Today we’ll discuss about vowel ‘e’ and learn different sounds it produces when it is used in a word.
One of the first encounters for a student will be this concept is of long and short vowel sounds, such as e. Short e, written phonetically as ?, makes the vowel sound of e, as in bet, get, bed and pen.
The following extensive list introduces “short e” and “long e” sound words to kindergarten students.
Short E Vowel Sound Words
Following is a list of words with short e sound:
| ben | bed | beg | bet | den | fed |
| gem | get | gel | hen | hem | jet |
| keg | led | leg | let | men | met |
| net | pen | peg | pet | red | set |
| ten | Ted | vet | yet | wed | wet |
| Ferry | Deck | Elbow | Echo | Egg | Pencil |
| Bread | Ready | Breath | Steady | Threat | Heavy |
| Pleasure | Deaf | Measure | Sweat | Weapon | Spread |
There are two ways to make a short e sound:
- Using letter e: These words use just the letter e to spell the short /e/ sound. Such as in 3 letter short e cvc words where vowel ‘e’ is used between two consonants
| Bed | Wet | Ted | Fed |
2. EA Words: These words use EA digraph to spell short /e/ sound. For example:
| Head | Read | Weather | Already |
Go through the words given in above table and try to pronounce them, Have you noticed anything?. You must have observed that we don’t have to stress on the vowel ‘e’ therefore we hear a soft ‘e’ sound.
Now let’s have a look at long ‘e’ vowel words where you would have to stress the vowel ‘e’ to pronounce the words correctly.
Long E Vowel Sound Words
Following is a list of phonics words with long e vowel sound:
| Bead | Bean | Mean | Lean | Dean | Teen |
| Feet | Heat | Beet | Beat | Seam | Keen |
| Meat | Meet | Sheet | Bleet | Feed | Need |
| Lead | Seat | Sleet | Fleet | Neat | Greet |
| Become | Gene | Recess | Theme | Evening | These |
| Portuguese | Decide | Happy | Relax | Glory | Delight |
| Field | Deceit | Brief | Receive | Mischief | Conceive |
Let’s explore seven different ways of spelling Long e sound:
This week we’re looking at the long /e/ sound and the seven different ways of spelling it.
1. Using letter e: These words use just the letter e to spell the long /e/ sound.
This spelling of the long /e/ sound is also used for words beginning with prefixes ‘re-‘, ‘be-‘, and ‘de-‘.
| evening | between | delight | recess |
There are some exceptions which include common words like ‘she’, ‘he’, ‘we’, ‘me’, and ‘be’.
2. EE Words: These words spell the long /e/ sound with the letters ee, which usually appears in the middle of the word and occasionally at the end of the word. For example:
| Meet | Seed | Three | Tree |
3. EA Words: These words spell the long /e/ sound with the letters ea. Here are some examples:
| Year | Feat | Reason | Peach |
| Season | Reach | Breathe | Squeak |
4. E_E Words: These words use split digraph e_e to spell the long /e/ sound, with an e in the middle of the word and an e at the end of the word. Here are some examples:
| Here | Theme | Concrete | Portuguese |
5. Y words: These words use letter y at the end to spell the long /e/ sound.
| Cherry | Glory | Twenty | Empty |
6. IE Words: These words use digraph ie to spell the long /e/ sound. Here are some examples:
| Shriek | Relieved | Brief | Fierce |
7. EI Words: There long /e/ sounds in these words are spelled with the letters ei, because the ‘i before e’ spelling rule doesn’t apply after the letter c.
| Ceiling | Conceive | Receipt | Perceive |
Because you have to stress long on vowel ‘e’ to make a sharp sound, they are called Long ‘e’ vowel words.
We hope you have found this post useful for your child. Practice sounding out these words to help your child upgrade his/her phonics skills.
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