"Con" contraction

[JanaBrailles]

I have a question regarding to word "coniferous." Per the old EBAE rules, the "con" contraction was NOT used in the word "coniferous." When we got the NLS-UEB version of the Instruction Manual, this was one of the questions I asked with regard to UEB. With the bridging of prefixes, and a disregard as to pronunciation, I was told the con contraction WAS used in the word "coniferous" and it was shown as contracted in the teacher key. I now have a distance-learning student on lesson 7 and in looking at the updated teacher key, it shows the word brailled without the con contracted. Can you tell me which way is correct? Rule?

Thanks!

[claurent]

According to 10.6.1 the 'con' contraction is only used when the letters it represents form the first syllable of a word.  According to dictionary.com the word 'coniferous' is split co-ni-fer-ous which would mean that 'con' does NOT form the first syllable of the word.

Cindi

 

 

[JanaBrailles]

Thanks Cindi. That is what I thought, but was previously told that pronunciation did not matter. UGH. Glad someone finally figured it out. I was curious if there was another rule I was overlooking. 🙂

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