Alphabet & Pronunciation
Alphabet & Pronunciation
Polish spelling looks intimidating at first — clusters like sz, cz, and a handful of accented letters — but each one maps to exactly one sound, so once you learn them, you can read almost any word correctly.
Grammar Comparison
Grammar Comparison
sz, cz, rz: One Sound, Two Letters
szkoła, czas, rzeka
school, time, river
sz makes an 'sh' sound (like English 'ship'), cz makes a 'ch' sound (like 'chip'), and rz makes a 'zh' sound — identical to how ż is pronounced, just spelled differently depending on the word's history. Don't pronounce these as two separate consonants; each pair is a single sound.
ł, ą, ę: Sounds English Doesn't Spell This Way
łódź, mąka, węgiel
boat, flour, coal
ł sounds like English 'w', not 'l' — łódź sounds roughly like 'wooj'. ą and ę are nasal vowels, pronounced with a hint of 'n' or 'm' trailing off as air escapes partly through the nose — a sound English simply doesn't have. mąka sounds like 'MOWN-kah', węgiel like 'VEN-gyel'.
Vocabulary
Vocabulary
- English
- school
- English
- time
- English
- river
- English
- frog
- English
- moth
- English
- snow
- English
- horse
- English
- boat
- English
- flour
- English
- coal
- English
- day
- English
- hour