Fontlex Silben
A plain text box, in a font that colors each word's syllables in turn, blue
and red, the way many German primary schools teach reading (the syllable method). Edit the text,
type your own, or use the font in a word processor to make worksheets.
How it decides
- Syllables come from the German hyphenation patterns TeX uses (38,117 patterns), run by the text
engine as you type, with a few rules for the reading syllables hyphenation never splits off:
A-bend, O-ma, Ra-di-o.
- Every word starts blue. Compounds split at their parts: Lieb-lings-schüs-sel.
- Everything happens inside the font. There is no script on this page doing the coloring.
How accurate it is
On 120 words from first readers, labeled by hand before any testing, the font splits
117 exactly as the syllable method does (97.5%). The misses: Ko-a-la, U-ni-form, A-pri-ko-se.
Measured with the font embedded in this page.
Limits
- Vowels next to each other inside a word stay together when they're separate syllables:
Koa-la, Thea-ter.
- A word starting with a single vowel and a consonant cluster, or with a prefix-like start, keeps the
vowel attached: Apri-ko-se, Uni-form.
- Needs an app that renders color fonts with OpenType features: current Chrome, Firefox and Safari do,
and so do Pages and TextEdit on a Mac.
Patterns: German hyphenation patterns by the Deutschsprachige Trennmustermannschaft (MIT
license). Base font: JetBrains Mono (SIL Open Font License).