Home > Spelling/Vocabulary > The i before e Spelling Rule

The i before e Spelling Rule

The i before e Spelling Rule      

Check out the song! The i before e Spelling Rule

Usually spell i before e (believe), but spell e before i after a c (receive) and when the letters are pronounced as a long /a/ sound (neighbor).

Exceptions to the rule: beige, caffeine, codeine, conscience, deify, deity, either, feign, feint, foreign, forfeit, freight, heifer, height, heinous, heir, heist, neither, protein, rein, science, seismic, seize, sheik, veil, vein, weird

Rig i before e

(to the tune of “Rig ‘a Jig Jig”)

Spell i before e ‘cause that’s the rule

Rig-a-jig-jig and away we go,

That we learned back in school.

Away we go, away we go!

But e before i comes after c,

Rig-a-jig-jig and away we go,

and when you hear long /a/. Hey!

Hi-ho, hi-ho, hi-ho.

Find  spelling rules with memorable raps and songs on CD, with a comprehensive whole-class diagnostic spelling assessment, enabling 4th–12th grade teachers to differentiate instruction with 35 remedial and 32 advanced spelling-vocabulary worksheets, spelling word lists/tests,  Greek and Latin affixes/rootssyllable practice, and spelling-vocabulary games, and more in Mark’s book, Teaching Spelling and Vocabulary.

Spelling/Vocabulary , , , ,


Comments are closed.