What does penance mean?
Word: Penance
Part of Speech: Noun
Meaning: Penance means something you do to show you are sorry for a wrong, often a hard task you accept or set for yourself.
Synonyms: amends
How do you spell penance?
Syllables: pen - ance
Tricky part: Students often double the first n and write pennance.
Watch out for: pennance, penanc
Memory tip: Pen comes first: picture writing sorry a hundred times with a pen as your penance.
Penance in a sentence
Example 1: As penance for breaking the window, Ravi washed the neighbour's car every Sunday for a month.
Example 2: The captain ran ten extra laps as penance for arriving late.
Example 3: She did extra chores as penance for forgetting her sister's birthday.
Fun Fact
Penance and penitent are related to repent; all of them go back to the Latin paenitere, to regret.
Practise the CREST Way
Spell-o-Spell
Only one of these words is spelt correctly. Choose its meaning:
1. remorce 2. penance 3. apologie 4. confesion
a) an admission of a wrong you did
b) a deep feeling of guilt
c) a task taken on to make up for doing wrong
d) a statement saying you are sorry
Show answer
c) a task taken on to make up for doing wrong. Remorse ends in se, confession has a double s and apology ends in y, so penance is the correctly spelt word.
Word Cookie
Fill in the missing letters to complete the word:
pen_n_e
a) a, s
b) a, c
c) e, c
d) i, c
Show answer
b) a, c. Penance ends in ance, as balance does: an a, then a c.
Word Connection
Choose the synonym of the word penance as used in the sentence:
He swept the hostel corridor for a week as penance for the prank.
a) agreement
b) reparation
c) excitement
d) amusement
Show answer
b) reparation. Sweeping to make up for the prank is a form of reparation.
Mingle-Mangle
Unjumble the letters in the sentence to form a meaningful word:
He cleaned the whole classroom as ecepann for the mess he had made.
a) penance
b) nuance
c) pennant
d) finance
Show answer
a) penance. The jumble has two e's and two n's but no t, f or u, which rules out pennant, finance and nuance.
Multiple Choice Questions
1. After breaking a neighbour's fence, a fitting penance would be ____.
a) mending it yourself
b) saying nothing about it
c) blaming the wind for it
d) asking someone else to fix it
Show answer
a) mending it yourself
2. A person who does penance usually hopes to ____.
a) be left alone
b) be paid
c) be famous
d) be forgiven
Show answer
d) be forgiven
