Primary 1 spelling words: short vowel words

Primary 1 · 25 words · Updated 2026-09-17

1. cat
2. hat
3. bed
4. net
5. pig
6. fin
7. dog
8. hop
9. cup
10. bug
11. clap
12. flag
13. crab
14. step
15. sled
16. drum
17. frog
18. grin
19. plan
20. spin
21. stop
22. swim
23. trip
24. glad
25. slip

How to practise these words

Unlike the high-frequency words, every one of these can be worked out by ear, so this is the list to practise by listening rather than by looking. Say the word once, let your child say it back slowly, and ask them to write the sounds in the order they hear them. The blends at the end of the list are the harder half: a child who writes "cap" for "clap" has heard the word but not the second sound, so slow that word down and stretch it rather than simply marking it wrong. Keep the vowel in mind too, because the short vowels are easy to confuse and "bed" written as "bad" is a listening slip, not a careless one. Mix the three-letter words and the blends together once both are going well, so your child has to decide for themselves which they are hearing.

Where these words come from

These are consonant-vowel-consonant words and simple initial blends, the pattern almost every English phonics sequence starts with. They are taken from common public-domain word families rather than from any school's own list.