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
Read More...
Spelling Rules
Spelling Rule- Before You Start: Part-A
Spelling Rule- 1: Syllables
Spelling Rule- 2 : English Words Never end with
Spelling Rule- 3 : “Y” acts as a consonant as well as a vowel
Spelling Rule- 4 : Two sounds of “C”
Spelling Rule- 5 : Two sounds of “G”
Spelling Rule- 6 : Magic-E/Silent-E
Spelling Rule- 7 : Drop the “e” rule
Spelling Rule-8: The 1:1:1 doubling-up rule
Spelling Rule-9: A E O U at the end of the Syllable
Spelling Rule-10: The Rabbit rule
Spelling Rule- Before You Start: Part-A
Spelling Rule- 11: The FLOSS/FLSZ rule
Spelling Rule- 12 : Use of C or K to pronounce K
Spelling Rule- 13: Use of /CH/ & /TCH/
Spelling Rule- 14: Use of /Cial/ & /Tial/
Spelling Rule-15: Two vowel’s sounds
Spelling Rule- 16 : Short Vowel Sounds
Spelling Rule- 17 : Long Vowel Sounds
Spelling Rule-18: Vowels in Short Words
Spelling Rule-19: Long Vowels’ Rules and Patterns
Spelling Rule-20: W is the Boss