Letter E Tracing Worksheet
Big E is four straight strokes; small e is one curl that starts halfway up. Both are on the sheet below — pick a size and print.
Start with the size that fits the hand you see, not the age on the birthday cake.
The hardest letter in the alphabet
Ask anyone who teaches reception-age children which letter catches the most of them out, and this one usually wins. Not because e is complicated to look at — because of where the pencil lands first.
Nearly every letter covered in these sheets begins at the top. E's small form doesn't: it starts halfway up, on the middle line. Start it at the top instead and the whole letter stretches, leans and falls over — which is exactly why so many early e's come home looking wobbly.
So the rest of this page circles one question: where does the pencil start?
Writing e: where each stroke starts
The two cases have almost nothing in common — the capital is all straight lines, the small letter is a single curl.
- Capital E — four straight strokes, and everyone starts on the left. Stroke one: top left corner, pull straight down the full height. Then three bars, each starting from that back line and running right: the top bar reaches full width, the middle bar stops a touch shorter, and the bottom bar reaches full width again.
- Small e — one flowing stroke, and it begins at the waist. Place the pencil on the middle line at the left of the letter. Slide right a moment, then curl up and over: up to the top, around the left side, down under the bottom, and back up to the middle — then keep going, straight out to the right. That final run is the belt.
One line worth repeating, because it never stops being the point: the small e starts at the middle line, never at the top. (Some programmes draw the belt as a second, short stroke — the start of the curl stays exactly the same either way.)
Teaching moves for the middle start
Every idea here assumes one thing: the start gets practised before the letter does.
- Dot the start. Before any tracing, put a pencil dot on the middle line where e begins. “Somewhere in the middle” turns into a target — trace a few with the dot helping, then send a row solo.
- Say the move, not the letter. “Slide right, curl around, belt it” — three phrases for three moments of the stroke. The letter's name can come later; the hand needs the move.
- Drift detection. If the e comes out leaning or stretched, the start has crept upward. Don't correct the letter itself — go back to the dot and try again from halfway.
- Two dots, one belt. Put a second dot at the right, on the same middle line, where the curl exits. Connect dot to dot and the belt lands level every time.
If the rounded sweep is still new to the hand, it is worth a session on the previous page: letter d tracing worksheet drills this exact curl as the bowl of d.
And e's two ingredients on their own — an open arc and one straight sleeping line — each have practice rows of their own in tracing lines worksheets.
The sound e makes: a letter with three jobs
e is a vowel, and vowels work differently from the consonants met so far: they don't hold one steady sound — they hand a sound to the word around them. Three jobs worth knowing about; only the first matters today.
- Short e — the sound in egg, bed, hen. Mouth open, chin down: /e/. This is the one to practise with the words below.
- Long e — e's own name, the “ee” of tree, bee and see. It arrives with reading.
- Silent e — the quiet one at the end of a word: it says nothing itself, but makes the vowel before it say its name (cake, bike, hope). One for later — a delicious discovery when it lands.
Five-second version: today is short e — egg, elephant, elbow. The other two jobs will introduce themselves when reading starts.
Words that open with e
- egg — breakfast, and the shape of the letter's own body. E–g–g.
- elephant — the trunk-and-tusks giant. E–l–e–p–h–a–n–t.
- elbow — the bend in the middle of your arm. E–l–b–o–w.
All three open with the same short /e/. Say each one twice, then trace one small e for every word.
Common e questions from parents
Where exactly does e start?
On the middle line, at the left edge of the letter — the same height as the bar going right. Not the top: that is the single biggest cause of wobbly e's. Put a dot there for the first week or two.
Why does my child's e keep falling over?
The start has drifted upward. An e that begins at the top has too far to travel, and the whole shape leans with it. Re-dot the middle line, write three together, then let your child solo a few again.
When do we get to silent e?
When reading gets moving — cake, bike and hope are the fun introductions, and children love the trick once they spot it. Handwriting sessions can stay on short /e/ for now.
Once e behaves, everything else feels easier
The same ruled lines are ready for a whole name when you are — the name tracing generator types it out and prints it in one click.