The Phonic Sound of G
“G” is the letter that produces two
sounds. It is important to differentiate between the two. Your child needs to
know the two sounds of the letter “G” at the first stage of learning English.
What are the two sounds of “G”?
The letter “G” has two sounds, soft “G” and hard “G”.
Soft G
The letter “G” is called a soft G when it produces the "j" sound. The letter “G” produces the “j” sound when the letter "G" precedes the letter "E", "I", or "Y".
- Gent
- Giraffe
- Gymnastic
In these examples, the letter “G”
produces its sound as the sound of “j”. This is because the letter “G” precedes
the letter “E" in the example, the letter "I" in the second example, and the letter "Y" in the third example.
Hard G
The letter “G” is called a hard G when
it is followed by the letters “A”, “O”, “U”, or any consonant letter. Hard G
produces a “g” sound. Remember that the sound of the letter "G" is hard when it comes at the end of a word.
- Game
- Goose
- Gun
- Glance
- King
The sound of the letter “G” in the above
words is hard because the above rule of hard G is applied to them.
Exceptions
What we discussed is not final. There
are some exceptions. Mostly, we have some words that produce the sound of hard
G instead of soft G. The case is opposite.
The word “give” is not pronounced
according to the rule. According to the rule, the letter "G" should produce the sound of soft G. Here, the letter "G" produces the sound of hard G.
GH
When the letter “G” is followed by the
letter “H”, the combination of “GH” produces different sounds like the sound of
hard G (ghost), silent /gh/ (light), and the sound of /f/ (laugh).
