Students new to linguistics often struggle to understand the concept of phonemes, especially the relationship between phonemes and allophones. They easily grasp that both are related to sounds, but find it difficult to distinguish between the two, or to use symbols such as brackets [ ] and slashes / / correctly. One of the most helpful activities is to examine specific examples, using a language that students already know. When students produce the sounds themselves, as well as transcribe words in which those sounds appear, using the International Phonetic Alphabet, they can begin to sort out the concept of an abstract sound that may take on slightly different pronunciations based on its position in a word (e.g., syllable-initial, after a fricative, etc.). I often draw a visual graphic on the board that depicts the relationship between a phoneme and its allophones that students sometimes also use in their own work or on quizzes to explain these concepts.