We remember it fondly from our elementary school days: if you can’t recall how to spell a word, sound it out! As adults, we might follow the same tactic when trying to rack our brains to produce that one word we know how to spell, but can’t piece together the correct letters.
However, sounding out words in print instead of in conversation could lead to the right word being written, but maybe not the right meaning for the word. For example, “I’m going to take the plain” is not the correct spelling of the word needed: this form means traversing a flat piece of land (plain) instead of boarding a mode of transportation (plane).
Below are several commonly misspelled words that you may not realize had different forms of spelling. Be careful to use these words as they could change how your sentence is read!
I see so many of those misuses. Most often, it is on social media sites. After being called a “grammar nazi” a few times, I learned to overlook the mistakes.
Thank you alot. Now i have to be more careful with use of words and their meaning.
Hi Blair,
Thanks for this refreshing teaching. It took me down the memory lane to these overlooked simple words and their meaning.
Thank you, This is interesting.
Thank you for your comments and it is amazing how words can be the same in sound but different in meaning and spelling. I enjoyed putting together this blog post for everyone and glad you all benefitted from learning these words as I did. Thank you and God Bless.
Thanks for the list – I once remember reading something in a computer magazine where every word in the paragraph had been chosen to pass a spell checker but fail a correct usage test. It’s probably somewhere on the web but not somewhere I’ve been able to find it.
Of course, what’s correct in one version of English isn’t always correct in another: full stop versus period, that kind of thing.
Don’t get me started on defiantly being used instead of definitely!
We are glad you enjoyed the list of words and agree that there are different versions of words for different languages. It’s an adventure every time in writing. Thanks for reading and God Bless.