The IPA

• The International Phonetic Alphabet represents children's pronunciations more precisely than standard spelling.
• The International Phonetic Alphabet allows us to represent each individual sound in the English Language with one symbol rather than using our complicated spelling system.
• Functional: consonants tend to occur at the margins of syllables.
• Structural: consonants are generally produced with greater constriction within the vocal tract.
• Voiced voicing: vocal chords vibrate. /d/
• Voiceless voicing: vocal chords don't vibrate. /s/
• Bilabial place of articulation: lips touch. /p/
• Labiodental place of articulation: bottom lip touches top teeth. /f/
• Dental place of articulation: tongue touches top teeth. /θ/
• Alveolar place of articulation: tongue touches mouth roof. /t/
• Post-alveolar place of articulation: tongue touches back of mouth. /ʃ/
• Palatal place of articulation: whole tongue touches mouth roof. /j/
• Velar place of articulation: back of tongue touches mouth roof. /k/
• Glottal place of articulation: mouth fully opens. /h/
• Stop/plosive manner of articulation: air flow is stopped. /p/
• Fricative manner of articulation: air flow is narrow. /f/
• Affricate manner of articulation: air flow stops then releases. /tʃ/
• Approximant manner of articulation: open vocal tract. /w/
• Nasal manner of articulation: air flows through nose. /m/
• Lateral manner of articulation: air flows around tongue. /l/
• Consonant cluster reduction: not pronouncing one or more consonant phonemes in a consecutive run of consonants in the target.
• Assimilation: a phoneme takes on qualities from its immediate phonetic environment.
• Reduplication: repeating one syllable, possibly with omission of the other syllables.
• Harmonisation: pronouncing the same phoneme at two points within the lexeme.
• Substitution: pronouncing a non-target phoneme in place of the target phoneme.
• Addition / insertion: pronouncing a phoneme not present in the target.
• Omission: failure to pronounce one or more phonemes.