How Different Vowel Lengths are Used to Differentiate Words Ending in Voiced and Voiceless Consonants

Teacher: Welcome to daily tips on learning English. Today's tip is on how different vowel lengths are used to differentiate words ending in voiced and voiceless consonants.

Teacher: Let's take an example: there is something in my eyes.

Teacher: There is something in my ice.

Teacher: The last words in the examples, eyes and ice, differ in two ways. One difference is eyes ends with the sound z and ice ends with the sound s. The other difference in the pronunciation of eyes and ice is how the vowel sound I is pronounced. In the word eyes, it's longer, eyes, eyes. In the word ice, it's very short, ice, ice.

Teacher: Listen to the example again, and note that the final consonant sound is not as clear as the difference in the length of the vowel. There is something in my eyes. There is something in my ice. Listen again. There is something in my eyes. There is something in my ice.

Teacher: Listen to some other examples of words that are identical except for the final consonants and the vowel length. Cap, Cab, Plate, Played, Seat, Seed.

Teacher: Today's tip is to pay more attention to the length of vowels as this difference is very important in distinguishing some words. Tune in tomorrow for another tip on learning English.