The pronunciation of the Past Simple made easy. In English, past tense verbs with an -ed ending are pronounced in three different ways:
[t]
[d] or
[Id].
Why the Sound Changes
If you place your fingertips on the front of your neck, and pronounce the following pairs of words, you should feel some vibration on your fingers with one of them:
vow | fake (vvv | fff)
zebra | snake (zzz | sss)
The vibrating ones are "voiced" sounds. [v] [z].
When we pronounce "voiceless" sounds (such as /p/, /f/, /s/, /ʃ/, /ʧ/ or /k/), our vocal chords do not vibrate.
This vibration or lack of vibration then carries forward to the following sound in the word. Therefore, this vibration or lack of vibration explains why we pronounce the past tense of verbs in three voiced or voiceless ways: [t], [d] or [Id].
1) If the verb ends in /t/ or /d/, this will cause the past simple ending to be pronounced /Id/ (or /əd/).
Examples, wanted, visited, edited, ended, threaded (beads).
2) If the verb ends in a voiceless sound, such as /p/, /f/, /s/, /ʃ/, /ʧ/, /θ/, or /k/, the past simple ending is pronounced as the voiceless /t/ (with no vocal chord vibration)
For example, stoppedn popped, talked, laughed, reached, kissed and washed.
3) If the verb ends in another voiced sound [b, g, ð, v, z, ʒ, dʒ, m, n, ŋ, r, l], cause the “-ed” ending to be pronounced as a voiced [d].
For example, Loved, rolled, cleared, banged, played, allowed, begged, breathed, raised, claimed, banned.
