The Elementary Spelling Book, being an Improvement on the American Spelling Book · No. 150 · Part 11: Rules for spelling, numbers and marks
130. More plurals, and words made with -ly, -ness, -less
Goal: Your child makes plurals of words ending in vowel + y and in f, and builds new words with -y, -ly, -ness and -less.
You'll need
- The book, open to this table
- A slate, small whiteboard, or paper and pencil
What's in the book
Rules 16 to 18: nouns in ay, ey, oy, ow, ew just add s (day, days; valley, valleys; boy, boys); nouns ending in a vowel (hoe, hoes; woe, woes); nouns in f that change to ves (life, lives; loaf, loaves; calf, calves; wife, wives; leaf, leaves; half, halves). Then lists of words formed with -y, -ly, -ness and -less: lovely, timely, manly, costly; happiness, laziness, emptiness; craftily, luckily; patiently; boundless, blameless.
The lesson, step by step
Review
Your child writes the plurals of fox, berry and church.
Vowel + y
When a vowel comes before the y, just add s: day, days; valley, valleys; boy, boys. Compare berry, berries (consonant before y).
f to ves
Read the list: life, lives; loaf, loaves; calf, calves; leaf, leaves; half, halves. Say them: the f turns into a v sound, and the spelling follows.
Building words
Read the lists of made words. Some of them:
lovely, timely, manly, costly
happiness, laziness, emptiness
boundless, blameless
Your child finds the short word inside each one. Note: happy becomes happi-ness, lazy becomes lazi-ness. y changes to i.
Make your own
Add endings: kind + ly, kind + ness; care + less; happy + ly (happily); empty + ness (emptiness).
Dictation
Dictate: days, leaves, halves, lovely, happiness, careless.