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When to Double Final Consonants?

When to Double Final Consonants?

Date: Oct 18 2010

Topic: Grammar

Author: Ocean-SA

Lesson

 The final consonant of a word is often doubled when adding -ed, -ing, -er, -est

In the following cases:

• Double final "b, d, g, l, m, n, p, r and t" at the end of words: rob - robbing sad - sadder big - bigger travel - traveller skim - skimming win - winner pop - popping prefer - preferred hit - hitting

• Double these final letters when there is the following pattern "consonant - vowel - consonant" at the end of a word. For example: travel – [vel] v > consonant - e > vowel - l > consonant.

• Words of more than one syllable have their consonants doubled only when the final syllable is stressed. begin - beginn ing BUT open - opening defer - deferr ing BUT offer - offering

• When words have more than one syllable and end in 'l' British English always doubles the 'l', even in the case of unstressed syllables. American English, on the other hand, the 'l' is not doubled when the syllable is unstressed.

British English - travelled American English – traveled

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