Elementary Cahto
Lesson 1
| 1. Learn the spelling of those Cahto sounds that are also in English. |
| 2. Learn some simple nouns. |
| 3. Learn some relationship terms with the first person singular possessor. |
| 4. Learn basic "What is this?" and "Who is this?" frames. |
The easiest part of the Cahto alphabet uses the same letters as English with almost the same pronunciation. These letters are pronounced almost exactly like they are in English:
| b | bis, river bank | bus |
| ch | ching, tree | chunk |
| d | doo, not | dough |
| g | goo, worm | go |
| h | hang, that one | hung |
| j | jaang, here | John |
| k | kiing, him/herself | king |
| l | laat, seaweed | lot |
| m | main, badger | mine |
| n | nees-ee, it is far | nay-say |
| ng | hang, that one | hung |
| p | baabeel, paper | papa |
| s | see, rock | say |
| sh | shash, grizzly bear | shush |
| t | taak', three | tick-tock |
| w | waakw, to one side of it | wok |
| y | yoo, over there | yo-yo |
These spellings are easier in Cahto than in English, because each letter or group of letters refers to only one sound. English has "hard" and "soft" pronunciations of certain letters like "g" and "ch", but Cahto only has the "hard" pronunciation.
| Remember: |
| Cahto g is always the hard g as in "girl", never the soft g in "George". |
| Cahto ch is always the hard ch in "chop", never the soft ch in "chute". |
| Cahto t is always the hard t in "toe", never the soft t in "future". |
| Cahto s is always the hard s in "sing", never the soft s in "fusion". |
| Cahto l is always the light l in "eel", never the dark l in "all". |
Another set of Cahto sounds have the same pronunciation as sounds in English, but a different spelling. These sounds are all vowels. The English spellings would be useless, because each vowel spelling in English refers to at least two, and often several pronunciations. We use double vowels to mark that the vowels are pronounced long like the vowel in "coat", not short like the vowel in "cot".
| Remember: |
| Cahto aa is always like the a in "father" or "caught", never like the a in "cat". |
| Cahto ee is always like the e in "bed" or "weigh", never like the ee in "beep". |
| Cahto ii is always the like the i in "machine", never like the i in "file". |
| Cahto oo is always like the o in "mole", never like the o in "cot". |
| Cahto uu is always like the u in "tune", never like the u in "put" or "putt". |
The final set of Cahto sounds for this lesson usually have nearly the same pronunciation as each other in Bill Ray's dialect. We need to use three different letters in order to account for what happens when the vowels are drawn out, and for the differences in the other dialects.
| a | ban'tc, housefly | bunch |
| i | bis, river bank | bus, kiss |
| o | kos, cough | cuss, toss |
This should be done as a question-and-answer chain. The first time through the teacher reads through all questions and answers. Then the teacher asks the first question and selects a student to give the answer. Then that same student asks the next student the next question. The exercise continues with each student answering a question, then asking another question. If possible the students should have cards or pictures of the different items.
This should also be done as a question-and-answer chain.