7 Plus spellings and vocabulary
Seven Plus exams require a fairly robust command of basic spelling rules. Although a separate spelling test is not commonly part of the 7 Plus exam, children must demonstrate that they have a good understanding of basic spelling rules in order to score highly in the writing part of their assessment. Teaching this material can be tricky, so we enlisted the help of one of our Seven Plus tutors to make this section of our website in “flashcard” format.
We’ve divided the 7 Plus requirements for spelling into their different parts. For each, we have made a set of flashcards to help your child learn the required spellings in a more straightforward way. Each set of flashcards provides an explanation of the rule, some ideas of how to teach the material and some example words. NB: these examples have been chosen as they are common words, not because they are more likely to feature on a 7 Plus test . All of this is written by an experience, qualified early years Primary teacher.
Most of the below is derived from material specified by the National Curriculum for students in Year 2, then adapted for the purposes of the 7+ exams.
Common exception words
Because, Children, Climb, Most & Only
Take off the ‘y’ and add ‘ies’
Flies, Tries, Cries, Babies & Copies
Adding ‘ed’ ‘ing’ ‘er’ and ‘est’ to a root word ending in ‘y’ with a consonant before it.
Copy, copied, copier, Happy, happier, happiest, Silly, sillier, silliest, Cry, cried, crier, Copying, crying & replying
Adding the endings – ing, –ed, –er, –est and –y to words ending in –e with a consonant before it
Hike, hiker, hiked, hiking, Nice, nicer, nicest, Shine, shinier, shiniest, shining, Take, taker, taking, Care, caring & cared
Adding –ing, –ed, –er, –est and –y to one-syllable words that end in a consonant
Pat, patting, patted, Hum, humming, hummed, Drop, dropping, dropped, Sad, sadder, saddest , Run, running & runny
Using ‘a’ to spell the ‘or’ sound
All, Ball, Call, Talk & Wall
The ‘u’ sound spelt with an ‘o’.
Other, Mother, Brother, Monday & Nothing
The ‘ee’ sound spelt ‘ey’
Donkey, Chimney, Key, Monkey & Valley
Words ending in ‘tion’
Station, Action, National, Fiction & Motion
Using ‘a’ after ‘qu’ or ‘w’
Want, Watch, Wander, Squash & Quantity
The suffixes –ment, –ness, –ful , –less and –ly
Careful, Beautiful, Sadness, Enjoyment & Badly
Using ‘g’ to make a ‘j’ sound.
Giant, Giraffe, Gem, Magic & Energy
Contractions
Can't, Didn't, Shouldn't, Don't & I'll
Homophones and near-homophones
Hear / here, One / won, Sun / son, Be / bee & See / sea
Words that end in ‘ge’ or ‘dge’.
Edge, Bridge, Badge, Huge & Village
Using ‘c’ to make a ‘s’ sound.
Race, Ice, Fancy, City & Cinema
The ‘n’ sound spelt as ‘kn’ or ‘gn’.
Know, Knock, Knee, Gnome & Gnaw
The ‘r’ sound spelt ‘wr’ at the beginning of words.
Write, Wrong, Written, Wrap & Wrote
The use of ‘le’ at the end of words for the 'el' sound.
Apple, Middle, Bottle, Table & Title
Using the ‘el’ sound at the end of words.
Camel, Squirrel, Tunnel, Travel & Towel
The ‘al’ sound at the end of words.
Metal, Animal, Hospital, Capital & Final
The ‘i’ sound at the end of a word spelt with a ‘y’
Cry, Dry, Try, Reply & July
Did you find these useful?
Let us know below!
This is Fantastic! Thank you very much. Appreciate your help!
Dear Aartahi
We're glad you like them! Best of luck to your child in their studies.
Best wishes
Owl Tutors