rule that helps English-speaking people remember the spelling rules: a vowel followed by a consonant and an "e" is pronounced using the "long name" of that vowel, that is, the name that we use to refer to that vowel when we are spelling out a word:

a is /eI/,
e is /i;/,
i is /aI/,
o is /@U/,
u is /ju;/.

• a + consonant + e = /eI/, e.g.: name, gave, save, mate, made, cake
  
  
• e + consonant + e = /i;/, e.g.: these, complete, concrete
  
  
• i + consonant + e = /aI/, e.g.: bike, bite, write, pipe, site, crime
  
  
• o + consonant + e = /@U/, e.g.: hope, rope, role, hole, note
  
  
• u + consonant + e = /ju;/, e.g.: use, huge, cube, refuse

Of course, in English there often seem to be more exceptions than rules when it comes to the relationship between pronunciation and spelling. Consider these other cases:

• a + consonant = /A;/, e.g.: fast, last, calm, calf
• a + consonant = /O;/, e.g.: all, wall, call, fall, talk, walk, hawk, waltz, also, salt
• a + r = /o;/, e.g.: war, wharf, wart
• a + consonant + e = /A;/, e.g.: (BrEng) vase
  
  
• i + consonant = /aI/, e.g.: fight, light, high, climb, bicycle, hi, minute (= tiny)
  
  
• o + consonant = /u;/, e.g.: tomb
• o + r = /3;/, e.g.: work, word, world
  
  
• u + consonant + e = /u;/, e.g.: rule, rude

If we compare short words like "land" and "lane", it is relatively easy to guess that "land" is pronounced /l&nd/ and "lane" is pronounced /leIn/.

With longer words, however, it is really difficult to know where a syllable ends —that's why it is also extremely difficult to know when it is possible to split a word with a hyphen at the end of a line: compare dic•cio•na•rio in Spanish with dic•tio•nary in English, and rap•id and stu•pid. (This is why English people don't like long words!)

Here are a few general rules from http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/385/what-are-the-rules-for-splitting-words-at-the-end-of-a-line:

• Break words at morpheme boundaries (inter•face).
• Break words between doubled consonants (bat•tle).
• Never break a word after a short vowel in an accented syllable (rap•id but stu•pid).
• Never separate an English digraph (e.g., th, ch, sh, ph, gh, ng, qu) when pronounced as a single unit (au•thor but out•house, pho•tog•ra•pher, pho•to•graph but shep•herd).
• If there is a string of consonants between syllables, break this string as far to the left as you can, consistent with never breaking after a short vowel and with the consonants in the following syllable being an acceptable combination in English for starting a word (mon•strous, mong•rel).

The only way to be sure how you can hyphenate a word is to look it up in a dictionary that shows the syllable boundaries.

So, that is the reason why the English language uses so many double consonants: to mark where a syllable with a short vowel ends. That way, the English know when they should write a double consonant, and we Spanish students know when we should pronounce a short vowel.

Compare these verbal forms:

• i + consonant + e = write
• i + consonant + e = writes
• i + consonant (+ e) = writing
• i + consonant = written

• i + consonant + e = bite
• i + consonant = bit
• i + consonant = bits
• i + consonant + e = bites
• i + consonant = bit•ten
• i + consonant (+ e) = biting

Exercise 1
Guess the pronunciation of these words in your notebook (try to write their phonetic transcription):

vale / valley
ale / all
whale / wall
cane / can / canned
man / mane / manned
bat / batter
fatter / fate
saddle / cradle
pet / Pete / Peter / petty
kit/ kite / kitty

Exercise 2
Identify one word in each of these groups which does not follow either of the two general rules described above:

tale	tall	telltale	task	tusk
/teIl/	/tO:l/	/"telteIl/	/t&sk/	/tVsk/

back	bake	baker	backup	balance
/b&k/	/beIk/	/"beIk@r/	/"b&kVp/	/"b&l@ns/

cat	cater	caterpillar	cut	cute	cuter	cutter
/k&t/	/"keItr/	/"k&t@pIl@r/	/kVt/	/kju;t/	/"kju;t@r/	/"kVt@r/

hide	hid	hidden	hiding	hideous	hideout
/haId/	/hId/	/"hId@n/	/"haIdIN/	/"hIdI@s/	/"haIdaUt/

ride	rode	ridden	riding	rise	rose	risen	rising
/raId/	/r@Ud/	/"rId@n/	/"raIdIN/	/raIz/	/r@Uz/	/"rIz@n/	/"raIzIN/

© Juan José Castaño