Lesson video

Hello and welcome to today's spelling lesson.

I'm Mr. Moss, I love spelling, and I'm really looking forward to teaching you.

With you for today's lesson, you need to bring your looking eyes, your listening ears, and your thinking brains, as well as that something to write with and write on, and someone or something to talk to you would also be excellent.

Right, let's get right into today's spelling lesson then.

In today's spelling lesson, we're going to be investigating the ee sound spelt ie or ei.

The outcome will be, I can spell words using ie or ei that make the ee sound.

Here are the keywords for today's learning: phoneme, grapheme, exception.

Brilliant, now you may recognise many of these words from your phonics days.

A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound that can change a word's meaning.

And that phoneme we're looking at today is ee.

A grapheme is a letter or group of letters that represent that phoneme or sound.

It might also be called a spelling.

The spellings that we're looking at today are ie and ei that represent that ee sound.

And an exception is a case or situation that does not follow the usual expected rule or pattern.

And there are many of these in spellings.

Keep an eye out for them today.

Here is the outline for today's lesson.

We're gonna look at all of the ee spellings and we'll review what you already know.

Then we're going to have a look at using this strange ie and ei to make the spellings that make that ee sound.

And we're also then going to look at spellings and curriculum words to finish out the lesson.

Let's get on with reviewing the ee sounds you already know.

Read these words: Three, street, employee, dream, creature, beneath complete, extreme.

All of these words include the sound ee, that phoneme ee.

The ee sound or phoneme can be represented in a variety of spellings.

And these spellings are what we call graphemes.

The spellings or graphemes, EE, EA, and E-E, our split digraph there, are the most common representations of this phoneme.

Can you remember any patterns about where these spellings are found in a word? Look carefully again at these words.

Have a think.

Great, we're gonna review where they come now.

The EE spelling is often found in the middle or at the end of a word.

So, for instance, three has it at the end.

Employee has it at the end.

But the words street, sweet, fleece, and meet, and meeting, have it in the middle.

Are there any exceptions to our generalisation here? Hmm, well, I can see here, it's right here in the middle of the root word, meet.

It's in the middle of our root word, and we added our -ing suffix.

So, not really, there are no clear exceptions.

Our rule here is our ee spelling, our ee grapheme for that phoneme ee is often found in the middle or at the end of the word.

The ea spelling can be found anywhere in a word, so we have to really watch out for this one.

If we look here, the words: dream, creature, beneath, beach, and reaching, we can see here that it's coming in the middle of the word.

The word, pea, it's coming at the end.

And in the word, eat, it's coming at the start.

The e-e, our split digraph for that ee sound is often found last but one, as is the case with most split digraphs, it will often have a consonant coming between it.

Serene, which means calm and peaceful.

These, complete, concede, we conceded a goal.

Even and complete.

Extreme is also an example.

Extremely, here too, with that root word extreme, we've added our LY.

Are there any exceptions to this generalisation? Hmm, well, I can see even isn't quite the last but one, is it? Even, is sort of at the beginning, isn't it? And in extremely, it's still last but one in the root word, which is extreme before we add our -ly suffix.

So, it is last but one, of the root word here.

With that in mind and with the review of these different ee graphemes that we've just looked at, could you match the word to the spelling pattern it uses? The words that we have below, read them carefully, and then match them.

Off you go.

Solid job, team.

So we had the words, extreme, speech, peace, eating and see, and they all contain different ee sounds.

They're different ee spellings for that same ee sound.

So, extreme, that was our e-e, and it came last but one.

Speech was our ee, which can often be found in the middle or at the end.

Peace is our ea, which can come anywhere.

And we see that then in eating where it's not in the middle this time, it's at the beginning, and we've added our -ing suffix, so at the beginning here of our root word, eat.

And then we have see.

Not a sea as in the choppy, salty sea, but see, as in I see you.

They're homophones.

And this is our EE spelling, with it coming at the end.

Great job.

There are many other less common ways to spell this ee sound, this phoneme.

Let's read these words: we.

Hmm, which grapheme there is making that phoneme? Evil, funny, sunny, honey, key, belief, receive.

So that belief might be a religious belief, something you firmly believe in.

And if you receive something, you are given it.

I received a gift.

The spellings, e, y, ey, and then ie and ei, which are our concentrated spellings for today, are other ways to represent that ee phoneme, that sound.

Can you remember any patterns about where these spellings are found in a word? Look carefully at the examples we've got.

What do you think? Off you go.

Brilliant job.

So, the E, just an E on its own spelling is often found at the start of a word or at the end of short, high-frequency words.

If we look at the word he, which appears very often, or we, for instance is coming at the end, or she.

Evil, it shows it coming at the beginning.

The same of Egypt, which here it has a capital letter, 'cause it's a proper noun.

The Y spelling is often found at the end of multisyllabic words.

Remember, our syllables are those beats where we have those vowel sounds, sunny.

So we have two syllables there.

Happy, another multisyllabic word.

Baby, another multisyllabic word.

Funny, slimy, slowly, funnily.

Multisyllabic words, all with that Y at the end.

There's something else I've noticed here as well.

These words are often adjectives or adverbs.

Not in all cases, because baby for instance is a noun.

But that's because our -y suffix is often used to create adjectives.

And our -ly suffix creates adverbs and it's making that ee sound in each instance.

The ey spelling for our ee sound is often found at the end of words.

Honey, for instance.

Monkey, money, that you can use to buy things.

Donkey, another animal.

Key, that you might use to open a door.

Match the word to the spelling pattern it uses.

Read the words below.

See if you can spot that spelling pattern, and then match them.

Off you go.

Okay, good effort, team.

So, evil is just our e spelling, which can come at the start, also at the end.

Spiky is an adjective, so it's that ee with that y.

And it's at the end of that multisyllabic word.

Spiky, two syllables there.

She, that high-frequency word with that E at the end.

Just the E spelling.

Honey, is our ey, often found at the end of words.

It's a noun.

I'm hungrily; multisyllabic.

And it's an adverb, so it's our ly and it's that Y making that ee, hungrily.

Great job, team.

So, for our practise task now, what I'd like you to do for me, is I'd like you to complete the table here below to show which spelling is used to represent our ee phoneme, that ee sound.

For all the words that do contain an ee phoneme, watch out, 'cause some of the words might not contain that ee phoneme.

They might have spellings in them that we might associate with that ee sound, but they might not make an ee sound.

So, read the words carefully.

Off you go.

Sort these words into the correct columns now.

Excellent job.

Let's see how you've done them.

First off, let's get rid of these words that don't have that ee sound in them.

The word sky, for instance, it has a y grapheme, but it's making an ahy sound.

Envelope has E's in it, doesn't it? But there's no ee sound there.

And best has another E in it that ee grapheme, but it's not making an ee sound, it's making an e, e sound.

So we can immediately rule out sky, envelope, or envelope, and best.

Let's see how you sorted the rest of the words then.

I'm hoping you've managed to get a table like this.

Feeling and steely, we have in our ee section, ee.

That word steely, can mean something associated with the metal steel, or something being cold, hard and determined.

Our ea words were defeated.

And here we have in our root word defeat, before we add our -ed suffix, and Easter with our capital E.

Remember, that can come in the middle, at the beginning, it can come in anywhere in a word really.

Then we had compete and even with our split digraph, remember that likes to come last but one.

Egypt with our e spelling, which likes to come at the beginning, or sometimes at the end of those high-frequency words.

And then stony and angrily, an adjective and an adverb, and then money and key, those nouns there of our ey spelling.

Great job.

Pause the video now.

Check and see how you did, make any corrections.

Check you've got all the words in the right columns.

Off you go.

Onto our next learning cycle then, which is going to be using ie, or ei, to represent that ee sound.

The ee phoneme can also be spelled ie or ei.

And there are some rules around this that we're going to look at now.

Here, let's read some words that contain it.

Deceit, a deceit is a trick.

Thief, someone who steals something.

Niece, that member of your family.

Inconceivable, something that is completely unthinkable.

Field, like a football field.

And grief, that feeling of sadness.

They all contain either the ei or the ie spelling for that ee sound.

Knowing which spelling to use can be really difficult, and I'm gonna help you out now with some rules.

There is a rule that does help us then.

I before E, except after C, say that for me.

I before E, except after C.

It means that the spelling ie is used unless the phoneme, the ee phoneme comes after a C, when the ei spelling is then used.

I before E words include, thief, niece, field, grief.

After C words: inconceivable, so ei.

Deceit, so ei, because it's coming after the C.

Many words follow this rule.

I before E words: belief, handkerchief, wield, as in to wield a weapon.

After C words: receive.

My turn, your turn.

Ceiling.

and deceive, the act of tricking someone.

This rule just applies to words where the ie and ei is making that ee sound.

So watch out.

There may be that spelling, those graphemes within other words where they're not making that ee sound, so this rule would not apply.

And, of course, there are some exceptions that keyword, exceptions, has appeared.

Words that don't follow this rule, like protein, which is the ei spelling, but not after a C, or caffeine, which is the ei spelling, but not after a C, and seize, which again, as in, to seize power, or seize control, is that ei spelling but not coming after a C.

So watch out for those exceptions that don't follow our rules.

So, for this check, I'd like you please to sort the words into the table by their spelling.

Only paste the words where their letters represent the ee phoneme.

Watch out, there may be some words in there that have the letters that don't represent the ee phoneme.

and you wouldn't put them into the table.

The headings on our table are I before E words, after C words, and then those words, which are exceptions and don't follow this rule.

Read the words first.

Off you go.

Great job.

Okay, so the words that we can immediately get rid of are quiet and eight, because our ie, or ei spellings, their graphemes aren't making that ee phoneme.

Quiet, eight, no ee in there.

I'm hoping then, you managed to sort the rest of the words like this.

Shrieked, as in that shrill loud, aah! Shrieked is that I before E, as is relieved, phew, I felt relieved.

After C words are the words receipt, which is that pt spelling at the end.

That receipt is what you receive when you had to buy something from a shop.

That piece of paper that lets you know what you bought.

Or perceive, if you perceive something, you understand it; you become aware or conscious of something.

And then we had two words which were exceptions to our rule here.

Caffeine and protein.

Caffeine is what's inside coffee, and protein is a nutrient that's found in lots of foods that your body uses to grow.

For our practise task now, we're going to have a go at spelling some words using ie or ei for that ee sound.

Remember to: sound it out.

Think of the spelling rules we've looked at, I before E, except after C.

Just listen to me say the words first of all.

The first word is thief.

The thief stole the money.

Number two is field.

We played on the football field.

Number three, deceit.

He felt betrayed by their deceit.

Number four, ceiling, ceiling.

Number five, belief.

His beliefs were unshakeable.

Belief, he held strong beliefs.

So, number one, thief.

Number two, field.

Number three, deceit, that soft C.

Number four, ceiling.

And number five, belief.

Pause the video now and have a go at writing those words.

Remember our rule, I before E, except after C.

Off you go.

Incredible job team, great application of our rule here.

So, the first word was thief.

Thief, it's our ie spelling, isn't it? 'Cause I before E, except after C, and there's a th coming before it.

So it's that ie grapheme for that ee phoneme.

Field.

Now, as in a football field, it's I before E, because there's no C before it.

Field.

Deceit.

Ooh, it has that soft C, doesn't it, like the word deceived or deception? So, deceit, I before E, except after C.

There's a C here, so it's our ei spelling.

The next one was ceiling, again, soft C, ceiling.

So, it is our ei spelling, I before E, except after C.

There's a C, so it's our ei.

And finally belief, I before E, except after C.

There's no C before this ee sound, is there? So it's our ie spelling.

Great job.

Make any corrections now and share your learning.

Off you go.

Brilliant job.

So, onto our final learning cycle then, which is spelling curriculum words.

Let's read the following curriculum words.

Remember that curriculum words are these words which are going to appear often in our reading and writing.

And they might have slightly tricky elements to them, so it's really important that we know how to read and spell them.

My turn, your turn, achieve.

believe.

possess.

If you possess something, you own it; it is your possession.

Hmm, what do you notice about these spellings? Anything interesting? Anything that links to our learning today? Pause the video and have a think.

Great job, team.

So I've noticed a couple of things.

The words achieve and believe, follow our I before E, except after C pattern.

And they both end in that ve representing the v sound, achieve, believe.

No words in the English language end just with the letter V by itself.

The word belief is related to believe, so it's our ie, and we've removed the F before adding our -ve suffix.

It can sound a bit like bi at the start, but it's spelled be, believe.

And the word possess has two double S's in it, doesn't it? Double S in the middle and double S at the end.

And that middle S sounds a bit like a z, doesn't it? Possess.

So be careful.

With that in mind, which of these words that we've just read are spelled correctly? Choose the correct ones now, for achieve, believe, and possess.

Off you go.

Great, so achieve, that's our ie for that ee sound.

Remember our rule, I before E, except after C, and there's an H before it, so it's this one here, ie.

And there's the ve at the end there.

Remember, no word in English just ends in a V on its own.

Then we have believe.

It follows exactly the same pattern as this.

It's I before E, except after C, there's no C before it, so it's ie, and then ve at the end as well.

And possess, two lots of double S's here, possess, P-O-S-S-E-S-S.

Watch out for those S's, 'cause they can sound like z, can't they? But be careful.

So because these are curriculum words, and they also link to the words that we've been learning about today, and that rule, I before E, except after C, we're gonna now use the look, cover, write, check strategy to practise them.

This is where you look very carefully at the spelling you're looking at and consider what's difficult about it, what we've achieved, I would look carefully at it.

I've got my ie spelling and then so I've got ve.

I memorise that, cover it up, achieve, A-C-H-I-E-V-E.

I have a go at writing it, and then I check back to see how I did? I got it correct, but I don't stop there.

I do that strategy a number of times to really embed it into my long-term memory.

Use the look, cover, write, check strategy now to practise these three words.

Off you go.

Great job team, I'm really impressed.

How did you get on? Did you manage to spell all of these curriculum words correctly? Did you remember our rules of I before E, except after C? Make any corrections now and share your learning.

Off you go.

Really great spelling today, team.

Remember that we've been investigating that ee sound for our ie and ei.

And there are many ways to spell that ee sound.

The spellings, ee, ea and e-e, our split digraph, are the most common representation of this phoneme.

But the spellings, e, y, ey, ie and ei are other ways to represent this ee phoneme, that sound.

The rule, I before E except after C, can help us choose between ie and the ei spelling when spelling that ee sound.

There are exceptions, including protein, caffeine, and seize.

Great learning today.

Keep an eye out for the ie or ei spellings in your reading.

See you again soon.