Spelling and Sound: Spelling Common Words in English

02/08/2026

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02/21/2024

Hi everyone! I have started my Instagram videos on spelling and on phrasal verbs! Go to https://www.instagram.com/p/C3n3V6DP2ta/ to see my introduction!

02/02/2024

Sometimes even native English speakers get it wrong. And it's funny. On Tuesday, a lawmaker in the US Congress named Marjorie Taylor Greene was trying to say the word "indictable." She pronounced it "in - dick - tubble". And that's what you might think it should be.
But no!
Two problems:

a) "Indict" is a legal term. It means "to formally charge someone with a serious crime." Like many legal words in English, its spelling is different from its pronunciation for historical reasons. But Marjorie Taylor Greene is not a lawyer, nor is she a person with a good education. So she doesn't know that the word is pronounced "in- dite." The "c" is silent.

b) The fun part is that "dick" (the syllable she mispronounced) is American slang for the male reproductive organ, the p***s. So she was trying to make a legal point, but she made a dirty joke instead. As I said, she's not very smart.

01/23/2024

Now let's talk about the /k/ sound. It's more complicated than it seems.

At the beginning of a word, /k/ can be spelled ca-, co-, or cu.

Here are examples: capital, consider, culinary. In addition to the A, O, U letters following the C, we also have CR - credit, CL - close.

At the END of a syllable or word, /k/ sound is spelled -CK but only if the vowel is a short vowel.

Black
Crack
Stick
Pick

If you add an ending to these words, simply add -ing, or -ed, or -le: cracking, sticking, pickle.

If you have a long vowel (a letter sound), you'll usually spell /k/ at the end of a word with just a -ke. There are a very few but common exceptions: steak and break.

Examples: snake, take, fake.

Practice: these pairs have two different vowel sounds. One is the short sound, and the other is the long or letter sound. Try to make them sound different.

Short sound Letter sound
Tack. Take
Lack Lake
Stack Stake

Pock. Poke
Stock Stoke

Duck Doke
Muck Mope

Back Break

01/14/2024

When should you pronounce the letter "c" as a /k/ sound, and when should you pronounce "c" as a /s/ sound?

Look at the letter AFTER the "c."

If the letters -a-, -o-, -u- follow the "c," pronounce the "c" as a "k."

CAT, CAN, COP, CONSTANT, CUP

But if the letters -e-, -i-, and -y- follow the "c," pronounce the "c" as an "s."

DANCE, FANCY, PRINCE C***R, CINNAMON, CIRCLE

Practice:
The fancy prince danced with the cozy cat.
She is constantly critical of the reception crew.
The new traffic design is circular. We're very excited!

12/29/2023

I saw a post today by a native English speaker, who wrote, "You are apart of God's plan." This is incorrect. Do you know why?

"A part" is one part of something whole. It can be a big part or a small part, but it belongs to the larger whole thing. You can see it in the drawing. To know that you are using it correctly, put the word "one" instead of the word "a." If it works correctly, you are using the spelling correctly. So we can say, "I am one part of my team."

On the other hand, "apart" means separation from the whole; it is like "away." Think of a child who is in a new school. Perhaps he doesn't know anyone and no one is talking to him on the first day because they are all shy. We see him on the playground, and he is standing "apart" from all the other children because he doesn't have friends yet.

So "a part of a group" means "together with a group."
"Apart from the group" means "away from the group."

These kinds of mistakes show how important spelling is in English.