long vowel
Stretched letter pronunciation
A long vowel is a vowel sound pronounced for a relatively extended duration, or one that "says its name"—the sound of A in mate, E in theme, I in mine, O in note, U in cute.
The term belongs primarily to teaching reading and phonics, where it contrasts with short vowels.
In linguistic description, vowel length distinctions matter more in some languages than others; English vowel "length" often correlates with quality differences rather than pure duration.
Minimal distinctive sound unit
- diphthongComplex vowel gliding between positions
- monophthongSteady, ungliding vowel sound
- articulationClear vocal expression
- phonologyScience of language sounds
allophone · sonority · resonance · segmental · timbre · acoustics · vocalic · oral cavity
Length of existence
- stressPressure, mental or vocal
- intonationPitch variation in speech
- pitchFrequency of sound
- accentRegional speech pattern
syllable · prosody · cadence · modulation · emphasis · tone · vocalization · drawn-out
Sound-based reading instruction
- decodingExtracting meaning from symbols
- literacyAbility to read, write
- reading instructionTeaching people to decode text
- curriculumEducational program's content plan
fluency · comprehension · workbooks · word study · pronunciation guide · ESL · language arts · early reading
Unpronounced final character
- magic eSpelling rule letter
- orthographyStandard writing conventions
- graphemeMinimal written symbol unit
- phonogramSymbol representing speech sound
phoneme
Minimal distinctive sound unit
- diphthongComplex vowel gliding between positions
- monophthongSteady, ungliding vowel sound
- articulationClear vocal expression
phonology · allophone · sonority · resonance · segmental · timbre · acoustics · vocalic · oral cavity · formant
duration
Length of existence
- stressPressure, mental or vocal
- intonationPitch variation in speech
- pitchFrequency of sound
accent · syllable · prosody · cadence · modulation · emphasis · tone · vocalization · drawn-out · sustained
phonics
Sound-based reading instruction
- decodingExtracting meaning from symbols
- literacyAbility to read, write
- reading instructionTeaching people to decode text
curriculum · fluency · comprehension · workbooks · word study · pronunciation guide · ESL · language arts · early reading · sounding out
silent e
Unpronounced final character
- magic eSpelling rule letter
- orthographyStandard writing conventions
- graphemeMinimal written symbol unit
- reading basicssight words, word family, letter tracing, word recognition, beginning reader
- vowelsa, e, u, y, ie
- phoneticsphonemes, phoneme, vocal folds, consonants, vibration
- prosodyscansion, meter, foot, stress pattern, metrics
- syllablessyllable, syllabification, syllabication, syllable stress, stressed syllable
- speechspeech, speaking, talk, diction, conversation