Spelling words for Years 1–6

1540 words, grouped by the spelling pattern they teach.

These are the words used across every Spell Kingdom game. They are our own selection, informed by the spelling progression in the Australian Curriculum v9.0 English content descriptions, and they include words from the statutory spelling lists in England's National Curriculum for Years 3 to 6. The Australian curriculum describes the kinds of spelling knowledge children build each year but does not publish an official word list, and this site is independent and not endorsed by ACARA. See data sources for how the list was made.

The lists on these pages use British English spelling (colour, centre). Learners who choose American English when they sign up are given the American spelling (color, center) automatically.

Year 1 spelling words 194 words · cvc words, tricky words, consonant blends, digraphs and more Year 1 spelling is about linking sounds to letters: short vowel words, consonant blends and digraphs, plurals, and the first common words that break the rules. Year 2 spelling words 187 words · vowel patterns, tricky words, suffixes, blends and digraphs and more In Year 2 children meet more ways to spell the same sound (vowel patterns), begin adding endings such as -ing and -ed, and build compound words. Year 3 spelling words 310 words · tricky words, blends and digraphs, compound words, vowel patterns and more Year 3 widens the toolkit: homophones, prefixes, contractions and more suffix rules, alongside a growing set of tricky high-frequency words. Year 4 spelling words 315 words · tricky words, vowel patterns, suffixes, blends and digraphs and more Year 4 words lean on knowing word parts: prefixes and suffixes, plurals with spelling changes, contractions and less common vowel patterns. Year 5 spelling words 268 words · tricky words, compound words, prefixes, suffixes and more By Year 5 spelling draws on word history and structure: silent letters, ough/augh patterns, -ence/-ance and -ary/-ery/-ory endings, homophones and word origins. Year 6 spelling words 266 words · tricky words, homophones, suffixes, compound words and more Year 6 continues with the harder patterns (word origins, silent letters, homophones, tricky endings) and the words children are most likely to misspell in their own writing.

Practise these words

Reading a list is not the same as practising it. In Spell Kingdom children hear each word, spell it in a game, and get a short tip when they miss, and the words they find hard come back more often. On the Family plan a parent can also enter this week's school list. See the games.

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