Pronouncing /tʃ/ (or CH) Sound

By Jennie Parker

​The /tʃ/ sound (often called the “CH sound”) may be trickier than you think! Look at the following list of words, and decide which contain the /tʃ/ sound, as in chicken and child.  Scroll down for the answers.
chef
choir
chair
cello
situation
catch
cappuccino

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Ready for the answers? The following words contain the /tʃ/ sound: chair, cello, situation, catch, and cappuccino. How’d you do?  In this month’s blog, we’re going to look at how to form the /tʃ/ sound correctly, and then we’ll look at phonics rules to help you predict which words contain the sound.
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First, to form the sound correctly, it may be helpful to think of it as a combination between /t/ and the SH (/ʃ/) sounds. In other words, stop the air flow, as in “t,” and then go into an SH sound. To do so, pucker your lips – as in “duck face” – and place the tip of your tongue on the roof of your mouth behind your front teeth. Use your tongue placement to stop air flow, and then release it. It’s important to stop the air flow before releasing it; if you don’t do so, you will be producing the SH sound, not the CH sound.
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Try the following minimal pair list: Listen
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​/tʃ/ CH                              ​/ʃ/ SH
chip                                    ship      
cheap                                sheep
chair                                  share
choose                              shoes
March                               marsh
watch                                wash
witch                                 wish
crutch                                crush
watcher                            washer
latching                             lashing

​Another sound that CH is similar to is /dʒ/ or the J sound, as in jam and jump. Tongue and lip placement are the same for both sounds; the difference is that CH is a voiceless sound, which means your vocal chords are not vibrating, and J is a voiced sound, which means they are. Another key difference between the two is that vowels preceding CH are shorter than the vowels preceding J. 
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Let’s try the following minimal pair list: Listen
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​/tʃ/ CH          /dʒ/ J
rich                  ridge    
H                      age
search           surge
March           Marge
batch             badge
perch             purge

Okay, so you can make the CH sound. But how can you recognize it?  Of all the CH sounds found in English, roughly three-fourths of them are spelled with “ch” or “tch,” and one-fourth are spelled with “tu.” Only 1% appear as “c” or “cc.”

Most of the time, when you see “ch,” it is pronounced /tʃ/, as in which and much. However, the “ch” in words derived from Greek are pronounced /k/, as in chemistry and school, and the “ch” in words derived from French are pronounced like SH, as in Chicago and champagne.

With regard to “tu,” you’ll hear the true /t/ sound at the beginning of a word (e.g., Tuesday), after "s" (e.g., student), or at the start of a stressed syllable (e.g., return). However, in most other instances, you'll hear the CH sound (e.g., situation, adventure, culture, virtual).

Finally, the “c” or “cc” followed by an “e” or an “i” in words derived from Italian are pronounced CH as in cello and concerto. Otherwise, “c” is usually pronounced as /k/, as in cake or /s/, as in slice, and “cc” is usually pronounced /k/, as in acclaim.

You may not always know from where a word is derived, and that’s okay. English is a giant mess of borrowed words, and even native speakers don’t always know how a word is pronounced unless they’ve heard it before. See The Labyrinth of English Spelling and Pronunciation for more on how English spelling and pronunciation evolved as it did. 

Please let me know in the comments whether this blog was helpful. I’d also love to hear your questions about other sounds or aspects of English – they could be a future blog post! For live, face-to-face assistance with /tʃ/ and other sounds, please see our Lunch Break: Pronunciation Workshop schedule and our private coaching services.