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Syllables

A syllable must contain a sound or vowel like sound.The most common type of syllable in language also has a consonant (C) before a vowel (V) and is typically represented as CV. Technically, the basic elements of the syllable are onset(one or more consonants) and the rhyme. The rhyme (sometimes written as a 'rime') consists of a vowel , which is treated as the nucleus, plus any following consonants, described as the coda.
Syllables like me,to or no have an onset and a nucleus but no coda. They are known as the open syllable. When a coda is present, as in the syllable up,cup,at or hat, they are called 'closed' syllables. The basic structure of the kind of syllable found in English words like green(CCVC), eggs(VCC), do(CV) and like(CVC) is shown in the following dialgram:

Consonant cluster:

Both the onset and the coda can consists of more than one consonant also known as a consonant cluster. In English, for example, the groups /spl/ and /ts/ are consonant clusters in the word splits.

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