Knowing spelling rules, and the exceptions to the rule, is a great strategy to help you understand why spelling is the way it is and helps you spell. It’s always good to know why spelling is the way it, and knowing spelling rules is one of many strategies to help you spell well. So even if you forget the rule, maybe you’ll remember the spelling pattern, and at least you hopefully will know why a spelling is the way it is.
Why is learning and knowing spelling rules so helpful?
1. They help explain why certain letter patterns occur, and why a word is spelled the way it is. 2. They can help you figure out how to spell a word. 3. They help your reading because you can identify the rule's letter patterns. 4. They help you build "long" words with prefixes & suffixes. 5. And they help your confidence to spell well, to read, and to improve your vocabulary.
The Top Ten Spelling Rules
1. "i before ‘e’ except after c" rule believe , piece, field, grief, chief, fierce, relief, niece, retrieve, reprieve
AFTER C- receive, perceive, deceit, ceiling, receipt, conceive, conceit, receive,
deceive, conceive, receive, deceive As a basic rule this is great but what about ancient, leisure, neighbour , neither, weird, seize, either, species
We have a longer version of the rule:
" i before e except after a long c but not when c is a "sh" sound and not when sounded like 'a' as in neighbour or weigh." ( i before e rule) believe, achieve, (except after c),receive, ceiling (but not when c is sounded like sh) ancient, proficient not when sounded like 'a' ) eight, beige But there are exceptions always exceptions so watch out for them.
2. Changing -y to -ies or -s You might not know the spelling rule but you might know the spelling pattern - most people do.
When the word ends in a vowel + y just add ‘s’
key → keys delay → delays trolley → trolleys (because we can't have three vowels in a row delaies x )
If the word has a consonant before the ‘y’:
take off the ‘y’ and add ‘ies’ baby → babies company → companies difficulty → difficulties 3. Adding -es to words ending in -s, -ss, -z -ch -sh -x This was added centuries ago to stop the plural 's' clashing with these letters and it softens the 's' sound to a 'z' sound bus → buses business → businesses watch → watches box → boxes quiz → quizzes
4. 1:1:1 doubling up rule
put - putting, big-bigger, quiz - quizzes, swim - swimming...
When a word has one syllable + 1 vowel next to 1 consonant we double up the final consonant with a vowel suffix: sit - sitter, big - biggest, tap - tapping, shop - shopper/shopping, fat - fatten, fattening, fatter, fattest...
This happens in longer words when the stress is on the final syllable: begin (beGIN) - beginner, beginning refer (reFER) - referring, referred occur (ocCUR) - occurring, occurred, occurrence
5. Suffix with Silent ‘E’ (Drop the ‘e’ rule)
We usually drop the final silent "e" when we add vowel suffix endings, for example:
write + ing → writing
hope + ed = hoped excite + able = excitable joke - joker large - largish close - closing sense + ible = sensible opposite + ion = opposition imagine + ation = imagination
We keep the 'e' if the word ends in –CE or –GE to keep a soft sound, with able/ous courage + ous = courageous outrage + ous = outrageous notice + able = noticeable manage + able = manageable
6. Changing the -y to -i when adding suffix endings.
If a word ends in a consonant + Y, the Y changes to i (unless adding endings
with "i" -ing -ish, which already begins with an i)
Nouns which end in two vowels plus -f usually form plurals in the normal way, with just an -s chief - chiefs spoof - spoofs roof - roofs chief - chiefs oaf - oafs EXCEPTIONS: thief - thieves, leaf - leaves
8. Words with the ‘SEED’ sound
There is only one English word ending in ‘sede’: SUPERSEDE. Three words end in ‘ceed’ : SUCCEED, EXCEED PROCEED. All other words ending with the sound ‘seed’ are spelt ‘cede’: RECEDE, SECEDE, PRECEDE, CONCEDE 9. Adding -ly
When we add -ly to words ending in -ful then we have double letters gratefully faithfully hopefully
We also add -ly to words ending in 'e'
love + ly = lovely like + ly = likely live + ly = lively complete + ly = completely definite + ly = definitely
BUT not truly (true + ly) This is a common misspelled word.
We change the end 'e' to 'y' in these -le words
gentle → gently idle → idly subtle → subtly
10. When we add "all" to the beginning of words we drop
the l all + so = also all + most = almost although always almighty already alright (all right as two words is used in more formal English) altogether (Note that altogether and all together do not mean the same thing. Altogether means ‘in total’, as in there are six bedrooms altogether, whereas all together means ‘all in one place’ or ‘all at once’, as in it was good to have a group of friends all together; they came in all together.
