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The Difference Between Diphthongs And Digraphs

this entry has 23 Comments/ in Articles, Reading / by Linda Farrell
February 1, 2010
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By Linda Farrell

The terms digraph and diphthong are common terms in the reading world. At workshops on spelling or phonics, I often find that many people are confused about the difference between the two terms.

The clear difference is that digraphs are letters and diphthongs are sounds. The morphemes (meaningful word parts) in each word help us remember their meanings. Both words are derived from Greek. The first morpheme di in both words means “two.” The morpheme graph means written, making the word digraph refer to something written that has two parts. The morpheme phthong means “sound”, making the word diphthong refer to a sound that has two parts. If you understand the meaning of the morphemes in each word, you will never confuse them again.

A digraph is two letters that spell one sound. Digraphs that spell consonant sounds include the letter pairs sh, ch, th, wh, ck, ph, ng. Digraphs that spell vowel sounds include the letter pairs ai, ay, ee, ea, ie, ei, oo, ou. ow, oe, oo, ue, ey, ay, oy, oi, au, aw. The important thing to remember is that a digraph is made of two letters, and although the letters spell a sound, the digraph is the two letters, not the sound.

A diphthong is a special kind of vowel sound. Most vowel sounds in English are made with the mouth in one position and with one pure sound. These vowel sounds are called monophthongs (mono meaning “one” and phthong meaning “sound”). A diphthong is one vowel sound formed by the combination of two vowel sounds. A diphthong begins as one vowel sound and moves toward another, such as the vowel sounds in coin or loud. Diphthongs can be contrasted with two monophthong vowel sounds together that form two syllables, such as in chaos, triage, or violin.1

When teaching reading, the two vowel sounds most commonly identified as diphthongs are /oy/ and /ow/. The most common spellings for the vowel sound /oy/ are oy (toy) and oi (void), and the two most common spellings for /ow/ are ow (cow) and ou (cloud). The fact that these two diphthongs are usually spelled with digraphs may explain the confusion between the terms.

 

1 To feel the difference between a monophthong and a diphthong, you can put an index finger on either side of your mouth. Say the vowel sound /ă/ and your fingers will stay in the same position because your mouth doesn’t move. The same thing happens with most vowel sounds. However, if you say the vowel sounds /oy/ or /ow/, your fingers will move because your mouth moves from one vowel sound to another. Two other diphthongs in American English are long i (/ī/) and long a (/ā/), which are always identified as diphthongs by linguists but not often by reading teachers. Both these vowel sounds pass the diphthong test, which is movement of a part of the mouth, generally the tongue or lips, while saying a vowel sound. Other diphthongs exist in various dialects and other languages.

Tags: Linda Farrell
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Comments

23 Responses to The Difference Between Diphthongs And Digraphs

  1. McDonnell Hiva says:
    September 21, 2015 at 3:58 am

    Very good explanation by Lynda Farell about difference between dipthongs and digraph. Thanks

    Reply
  2. MsB says:
    March 21, 2016 at 10:18 pm

    Oh my goodness! Thank you! I have two different phonics books (Modern Curriculum Press and Scholastic) and they had me terribly confused with their conflicting descriptions.

    Reply
  3. Beckey Smith says:
    April 19, 2016 at 8:45 pm

    Lynda Farell has written an explanation that is clear, concise, and firmly rooted in knowledge. I’m so pleased I found this newsletter!

    Reply
  4. Michael Mays says:
    May 14, 2016 at 9:23 pm

    A diphthong is written as a digraph?

    Reply
  5. Zelda Taylor says:
    August 17, 2016 at 7:39 pm

    Great explanations. I do wonder, however, why the written versions of dipththongs are considered digraphs and not blends. Two letters combined where one sound is heard is a digraph. Two or three letters combined where all letter sounds are heard is a blend. In diphthongs two letter sounds can be distinguished.

    Reply
    • Laura says:
      July 23, 2017 at 3:42 pm

      Diphthongs make one single sound. That is different than a blend.

      Reply
  6. Jae Nulton says:
    October 22, 2016 at 8:16 am

    Excellent explanation of the distinction! Thank you for sharing in a manner so easy to understand.

    Reply
  7. Julia Bacarella says:
    January 16, 2017 at 5:12 am

    Thank you! This makes so much sense now.

    Reply
  8. farwa hassan says:
    January 19, 2017 at 3:52 pm

    thanku so much it was too much helpful!

    Reply
  9. T G says:
    February 6, 2017 at 7:31 pm

    Thanks. Very clearly explained.

    Reply
  10. Devika Mohan says:
    February 20, 2017 at 5:53 am

    A very clear and crisp explanation. Thank you.

    Reply
    • Ameena says:
      April 3, 2017 at 5:58 am

      Thank you Ms. Farrell for explaining the difference between ‘digraph’ and ‘diphthong’. You cleared the mystery! I was having the hardest time ever understanding the difference. I deeply appreciate that you explained ‘monophthongs’ a word that I had never heard before but was extremely important to know.

      Reply
  11. Ameena says:
    April 5, 2017 at 12:41 am

    Hi all,
    I have a question. Is there a way to learn and master 44 sounds of English and then be able to read and categorize words based on that knowledge?
    Thanks:)

    Reply
    • Carlos Aldana says:
      October 6, 2017 at 6:07 am

      I would like the answer to that very question too.

      Reply
    • Connie says:
      January 11, 2018 at 5:26 am

      Wonder if the problem comes with the many ways we can spell those 44 sounds.

      Reply
  12. Sheila says:
    May 20, 2017 at 5:27 pm

    This makes so much sense! Remembering to break the words into their morphemes and knowing their original meanings is so helpful. Thanks for taking the time to write this.

    Reply
  13. oliver says:
    May 31, 2017 at 12:18 pm

    Wow clear explanation

    Reply
  14. Doris Jones says:
    June 28, 2017 at 5:13 pm

    In phonetics we were taught that words like “apple” and “act” have the sound combination “ae” and our materials called it a diphthong. Our phonetics differentiated between broad “a” tomato (Boston), long “a” tomato (most U.S.A.), and diphthong “ae” apple.

    Reply
  15. Nancy Williams says:
    November 23, 2017 at 2:05 am

    I still confused why long a and long i are considered diphthongs? Using the two-finger test, I can’t make it work for me.

    Reply
  16. BN Liew says:
    April 2, 2018 at 12:10 am

    Well-explained, clear and concise. Thank you for the article; it has definitely helped to rid of confusion over the two terms.

    Reply
  17. A.K says:
    April 14, 2018 at 4:29 am

    wonderful explanation. Thank you for clarifying my doubts.

    Reply
  18. Jarred says:
    December 13, 2018 at 1:06 pm

    Great description. One critique is that everyone should use IPA when describing sounds. When I see something in phonemic slashes like /ā/ and /ī/, I think, oh, /a:/ like father. But you mean /ei/ and /ai/.

    I know it stems from a desire to hang closer to English orthography, but English orthography is royally messed up from the Great Vowel Shift and using pseudo-phonetic spelling like this is way more confusing than it needs to be.

    Reply
  19. Brian Heagney says:
    January 20, 2019 at 2:15 pm

    I’d love to hear more how “oi” in coin is a dipthong but the “oy” in toy is a digraph when it’s the exact same 2 sounds.

    Reply

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