G and J letter sounds

[makaveli]

Hi teachers,
Could you please tell me if there is a hard and fast rule for when a g is pronounced as a j when teaching phonics?
Gem, genuine, gel, are all followed by e but giant is a double vowel-ia.
Many thanks for shedding some light!
Mak

[shinna]

any g followed by i,e,or y says 'j'

eg: gym. gel, giant.

this is a grammer rule

from sally-jo.

[rewboss]

It's not a grammar rule -- grammar is about the way words are combined to form sentences. This is a branch of linguistics called "phonetics".

Although the rule shinna states holds good in most cases, there are a lot of exceptions and unfortunately some of those exceptions happen to be common words; "get" and "give" are two examples. "Margarine", "gaol" and "gynaecologist" also break the rule.

Sometimes, if we don't want "g" to say "j", we add a "u". We don't usually pronounce it, it's just there to keep the "g" hard: "disguise", "guest" and "vague" are examples of this.