rights
Rights preserves the silent gh in right before the plural s. Its meaning distinguishes it from the homophone rites.
In a sentence: The class read about citizens’ rights.
5th Grade · Themed Spelling Practice
5th Grade Civics and Government Spelling Words
Civics and government words may appear in social studies reading, notes, and written responses. This twelve-word set develops spelling through genuine bases and suffixes, repeated endings, long-word organization, and meaning-dependent contrasts.
Word list
All 12 words in this list
5th Grade · Themed Spelling Practice
- citizen
- law
- amendment
- justice
- constitution
- congress
- election
- representative
- liberty
- rights
- independence
- capital
12 words
What to notice when spelling these words
Amendment and representative share genuine bases and suffixes, and this twelve-word civics set uses connections like that — plus a few words that need attention for other reasons — as its spelling focus.
Build with bases and suffixes
Amendment is amend + ment, and representative is represent + ative. Both keep the complete base when the suffix is added. Rights also preserves its base, right, including the silent gh, before the plural s.
Compare recurring endings
Constitution and election share the ending tion. Organize them as con-sti-tu-tion and e-lec-tion so their different earlier sequences remain clear. Justice ends in tice, not tion, while independence ends in the larger written sequence dence.
Hold distinctive internal spellings
Citizen begins with soft c and keeps z in its final syllable. Congress has doubled s at the end, and liberty finishes with ty. The short spelling law ends in aw. In capital, keep the middle it and the ending al to distinguish it from the government-building spelling capitol.
Notes for particular words
representative
Build representative from represent + ative. Keeping the complete base represent secures the first nine letters before the suffix is added.
capital
Capital ends in al when it names an important city or another form of capital. Capitol ends in ol when it names a particular government building.
In a sentence: The state capital is marked on the map.