We use –gh– in very common words like: though, right, daughter, weigh, cough, brought, enough…

And we use it in common letter patterns: ough, augh, eigh, igh.

But why have we got these “stupid” looking and sounding words?

It’s all to do with the history of gh. though, right, daughter, weigh, cough, brought, enough… are very old Anglo-Saxon words, and we used to pronounce the ‘gh’ as a throaty hard sound like in the Scottish loch

Anglo-Saxon spellings (in brackets): daughter (dohtor), night (niht), light (liht), bright (beorht), dough (dāg), bough (bōh), rough (ruh)

But then the French invaded in 1066, and changed spellings. They added a ‘g’ the ‘h’ to reflect the hard ‘h’ sound. The ‘gh’ eventually became silent, or an end “f” sound. We leave the ‘gh’ in there to show the origins and history of the world.

–ough has seven sounds

Read this “Have you thought this through thoroughly enough?” (4 sounds in this sentence)
Sometimes the -gh at the end is silent sometimes it has a “f” sound. 

1. through (“throo”)
2. cough, trough (“off”)
3.  enough, rough, tough (“uff”)
4. dough, though, although (“doe, tho”)
5. bough (“bow”)
6. borough, thorough (“buro, thuro”)
7. bought, brought, fought, nought, ought, sought, wrought, thought (“ort”)

–augh normally sounds like “or”
daughter, naughty, slaughter, taught, haughty
but laugh/laughter is pronounced with a long or short ‘a’ “laff” or “larff”

–eigh normally sounds like “ay”
say, day eight, neighbour, weigh, weight, sleigh
But height rhymes with bite!!

–igh sounds like “eye”
in tie high, sigh, thigh,

-ight light, delight, sight, might, night, right, tight, flight

1. Now write some letter pattern sentences in Your Notebook.
2. Now try the exercises below