Russian Phonological Keyboard
||0.0 (0 WK096)
||Mar 14, 2012|
Russian letters representing consonants could be divided into two large group: voiced and unvoiced. The first one are pronounced with voice and the latter are pronounced without voice. Many consonants form voiced/unvoiced pairs like B-P (Б-П), V-F (В-Ф) and others.
Russian letters representing vowels also could be split into two groups: simple vowels and iotated vowels. Simple vowels are А, О, У, Э, Ы and И. Iotated vowels Я, ё, Ю, Е represent two sounds when the first letter in a word or after the hard sign (ъ). Thus, я = i+a, ё = i+o, ю = i+у and е = i+e.
I haven't mentioned the remaining two letters, the soft and hard signs. They are mute, i.e. they do not represent any sound. The soft sign is used to show that the previous consonant is soft, and the hard sign is used when you have a consonant and an iotated vowel next to it, but the consonant should remain hard. In this case, iotated vowels should keep their i-sound.
In order to help everyone who recently started learning Russian, I developed a colour-coded Russian keyboard layout (see the picture). I marked consonants with blue (light blue for voiceless and dark blue for voiced consonants), and vowels with pink (light pink for simple vowels and a darker shade for the iotated/softening ones). The mute letters are marked with yellow. I hope, you'll find it helpful. Also, I would appreciate your feedback and suggestions. I'm going to order these custom keyboard stickers and would like to know your opinion. Thank you!