Ultimate Vocabulary Software

Take heart! Even if you’re currently frustrated with trying to learn all of the many (and often contradictory) rules of English spelling, the good news is that once you have the basics down, it’s really a matter of building on that solid base and handling the exceptions as they come along. This will require study, and it will take some time, but think of the benefits you’ll get in the end: you’ll breeze through your school studies without getting back any term papers marked with the dreaded red pen; you’ll be confident in sending out e-mails and department memos without worrying that people will be laughing at misspelled words; you’ll have the resources to read, understand, and write about the things that are essential for your work and personal progress. And if you understand and enjoy the benefits of being a good speller, you can pass that appreciation on to your children. The earlier people learn how to spell, and how to enjoy having the ability to spell, the better.

It’s often easier to enjoy learning how to spell when there’s an element of fun involved. Look for word- or spelling-based games on line or as part of the spelling software you purchase. If you’re buying spelling software make sure that it supports different user levels so that all members of your family can benefit from it, no matter their ages. You can also play the games found in many daily newspapers that involve words. By doing the crossword puzzle, you’ll find that your eye learns the patterns in words by filling in the blanks. You’ll also be exposed to new words, which will give you a better understanding of English vocabulary as well as English spelling rules. If there’s a “word jumble” game where you need to rearrange letters to form words, this is another great way to learn patterns of letters in English words. Even a word search game, while not requiring you to know how to spell, is useful – again, it gives you a list of words you might not know, and they’ll be correctly spelled.

Take every opportunity in work and play to focus on spelling, and you’ll love the results.

One of the things about English spelling rules that many people find confusing is how the basic spelling of a word changes when the word is modified to become a different part of speech (this is often referred to as “derivation”). That is, when you change a noun into a verb, for example, you’ll often be altering the spelling of that word as well. Not all words will change – you can drive (verb) your car on a sunny Sunday drive (noun) in the country. Most of the time, though, you’ll be changing the ends of words and often some other letters besides. Here are some examples of common alterations:

Changing nouns to verbs. Certain nouns are changed to verbs by adding the suffix -fy or -ify. Notice that in most cases the existing vowel towards the end of the word is replaced by the letter i.

terror / terrify
satisfaction / satisfy
unity / unify
mystery / mystify
significance / signify
justice / justify
certificate / certify

Another common noun-to-verb change is accomplished with the suffix -ize. In this case, there are usually fewer or no changes to the original word’s spelling.

critic / criticize
fiction / fictionalize
terror / terrorize

The adjective random becomes the verb randomize using this same rule.

Changing adjectives to nouns. A spelling change occurs to the original word when you add the suffix -nce, -ence, or -ance to an adjective to make it a noun.

absent / absence
different / difference
violent / violence
important / importance
patient / patience

The verb deliver becomes the noun deliverance by this rule as well.

Another common way to change an adjective to a noun is by adding -ness to the end of the word. If the original adjective ends in a y, you need to change the y to an i.

happy / happiness
slow / slowness
late / lateness
careless / carelessness
pretty / prettiness

These are only some of the examples of spelling changes with word derivations, and we’ll have more examples in future posts.

English is a difficult language to learn because of the many different ways that individual and groups of letters can be pronounced. It’s difficult to explain to children that in the word place the “a” sound is AY, but in the word that it’s pronounced AH. When two or more letters are combined, the pronunciation differences are even more confusing. Think of the words height and weight, for example; in the first word, the “ei” combination is pronounced EYE but in the second it’s AY. And in neither case is it what a child might logically assume; that is, both vowels sequentially, or EE-EYE. It gets even more complicated when comparing the words weight and wait, which in English are generally pronounced the same, though the vowel cluster is different.

Phonics is a way of teaching reading that also teaches children how to correctly pronounce and spell words, by showing children from the beginning that letters and letter groups can have different pronunciations. Rather than just giving children simple words to learn and skipping over any questions about why two words that use the same letters are pronounced differently, or why two words using different letters are pronounced the same, a phonics instructor will isolate each phoneme (the sound made) as well as the letters associated with them. The phoneme generally represented by the letter F is written as /f/ phonically, but the letter F can also sound like a V, as in the word of (/^v/), and the word enough has an F-sound in the cluster OUGH (/^f/) – something that even adults find confusing! However, by breaking down words into their phonemes, or sounds, it’s actually easier for children to learn and understand how words should be pronounced, and this leads to quicker improvement in spelling, because it helps break a child’s instinctive habit of spelling words “just the way they sound.”

Phonics also leads to better reading skills, and the more children read, the better spellers they become. If you have young children in school, you might want to see if phonics is used in their English and reading classes, and encourage teachers to use this method.