What Is The IPA? An Introduction To The International Phonetic Alphabet

Join a global community of over 200,000 TEFL teachers working throughout the world! Enrol me!

If you hear the abbreviation IPA, do you think of beer? If you do, then this is for you. In the linguistics world, IPA stands for the International Phonetic Alphabet. It’s a very useful tool to have at your disposal in the EFL classroom, but you need to know what it is to be able to use it!

What is the International Phonetic Alphabet?

The IPA is a system of phonetic notation used to represent the different sounds of languages. It allows us to transcribe words in different languages and pronounce them correctly, no matter the language.

Who invented the International Phonetic Alphabet? It was created in 1888 by Paul Passy, a French linguist.

When we teach English as a foreign language we are concerned with the sounds, or phonemes, which make up the English language. While there are hundreds of phonetic sounds in the IPA, when it comes to English we are dealing with 44 phonetic sounds. These are all the sounds in English. The IPA is a useful tool when it comes to teaching pronunciation.

Read more: Pronunciation Terms You Should Know

What is the International Phonetic Alphabet chart?

International Phonetic Alphabet chart
The International Phonetic Alphabet chart (right)

The International Phonetic Alphabet can be translated into a chart. These charts can look confusing, but they’re not as difficult as you may initially think. The IPA chart is divided into sections:

  • vowel sounds (Note: vowel sounds, not vowels)
  • dipthongs
  • consonant sounds

There are also some diacritics which help us understand the pronunciation of the sounds. For example, the two dots which you can see on certain sounds show that that particular sound is a long sound.

Handy hint: This website allows you to copy and paste phonetic symbols in Word into your lesson plans.

How do I teach the International Phonetic Alphabet in the classroom?

There are different schools of thought on this. It’s not really necessary for your students to sit down and study the IPA. However, it can be useful for them to get to know what the symbols represent so you can utilise them when teaching pronunciation. To do this, simply introduce the symbols as they come up in the lessons and re-use them regularly to familiarise your students with them. It makes sense to do this with the most common sounds.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that you don’t need to know the IPA. But again, you don’t need to spend your weekend learning all the different symbols. Instead, you should familiarise yourself with the sounds over time.

Handy hint: There are a number of free websites which show you helpful illustrations to help you remember the sounds correlating to the IPA symbols. You can also click on the sounds to hear them.

Read more: Pronunciation-Specific Pronunciation Problems For English Language Learners

How is the International Phonetic Alphabet useful for our learners?

WHY DO MY LEARNERS MAKE THE SAME MISTAKES
The IPA helps us understand that their and there have the same pronuciation, even though their spelling is different.

The next obvious question is to ask why our students need to know the IPA in the first place.

Firstly, consider those sound-spelling correspondences are quite tricky in English. Being able to identify the sound that a particular spelling sequence corresponds to is invaluable. Sound-spelling correspondences are the cause of many spelling and pronunciation errors our learners make.

 

Then remember that any time a learner looks up a word in the dictionary they will find the phonetic transcription of the word. Knowing the IPA will help them be able to pronounce the word properly.

Knowing and understanding the International Phonetic Alphabet is one of the first steps a TEFL teacher should take to be able to teach English pronunciation well. Introduce it into your lessons and your students will benefit even in they’re learning outside the classroom.

Get Social

Follow us on social networks, join our newsletter - get the latest news and early discounts

Sign up to our newsletter

Follow us on social networks, sign up to our e-newsletters – get the latest news and early discounts

Accreditation Partners

The TEFL Academy was the world’s first TEFL course provider to receive official recognition from government regulated awarding bodies in both the USA and UK. This means when you graduate you’ll hold a globally recognised Level 3 (120hr) Certificate or Level 5 (168hr) Diploma, meaning you can find work anywhere and apply for jobs immediately.

Product added to your cart

You have added to your cart:

Request call back

    Please leave your details below and one of our TEFL experts will get back to you ASAP:

    captchaType characters on the left:

    Would you like us to update you on TEFL opportunities, jobs and related products & services?

    Yes, keep me updatedNo, but thanks anyway!

    Thank you! Your message has been sent!

    Download the TEFL World Factbook

      Please enter your details in order to download the latest TEFL World Factbook.

      Would you like us to update you on TEFL opportunities, jobs and related products & services?

      Yes, keep me updatedNo, but thanks anyway!

      Thank you for downloading the TEFL World Factbook!

      If the TEFL World Factbook did not download
      > Click Here To Download <

      Download the Online Teaching Guide

        Please enter your details in order to download our Online Teaching Guide.

        Would you like us to update you on TEFL opportunities, jobs and related products & services?

        Yes, keep me updatedNo, but thanks anyway!

        Thank you for downloading our Online Teaching Guide!

        If the Online Teaching Guide did not download
        > Click Here To Download <

        Download Prospectus

          Please enter your details in order to download our latest prospectus.

          Would you like us to update you on TEFL opportunities, jobs and related products & services?

          Yes, keep me updatedNo, but thanks anyway!

          Thank you for downloading our prospectus!

          We hope you enjoy reading our prospectus, we have tried to make it as useful as possible! Please get in touch if you have any questions.

          If the prospectus did not download automatically
          > Click Here To Download <

          $
          $