Long E Vowel Teams (ee, ea) Worksheets

Ee and ea are the two big spellings for the long e sound: see, tree, and sleep against eat, sea, and team. First graders sort words by which team they use, building the word-by-word visual memory this pair demands, since sound alone can't tell them apart.

By grade

What students need to know

Ee and ea both say the long e sound: see, eat. The tricky part is remembering which team each word uses.

This skill runs from 1st grade through 2nd grade. Pick a grade above for level-matched sentences, teaching notes, and worksheets.

Long E Vowel Teams (ee, ea) across the grades

1st Grade

Ee and ea are the two big spellings for the long e sound: see, tree, and sleep against eat, sea, and team. First graders sort words by which team they use, building the word-by-word visual memory this pair demands, since sound alone can't tell them apart.

2nd Grade

Second graders sort ee and ea words confidently and start noticing small tendencies, like ee in body words such as feet, heel, and teeth, and ea in food words like meat, peach, and wheat. Mostly, though, this pair is learned by sight, which is exactly why repeated sorting works.