Letter 20 of 26
The letter T in braille
T is dots 2, 3, 4 and 5.
Dots 2-3-4-5
Unicode ⠞ — U+281E
How to recognise it
Dots 2, 3, 4 and 5 close the second decade. t is the mirror partner of s in the same way j mirrors h.
J, T and the “with” sign
T is J with dot 3 added; add dot 6 as well and the cell is the “with” sign, ⠾, rather than a letter.
Adding dots 3 and 6 turns a, b, c, d and e into u, v, x, y and z. For f, g, h, i and j the same step gives the words and, for, of, the and with — so j plus dots 3 and 6 is “with”, not a letter. The contraction reference lists all five.
Where T turns up in Grade 2
Standing alone, T is the word “that”. Inside a word it is the letter again: “take” is ⠞⠁⠅⠑.
| Cell | Letters | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| the | one cell for “the”, whether it is a word of its own or letters inside one | |
| with | one cell for “with”, whether it is a word of its own or letters inside one | |
| th | one cell for the letters “th”; standing alone it is the word “this” | |
| st | one cell for the letters “st”; standing alone it is the word “still” |
The contraction reference gives the rules for each.
Writing a capital T
Capital T is two cells: the capital sign, dot 6, then T. A word in capitals takes the sign twice, once for the whole word: “TAKE” is ⠠⠠⠞⠁⠅⠑. Capitals covers longer runs.
Easily confused with
T differs by a single dot from J, Q and S — the letters to drill it against.
Practice words
Words that start with T, one cell per letter in Grade 1. Where Grade 2 writes one shorter, that form follows.
the
Grade 2: ⠮ — 1 cell instead of 3
time
Grade 2: ⠐⠞ — 2 cells instead of 4
take
In a whole book
In a count over the whole of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the letter t is printed 10,686 times. Grade 2 still writes it as its own cell 4,329 times, 40.5%. The other 6,357 are inside contractions, most often “the” (2,077), “that” (600), “it” (592) and “th” (506).
The cell itself is written 4,824 times in the Grade 2 text: 4,329 as the letter, 300 as the word “that”, 61 inside shortforms and 134 as the second cell of a two-cell contraction.
T in braille as an image
