Deutsche Ecke

R-2 Libby Edwards
Yrs 3-6 Emma Chesterman

It Sounds Like Time for German! 󰎲󰎲

In our German lessons, we are diving deep into phonics and linking our language learning with ourwhole-school literacy approach.

Students in Torrens and Fisher have been revising German vowel sounds and "special characters." They areidentifying patterns and sharpening the decoding skills they use every day in English reading and writing.

German Vowels: German vowels are very consistent! We’ve been comparing the German a to the English'ah' (like car) and the German e to a short 'eh' (like egg).
The Extra Letters: You might notice dots that sometimes appear over a, o, and u (ä, ö, and ü ). They maylook like a smiley face, but this is called an Umlaut , and it tells us the letter has changed its sound.
Look Out!: Some letters play tricks on us! In German, the letter w sounds like an English v (Volkswagen),and the letter j sounds like an English y (ja sounds like yah).
Working Together: Just like our students, German letters often work collaboratively to create a sound. We call these teams digraphs (2 letters making one sound, like ei) or trigraphs (3 letters making one sound,like sch).

Understanding these special sounds helps our students decode new words and say them with confidence!

🔍 The Family Challenge: Ask Your Language Expert!

1. The Mystery Letter: Can you find the letter that looks like a capital B? What is its real name, and whatsound does it make?

2. The Digraph Dilemma: Which digraph sounds like something you use to see with?

3. The Trigraph Clue: What trigraph makes the "sh" sound in the word Deutsch ?

Check the answers below to see if you were correct!

Lass uns üben! (Let’s practise!) Check out the images from our classroom slides below. Can your child help you to say these words correctly?________________________________________________________________________________

Answers to Family Challenge:

1. It is called the Eszett (ß) and it makes an /ss/ sound.

2. The ei digraph (sounds like "eye").

3. The sch trigraph.