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GCSE English Language · key term
A group of letters added at the end of a word to change its meaning or grammatical role, such as -ness in happiness.
Used by AQA, Edexcel, OCR and Eduqas
Paper 1, Paper 2
Letters added to the end of a word to form another word, such as ‘-ful’ in ‘hopeful’.
Revise: SpellingA suffix goes at the end: care + ful = careful, with one ‘l’ in ‘-ful’. When adding ‘-ing’ to write, drop the silent final ‘e’ to make writing.
Paper 1, Paper 2
When checking a difficult word, separate its prefix, root and suffix, then inspect the joins.
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A group of letters added to the end of a word to change its meaning or grammatical function, such as ‘-ness’ in ‘kindness’.
A suffix is added at the end of a word. Sometimes the base word stays unchanged, as in ‘kind’ becoming ‘kindness’. Sometimes adding the suffix changes its ending.
Paper 1, Paper 2
Revise: SpellingA prefix comes before it; a suffix comes after it. Recognising those parts gives you something more reliable than a guess based on pronunciation.
Paper 1, Paper 2
Letters added to the end of a root word, often changing its meaning or grammatical role, such as ‘–ness’ in ‘happiness’.
Revise: SpellingA suffix goes at the end of a root. Many suffixes beginning with a consonant can be added directly: enjoyment, careful, hopeless and sadly. The suffix –ful contains just one l, even though the separate word full contains two.
Component 1, Component 2
A letter or group of letters added to the end of a word to change its meaning or grammatical role, such as ‘–ness’ in ‘sadness’.
Revise: SpellingA suffix goes after the root. Suffixes beginning with a consonant, such as ‘–ness’, ‘–ful’ and ‘–ly’, usually attach directly: sadness, careful, completely. Keep the letters at the join: usual + ly = usually and final + ly = finally.
