Video summary
These types of words with silent letters are hard to spell because they cannot be heard when the word is spoken.
For these types of words, it is necessary to learn and remember the silent letters.
Silent b is introduced in the word 鈥榣amb鈥.
To help remember this silent letter, there is a story of how the word was originally spelt 鈥 lambaz 鈥 in old Germanic.
Over time the 鈥榖az鈥 at the end of the word was dropped from the pronunciation but the 鈥榖鈥 remained in the spelling of the word.
The word 鈥榢ambaz鈥 is the old Germanic word for 'comb' and a similar thing happened to this word too.
The word 'bomb' was originally 鈥榖ombus鈥, a Latin word that described a booming sound.
The 鈥榰s鈥 has been dropped but the 鈥榖鈥 remained.
Another word that was used by the Anglo-Saxons was 鈥榗limban鈥 鈥 which has dropped the 鈥榓n鈥 but kept the 鈥榖鈥.
Finally, two words from the Latin language, 'plumb' and 'doubt', are explained.
This short film is from the 麻豆社 series, Wonderful Words, a series of animated clips to support vocabulary knowledge.
Teacher Notes
This short film could be used in teaching about the silent letter b and to reinforce spellings containing silent letters.
Pupils could write a short story incorporating words with a silent b.
This could also be used as part of a history topic on the origin of words.
This short film is relevant to teaching English at KS2 level in England and Northern Ireland and Second Level in Scotland.
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