Spelling List Overview Document:

Download the PDF below to access the overviews for each spelling week. Scroll down for each term!

This week's words focus on word families, looking at how different words come from the same root:

temperature

temper

temperament

tempered

variety

vary

variation

varied

variable

variance

-ably

This week's words should be quite easy, as they are the same as last week's, but with a slightly different suffix!

adorably

valuably

believably

considerably

tolerably

changeably

noticeably

dependably

comfortably

reasonably

-able words

The root word ends in an 'e', and we can hear the whole root word, so we drop the 'e' before adding -able

adorable

valuable

advisable

believable

desirable

excitable

knowledgeable - we keep the 'e' as otherwise the sound would change. (need the 'dge')

likeable need the 'e' or it would say likable - NB American English loses the 'e'

changeable - need the 'ge'

noticeable - need the 'e' or it would say noticable 

The root words here don't end in 'e' so we just add the suffix -able

comfortable

considerable

breakable

fashionable

perishable

reasonable

dependable

These are slightly different, as the root words are: 

apply - applicable

tolerate - tolerable

operate - operable

We only have three days this week, so rather than having a proper test, we will focus on words that are often misspelt (or misspelled, if you prefer.... That's the funny thing about the English language...so many options!)

interestingly: lots of people spell this 'intrest' and forget the middle e. Also, -ing suffix and -ly suffix. Lots going on in this word!

disappear: dis- prefix is often spelt diss- We also often forget double p

century: understanding that cent means 100 is always useful, but it's the -tury sound that throws people!

temperatures: again, the -ture sound is tricky - children often spell this tempracher, forgetting to sound out the middle 3 and replacing -ture with -cher. There is a difference!

knowledge: silent k, and a tricky dge trigraph!

physically: ph digraph, a strange y when it sounds like an i, and forgetting to include the a sound, so often spelt fizicly, or something similar

qualified: always good to remember the u after a q, but the main mistake here is forgetting to change the y from qualify to an i before adding the -ed suffix

mummies: change the y to an i before adding the -es suffix

challenging: the -ge digraph makes the sound at the end of challenge, but we must lose the e when adding the -ing suffix

climbing: climb has a silent b, which we keep and just add the -ing suffix!

So many things to remember!

Spelling this week still focus on the use of the hyphen! We understand how a hyphen can join together two words to create a compound adjective.

man-eating

little-used

rock-bottom

wide-eyed 

pig-headed

tight-fisted

cold-hearted

stone-faced

green-eyed

short-tempered

This week, we are looking at hyphenated prefix words:

Some words with prefixes need to have a hyphen added to separate the prefix and the root word, because they have a prefix that ends in a vowel and a root word that begins in a vowel.

co-operate

co-ordinate

co-own

co-author

re-enter   

re-educate

re-examine

re-evaluate

re-energise

re-elect

Words this week are nouns that end in -ence/-ency and the related adjectives that end in

-ent:

innocent

innocence

decent

decency

excellent

excellence

confident

confidence

existent

existence

This week's spellings involve the -ce or -se endings, and are often misused. 

-ce is the noun (a person, place, object or idea).

e.g. the doctor's practice, a choir practice, her driving licence, his mobile device, the helpful advice, the prophecy of the three witches in Macbeth.

We can tell these are nouns, because they are preceded with determiners (e.g. the, a, an, her, his etc)

-se is the verb, so it's an action or doing word

e.g. to practise spellings, to license the pub landlord, to devise a cunning plan, to advise someone how to draw, to prophesy the future. 

These words are all preceded with the word 'to', which tells us they are a verb.

The spellings we were focussing on in class last week are ones that are frequently misspelled - please make sure your child knows the difference between these homophones!

you're

your

there

their

they're

know

no

hear

here

The first week's spellings are all ambitious synonyms! This is a tricky list, as there is no one spelling rule to learn! Find out what the words mean, and this will help you to spell them!

Our words:

aggressive

hostile

awkward

obstinate

desperate

frantic

disastrous

calamitous

marvellous

spectacular