Doubled consonants & closed syllables

These are two-syllable words that split between two consonants: rab-bit, sun-set, nap-kin, but-ton, bas-ket. Both halves are closed syllables — they end in a consonant, so the vowel inside stays short. Many of them double a consonant in the middle ('summer', 'dinner', 'kitten', 'happy'), and that doubled letter is doing a job: it keeps the first vowel short.

How it is taught

This is usually where children are given a way to break a longer word up instead of guessing at it. They find the vowels, look at the consonants between them, and split between the two — sun/set, let/ter, mag/net — then read each short chunk. Reading it this way comes first; the reason the letter is doubled is explained afterwards, once children have seen enough examples to notice that the vowel before a double consonant is always short.

Where children get stuck

• One of the doubled letters gets dropped in spelling: 'rabit', 'diner', 'buton', 'sumer'. Nothing in the sound signals the double, so this is not a listening error and more listening will not fix it.
• Children split the word in the wrong place — 'ra-bbit', 'happ-y' — which produces chunks that do not sound like anything.
• 'pocket' has ck rather than a repeated letter, but ck behaves the same way and splits the same way (pock/et), which children rarely spot unaided.
• Once the doubling habit forms, it gets over-applied to words that do not need it.

Word list

Printable flashcards

Practise these in a game