The App

To help in your Cree language journey, review the following explanations of Cree consonants, vowels, writing systems, and sounds. kw, tw, mw, nw, kway, tway, mway are related along with consonant vowel syllables. There are four vowels in the Cree Language: é, í, o, a. There are 10 consonants: h, ch, k, m, n, p, s, t, w, and y. Three other consonants, l, v and r, were added later to accommodate proper nouns such as names and slang Cree words.

Cree translated to English:

achimo	tell a story/news	ékosi	thank you
ayami	talk	ininiw	Aboriginal, First Nations/Indian
chakastéw	to shine	kakiké	forever

The Cree writing system uses syllabics. There are 65 syllabic characters as shown in syllabic chart. There are three new syllabic character rows added: lé, lí, lo, la—ré rí, ro, ra—vé, ví, vo, va. There are now 13 final consonants: h, ch, k, m, n, p, s, t, w, y, l, r and v.

Cree sounds consist of the following:

Letter	Sound	Cree	English
é	“ay”	émikwan	spoon
í	“e”	nípin	summer
i	“ih”	ihskwatém	door
a	“ah”	ahkosiwikamik	hospital
o	“o”	ohomisiw	owl

In this app, the English words are translated into Cree using Roman orthography, phonetics, and Cree syllabics. The distinction between English and Cree letters in Roman orthography are the letter e and i sounds. Cree letters have diacritics when there are “ay” and “a” sounds (for example: émikwan). There is a diacritic over í when there is an “e”letter sound. For example, in the word písim, the first i has a diacritic.

SYLLABIC CHART

ᐁ	é	ᐃ	i	ᐅ	o	ᐊ	a	ᐦ	h
ᒉ	ché	ᒋ	chi	ᒍ	cho	ᒐ	cha	ᐨ	ch
ᑫ	ké	ᑭ	ki	ᑯ	ko	ᑲ	ka	ᐠ	k
ᒣ	mé	ᒥ	mi	ᒧ	mo	ᒪ	ma	ᑦ	m
ᓀ	né	ᓂ	ni	ᓄ	no	ᓇ	na	ᐣ	n
ᐯ	pé	ᐱ	pi	ᐳ	po	ᐸ	pa	ᑊ	p
ᓭ	sé	ᓯ	si	ᓱ	so	ᓴ	sa	ᐢ	s
ᑌ	té	ᑎ	ti	ᑐ	to	ᑕ	ta	ᐟ	t
ᐍ	wé	ᐏ	wi	ᐓ	wo	ᐘ	wa	ᐤ	w
ᔦ	yé	ᔨ	yi	ᔪ	yo	ᔭ	ya	ᐩ	y
ᓓ	lé	ᓕ	li	ᓗ	lo	ᓚ	la	ᓫ	l
ᕃ	ré	ᕆ	ri	ᕈ	ro	ᕋ	ra	ᕑ	r
ᕞ	vé	ᕠ	vi	ᕤ	vo	ᕦ	va	ᕪ	v

The App is a user-friendly tool, there are three drop down menus available at the upper portion of the portal, namely

 – About the App, Cree Phrases and Dictionary.