Do spell checkers make this skill pointless?

The opposite: a spell checker can't catch a homophone error, because the wrong twin is still a correctly spelled word. "I saw the whole show" and "I saw the hole show" both pass. The writer is the only checker these mistakes ever meet.

Which homophone pairs cause the most trouble in 4th grade writing?

Teachers report the abstract ones: seem/seam, fare/fair, waste/waist, role/roll. Concrete pairs like bear/bare come with mental pictures; the abstract ones need the sentence-meaning habit this sheet drills.

4th grade homophones

4th grade homophones worksheets

By fourth grade the pairs get subtler (peak and peek, vein and vain, coarse and course) and the cost of mixing them up moves into real writing. This sheet is a fast way to find which pairs still wobble; the grammar set (their/there, your/you're) lives on our commonly confused words worksheets.

Free printable PDF worksheet, aligned to Common Core L.4.1.g.

Each print is a different sheet with its own answer key. You don't need to sign up.

The kind of sentences you'll get

Read each sentence. Circle the letter of the word that is spelled right for the meaning.

of the cookies were left by noon. Nun · None
Answer: None
The horse trotted with a smooth . gate · gait
The doctor saw twelve before lunch. patients · patience

Every print pulls a new set of sentences at this level, so a make-up test or a second sibling gets a different mix.

What's on a 4th grade sheet

4th grade sheets draw from 60 sentences, 10 to a page. None of these sentences are on 3rd grade sheets.

Some of the answers:

doughfoulhallmissedmorningprayshowntiedtoadWhich

Choose the word. Read each sentence. Circle the letter of the word that is spelled right for the meaning. 10 questions per page.
Fix it. Write the word in parentheses that fits each sentence. 8 sentences to fix per page.

Every version prints on US Letter or A4, with its answer key on the last page.

How to teach this

Move it into writing: after the sheet, ask for one sentence using each twin correctly in the same sentence ("I see the sea"). Fourth graders who can do that on three pairs in a row are done with those pairs for good.

Watch for: Sounding it out can't settle a homophone; both spellings pass the ear test. Only the meaning in the sentence decides. Homophones aren't misspellings of each other: pear and pair are both correct words. The error is putting the right sound in the wrong job.

Common questions about 4th grade homophones

Do spell checkers make this skill pointless?: The opposite: a spell checker can't catch a homophone error, because the wrong twin is still a correctly spelled word. "I saw the whole show" and "I saw the hole show" both pass. The writer is the only checker these mistakes ever meet.
Which homophone pairs cause the most trouble in 4th grade writing?: Teachers report the abstract ones: seem/seam, fare/fair, waste/waist, role/roll. Concrete pairs like bear/bare come with mental pictures; the abstract ones need the sentence-meaning habit this sheet drills.

Related worksheets

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Aligned to Common Core L.4.1.g. Reviewed by the One more sheet team. Content version 240, updated October 2026.

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