Spelling Rule-6: Silent ‘e’ / Silent Final ‘e’/ Magic ‘e’

The silent ‘e’ magic ‘e’ is all about the ‘e’ at the end of words and how it makes a huge difference to the spelling, pronunciation and meaning of them: name, site, wife, gate, time, nose, volume.

You can call this ‘e’ the magic ‘e‘, the bossy ‘e’, or the final silent ‘e’.

But I like the magic ‘e’ silent ‘e’ – it’s magic because it changes the meaning and sound, and it’s silent! (We’ll see this silent ‘e’ again in drop the ‘e’ rule).

The magic ‘e’ silent ‘e’ is called a marker. That means it doesn’t represent a sound but tells us the sounds of the other letters in the word.

It’s a marker of a long vowel sound. It makes the nearest vowel to it say its name – say it’s alphabet name – a e i o u ) but we have exceptions. which we’ll see later.

Look at these words:

age, alone, date, wine, life, shine, write, volume, those, twice, marmalade.

They all have a long vowel sound.

Notice the pattern:

vowel + consonant + silent e = long vowel sound

age

alone

date

wine

life

shine

write

volume

Spelling Rule-6.1: Silent Final 'e" changes the pronunciation and meaning of short vowel sound words to long vowel sounds.

Let’s look at how one simple ‘e’ at the end of a word can change the pronunciation and meaning of short vowel sound words to long vowel sounds:

I want you to read the following words out loud:

Short vowel sound / Long vowel sound

tap / tape

them / theme

slim / slime

not / note

us / use

breath / breathe

rag / rage

Did you notice the first column of words are short vowel sounds and the second column with the ‘e’ have a long vowel sound?

So adding the magic ‘e’ silent ‘e’ makes the vowel say its alphabet name but there are exceptions with the presence of /r/: bar/bare, car/care, far/fare, (they’re both long sounds but the ‘e’ words don’t say their name), moral/morale (short sounds) , on/one (doesn’t say its name)

More short to long vowel words

scrap / scrape

tap/tape

gap /gape

mad / made

fad / fade

pan/ pane

can / cane

van / vane

man / mane

plan / plane

dam / dame

slop / slope

pop / pope

cod / code

rod / rode

bod / bode

not / note

dot / dote

pal / pale

rag / rage

wag / wag

stag / staget / ate

mat / mate

hat / hate

fat / fate

rat / rate

cap / cape

fin / fine

pin / pine / pineapple

din / dine

rob / robe

ton / tone

us / use/ used

cut / cute

tub / tube

hug / huge

sit / site

quit / quite

bit / bite

kit / kite

spit / spite

Tim / time

hop / hope

cop / cope

writ / write

pip / pipe

rip / ripe

strip / stripe

rid/ ride

hid / hide

Sid / side

slim / slime

cub / cube

plum / plume

nud / nude

Spelling Rule-6.2: The magic ‘e’ silent ‘e’ also makes the ‘g’ soft.

The magic ‘e’ silent ‘e’ also makes the ‘g’ soft as in:

rag / rage
hug / huge
wag /wage
stag/stage

Spelling Rule-6.3: The magic ‘e’ silent ‘e’ also makes the ‘c’ soft.

The magic ‘e’ silent ‘e’ also makes the ‘c’ soft as in:

cecal.
cecum.
cedar.
ceded.
ceder.
cedes.

It makes the hard c into a soft c “s” sound in (but it sometimes doesn’t make the vowel long)

: these words are long: vice, advice, ace, place, mice, nice, piece/peace,

but choice ( says it’s -oi- pattern “oy”),

: fence, glance, dance – notice these don’t have the vowel + consonan t + silent ‘e’ pattern

Spelling Rule-6.4: The magic ‘e’ silent ‘e’ also makes the final "th" more voiced and a long vowel sound.

It also makes the final “th” more voiced and a long vowel sound:

breath / breathe
cloth/ clothe
bath/ bathe
loathe
lathe
writhe
seethe
soothe.

Spelling Rule-6.5: The silent 'e' distinguishes homophones.

The silent ‘e’ distinguishes homophones.

Examples:

– be/bee, bell/belle, by/bye, for/fore, laps/lapse

Spelling Rule-6.6: The silent 'e' show the final 's' isn't plural.

It’s also there to show the final ‘s’ isn’t plural.

Example:

house, mouse, nurse, purse…

Spelling Rule-6.7: The silent 'e' difference between the -se "s" and -s "zuh" sound.

Notice the difference between the -se “s” and -s “zuh” sound in:

tense / tens dense / dens fence/ fens curse/curs

The ‘e’ makes a difference to the s sound.

Spelling Rule-6.8: The magic 'e' makes the final syllable a longer vowel sound.

We have some longer words – the magic ‘e’ makes the final syllable a longer vowel sound – the vowel nearest the magic e

vowel + consonant + silent ‘e’

mistake

fascinate

Chinese

realise/realize

intrude

divide

phone

quote

outside

electrode

astute

Spelling Rule-6.9: English words do not end with i,j,u and v. so added e to the end.

English words do not end with i,j,u and v. so added e to the end if a word ends with i,j,u and v.

This is because writing ii or jj is difficult.

Also, two u, (uu) or two v (vv) may look like w. so ‘e’ was added to words like: – have, give, due, clue, love

*(exceptions are menu – a foreign word & flu and rev – abbreviations)

-ue words have a long vowel sound: due, clue, glue, clue

but love/ glove/ above/ have /come/ some/ none / oven/ cover/ glove/ to live have short vowel sounds. but there is a long sound in: gave, save, clove, life, live, live wire, alive.

Exceptions: There are a few exceptions of words that have an ‘ e’ at the end of the word and it’s pronounced: be, me, see