Back to results
US 4,643,680 AGranted
Vowel sound teaching device
OwnerJohn Hillinventor
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An educational device useful in the teaching of pronunciation and spelling is disclosed. The device takes a generally planar shape and has a display window in which letters of a desired word are displayed. The letters are provided on rotatable discs, which may be three or five in number, which are individually manipulated to form the words. One of the rotatable discs bears a plurality of different visually-recognizable vowel symbols, each different vowel symbol being colored or being displayed on a colored background. The pronunciation of the vowel in the name of the color has a phonetic relationship with the desired pronunciation of the respective vowel symbol, so as to aid the student in achieving the correct pronunciation of the word displayed in the window.
Claims15
An educational device provided in planar generally rectangular form, comprising:
- a first planar support member having a front face and a back face;
- a display window constituted by a rectangular cut-away in the front face of the planar support member;
- a plurality of different visually-recognizable vowel symbols provided adjacent the periphery of a first rotatable member mounted to said support member, one of which vowel symbols may be displayed at the display window by rotation of said first rotatable member, each different vowel symbol comprising single vowel letter/or multiple vowel letters for a word to be displayed in the display window and being coloured or displayed on a coloured background in a colour the pronunciation of the vowel of which has a phonetic relationship with the desired pronunciation of the respective vowel symbol;
- and
- a plurality of additional alphabetical symbols provided adjacent the periphery of at least second and third rotatable members mounted to said support member, which additional alphabetical symbols may be displayed at the display window by rotation of said second and/or third rotatable members to form a word with the displayed vowel symbol at the display window;
- said rotatable members being mounted to said support member with their axes forming a triangle with a peripheral portion of said first rotatable member protruding from one longitudinal edge of said support member and with a peripheral portion of each of said second and third rotatable members protruding from another longitudinal edge of said support member to enable rotation of said rotatable members to be effected by manual manipulation of said protruding peripheral portions of said rotatable members.
3 more elements
An educational device, comprising:
- a first generally rectangular planar member,
- a second generally rectangular planar member spaced apart from said first generally rectangular planar member,
- an elongate window opening formed through said second generally rectangular planar member,
- a first rotatable member mounted between said first and second rectangular planar members for rotation about an axis, said first rotatable member bearing a plurality of different visually-recognizable vowel symbols, either in the form of a colored letter or combination of colored letters or a letter or combination of letters on a colored background, the color being correlated to the desired vowel sound,
- said plurality of vowel sounds being located at arcuately-spaced locations on said first rotatable member so as to be selectively individually displayed in said window upon rotation of said first rotatable member,
- a second rotatable member mounted between said first and second rectangular planar members for rotation about an axis, said second rotatable member bearing a plurality of additional alphabetical symbols comprising consonants, non-sounding letters and blanks, said additional alphabetical symbols being located at arcuately-spaced locations on said second rotatable member so as to be selectively individually displayed in said window upon rotation of said second rotatable member, and
- a third rotatable member mounted between the first and second rectangular planar members for rotation about an axis, said third rotatable member bearing a plurality of further alphabetical symbols comprising consonants, non-sounding letters and blanks, said further alphabetical symbols being located at arcuately-spaced locations on said third rotatable member so as to be selectively individually displayed in said window upon rotation of said third rotatable member,
- said first, second and third rotatable members being mounted and arranged in relation to each other and said window so that desired words comprising the vowel symbols, the additional alphabetical symbols and the further alphabetical symbols may be displayed in the window by selective independent rotation of the rotatable members.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.