Pronunciation of 'ED'

In my time as teacher here in Brazil, I have come across a common pronunciation issue. The use and pronunciation of ED at the end of verbs in the past simple. Initially, most students start by always pronouncing 'ed' as the ending sound of each verb, which in most cases is actually incorrect. 'ED' has three possible ending sounds: 'T', 'D' and 'ED'. The question then becomes, 'How do I know which to use for a given verb?' To answer this we look at phonetics.

Let's consider the following three verbs: Worked, Saved and Invited. Each of these verbs are examples of regular verbs in the past simple. However each one of these verbs has a different pronunciation for the ending sound of the verb. To know which ending sound to use, we must look at the sound that come just before the 'ED'. This sound will determine which of the ending sounds the verb will take. It can be a letter or a letter pair.

Voiceless Sounds. Voiceless sounds are sounds that do not require the vibrations of the vocal chords to produce. They are produced by pushing air through the mouth and the position of the tongue, mouth and lips help to produce the sounds. Here are some examples of letters and letter pairs that are voiceless sounds: K, P, S, X, F, CH, SH, TH. If the sound that comes before ED is a voiceless sound, 'ED' will take the sound of 'T' at the end. If we consider the first verb above (worked) the K sound comes before the ED. We will then pronounce the 2 consonant sounds together as one work(t).

Voiced Sound. Voiced sounds are the opposite of voiceless sounds, they do require the vibrations of the vocal chords to produce. Sometimes this vibration is held and sustained such as: V, L, M, N, R or the vibration is short such as: D, B, G. The sound for all vowels are also voiced sounds. If the sound that comes before ED is a voiced sound. 'ED' will take the sound of 'D' at the end. If we consider the second verb above (saved) we again will pronounce two consonant sounds together as one sav(D).

The last verb (invited) is an exception to the voiceless and voiced sounds. Verbs which already have the sound of 'T' or 'D' before the ED will end with 'ED' as the ending sound. For example: Needed, Wanted, Decided, Invited. 

To summarize:

Voiceless Sounds, 'ED' takes the sound of 'T' at the end

Voiced Sounds, 'ED' takes the sound of 'D' at the end

If the sound before ED is already 'T' or 'D' then 'ED' is pronounced.

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