Meaning & use
phonemes
Last updated
The smallest distinct units of sound in a language that distinguish one word from another.
See it in a sentence
The words "bat" and "pat" differ by only one phoneme.
Learning to recognize phonemes is an important early step in teaching children to read.
A note on using this word
Phonemes are units of sound, not letters -- a single letter can represent different phonemes, and some phonemes are spelled with more than one letter.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “phonemes”, then compare your use with the examples above.
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