Overview

Overview of English spelling problems

To become even just a moderately competent speller of English one has to memorise
at least 3695 common words with exceptional spellings
(listed in the various subsections of this website).

(Understanding English Spelling provides a more detailed analysis of English spelling inconsistencies and the learning difficulties which they cause.)

English has 88 main basic spelling patterns (shown in table 1), but they all have some exceptions (tables 2, 3 and 4 below); 22 spelling patterns have so many exceptions that they are not really patterns at all. The worst of these are shown in table 2

Table 1: 66 basic English spelling patterns and 22 pseudo-patterns

41 Vowel Spellings		Consonant Spellings

Short vowels		The biggest consonant spelling problem is consonant doubling (when to use bb, dd, ff, gg, ll, mm, nn, pp, rr, ss, tt, zz, and ck, tch or dge after a short, stressed vowel in root words of more than one syllable
cat
pet
sit
pot
mum		46 CONSONANT PATTERNS
would wool pull		bob	pop
			rat
Long vowels
In stem of words and stressed endings		K-sound
pane	pay	cat, cot, cut kept, kit clap milk peek rock comic queen[Kw-sound] taxi [Ks-sound]	send
seen / mean	see / tea / me		fence
bite	by / high / tie		decide
stole / coal	low / so / toe		office / promise / trellis
cube	cue / new
fool / rule	too / blue / flew		shop, rush
scout	cow		station
oil	boy		machine
awful / autumn	saw / for*		essential
	*in UK English		vicious
Blends with r		chip
cart		catch	tot
dormouse
term / turn / girl / earl		dad
air / dare / bear		film	this (voiced or
		gag	thing unvoiced)
Endings of longer words
daddy		jab, job, jug	van
better		agent	have
blizzard		cage
believable		gentle / jest	willow
evidence
evident		hand	yes
musical
sample		leg	zip
hasten / certain / abandon		well	absorb, wise
solitary / cemetery / symmetry		will
delicate / favourite / democrat			vision
Beginnings or prefixes		mum
decide		net, ten
include		ring

The most problematic spellings in learning to read and write English are:

Unsystematic consonant doubling (e.g. happy - rapid, apply),
Random and overlapping spellings for the EE-sound and short E-sound
   (e.g. sleep - leap, leapt – slept; friend - field)
Unsystematic and overlapping use of the letters o and u
   (on – other, once, only, woman, women, womb; move – over;
   cup – come, couple, flood; food – wood, put – foot).

Table 2:

This shows how many words use the 11 spelling patterns that cause both reading
and spelling problems and how many fail to conform.
Examples of each pattern are given in the 1st column,
numbers of words using them and not using them in the 2^nd and 3^rd columns.
The most common divergent spellings and their numbers are shown on the right.
(The links show the lists of words which use or disobey each pattern.)

Pattern	No of words with pattern	No of words not using pattern	Examples of divergent spellings	Total number to memorise
Consonant doubling			(missing 323) (surplus / wrong 298)
e.g. horrid, yellow	381*	605	forest, melon, correct, parallel	986

EE-sound and E
keep	132*	322	leap 152*, here 86, believe 31, police 29	454
kept	300	64	leapt 49, said, friend	64

OO-sounds
spoon	72*	57	rude 31, soup 13, shrewd, move	129
too	18*	34	flew 12, blue 8, do, through, shoe	52
wood	15*	21	put 15, would, woman	36

Other tricky vowels
stole	170	101	coal 37, roll, bowl, soul, control	101
go	50	60	blow 42, toe, though, cacao	60

out	74	23	brown	23

but	308	68	some 50, country 14, blood	68
pot	375	35	want 30, gone, cough	35


	1698 618	1390	total of quirky spellings to memorise	2008

* It can be seen that consonant doubling and the spellings for EE and OO sounds have so many exceptions that they really have no pattern. Learners simply have to memorise, word by word, when to double a consonant, how to spell the EE-sound and when to use or not to use oo. When the biggest number of common words using a particular spelling pattern is smaller than the total of words using alternative spellings, the spellings are all simply unpredictable.

The above patterns are all very difficult for learners because they all cause both reading and spelling problems, and because between them they account for nearly half of all English spelling difficulties, i.e. 2008 divergent spellings out of 4206 (which occur in 3700 words out of the 6800 most commonly used ones). - Some words, like 'quay', have more than one irregularity.

Nearly all English spelling patterns have some exceptions

The 11 most problematic patterns (consonant doubling, ea, e, u, o, o-e, oo, ou and ow) have been
summarised in table 2. Another 22 spelling patterns shown below make learning to spell English quite tricky
too because they also have fairly numerous exceptions and necessitate the individual memorising of 1665
spellings; but unlike the patterns listed in table 1, they rarely cause reading difficulties as well. Just a few,
like 'eight – height', impede reading progress too (R).

Table 3: 22 spelling patterns with 1668 unpredictable spellings between them.

13 Vowel patterns	occurrences	exceptions	Examples of exceptions with numbers of words for biggest subgroups
term*	70*	125	fur 65, fir 36, earn, work, were, journey R
better	340	136	visitor 75, grammar 34, harbour 18
			also similar: future 42, data 45
hasten*	73*	131	abandon 68, urban 34, certain

cake	338	108	main 90, weight 10, break R

fault*	39*	64	dawn 17, all 14, shawl 8, salt 10, nought

ordinary*	37*	55	battery 25, carpentry, luxury

bite	278	79	bright 18, cycle 26, kind 12, height R

for	188	62	more 22, your, door, oar-
			(in UK 13 more, e.g. saw)
care	31*	27	air 15, aerial, there, their

pertinent / pertinence	176	58	dominant / dominance

bit	421	53	system 45, pretty, women R

daddy	602	51	monkey 26, movie 8, taxi 12, coffee

due*	20*	22	few 19, view, menu
9 Consonant patterns (involving 5 sounds)
firm, if	580	43	photo 35, puff, rough, staff, laugh

gag	198	40	ghost, guess, guilt, league
gem*	20*	19	jet, jig

send	138	47	centre 18, city 18, science
fence, ancestor, agency	218	90	sense 35, base 21, consider, courtesy, embassy
fortress*	21*	40	basis 20, practice 17, promise

station	580	34	diversion 19, ocean, fashion
essential*	20*	15*	commercial 14, controversial
vicious*	20*	15	pretentious 12, luscious
	351*	1314	making a total of 1665 spellings to memorise

* Patterns in which the exceptions outweigh or nearly equal the number of words which obey it.

R Exceptional spellings which present some reading difficulties as well.

Table 4: 57 English spelling patterns have only 533 exceptions between them.

26 patterns with relatively few exceptions					31 patterns with minimal or no exceptions
v o w e l s c o n s o n a n t s	Pattern	N	other	Examples of other spellings	Pattern	N	other	Examples
	critical	195	33	towel 28, civil	cat	466	2	salmon, , plait
	amble	93	17	kernel, stencil	cart	138	4	*are, hear*t
	loveable	33	17	credible				Standard UK English
								88 more: ask bath..
	fly	17	14	**die ,high ,bye buy**	warm	17	1	*wore, (wor*n)
	decide	57	28	divide	blizzard	22	1	sheph*erd*
	induce	73	28	endure	now	11	3	bough,plough,thou
	tune	137	21	feud, jewel, nuclear	boil	29	1	oyster
	play	35	19	they, duvet ,weigh	boy	12	1	buoy

	K-sound				bib	784	-
	cat, cot, cut	1022	18	chaos11, karate,	chip	155	1	cello
	clap	192	10	chlorine	batch	23	3	much, rich, such
	comic	89	9	barrack, kayak	dad	1010	1	blonde
	kid, kept	124	7	chemistry	hand	237	4	who, whom, whose
	peek	36	5	unique, antique				whole
	milk	86	10	disc, monarch	jab, job, jug	78	-
	deck	62	6	spec, yak	urge	115	2	spinach
	queen	78	4	acquire, choir	agent	71	8	subject x 7
	taxi	98	14	accent, except				majestic
					leg, feel	1945	-
	mum	1128	17	bomb 9, autumn 6	well, will	43	-
					always	9	1	*all* right
	net, ten	2312	35	knee 15, gnome
					ring	40	1	merin*gue*
	rat,	1670	26	write 20, rhubarb	pop	1220	1	hiccough

	shush	162	12	chef, sure
					this	61	-
	mushroom*	5*	17	ancient, pressure,	thing	142	-
	(middle sh)			Machine, conscience
					van, drive	531	-
	tot	1398	16	dou*bt, tw*o	never	55	3	chivvy, navvy

	willow	216	33	when, white	you	31	5	uniform unite

	wise	91	22	blaze, size (in US 16 more	zip	14	1	xylophone
				e.g. advert*ize*)	buzz	2*	2	quiz, whiz
	absorb	94	16	citizen 16, possess
					vision	19	9	pleasure 7, azure
		22*	454			2*	55

* A pattern in which the exceptions outweigh the number of words which obey it.

Among the lesser spelling problems shown above, the spelling of of the K-sound is probably the most serious. It is governed by 9 different spelling rules, as well as the use of ck instead of a doubled consonant for marking a short vowel in a longer word (e.g. rocket). There are not many exceptions to the different rules, but they combine to confuse an already complex area.

mashabell@aol.com

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