Some people object to jeans with holes in them, but a lot more people object to bad spelling. Those who can’t spell, like the copywriter above, claim that English spelling is random and far too complicated to master. They emphasize all the hurdles to good spelling, pointing out that for most of the history of the language, English spelling was not standardized. There was no one right way to spell a word before 1400. Even when the rules were formulated, they seemed to have exceptions. Maybe it’s not so odd that one of the exceptions to the “i before e except after c” rule is the word weird? Add to the hurdle of spelling foreign words such as some fashionable ones borrowed from the French, like décor, chic, and beret. Then, all those English homophones, like the ones used incorrectly below, add even more confusion.

No bear feet allowed.

You can find some examples hear.

You are a site for sore eyes.

You probably know that the homophones in red should be "bare," "here," and "sight." On the other side of the spelling spectrum are the contestants in the Scripps National Spelling Bee who are “obsessed” with correct spelling. They are willing to memorize long lists of multisyllabic, rare words in order to excel. These devoted spellers have also discovered that the English language follows a spelling logic, and many words can be spelled by following a few rules. Click the video to watch a brief overview of these rules: “How to Learn the Basic Spelling Rules of English.” Watch as often as necessary so you can commit these patterns to memory.

Keeping the rules in mind, decide which of the following words are spelled correctly and drag them to the column labeled “Spelled Correctly.” The ones that don’t follow the patterns should be dragged to the column labeled “Misspelled.”

Knowing some of the important spelling rules makes writing and proofreading easier, but it’s only part of a strategy to help you submit writing assignments with every word spelled correctly. Another very valuable tool at your disposal is your spell checker. Use it whenever you type. While this resource is far from perfect, it can alert you to many spelling errors.

To ensure that you don’t continue to misspell the same words, create your own checklist. Include both challenging words and easily confused homophones such as weather/whether, two/too, it’s/ its, your/you’re, and their/they’re/there. Put this checklist in some easily accessible place on your desktop so you can add to it and check it as you write and proofread.

Finally, use a dictionary to find words not included in your spell-checking software and to confirm the spelling of words that you suspect are incorrect. You may want to add the words you look up to your checklist as well.

Remember that those of you who are new to proofreading shouldn’t try to read for spelling, capitalization, and punctuation all at the same time. It is far easier to concentrate on one kind of error at a time.