Spanish and English teachers seem to love spelling tests. Don't take them too seriously.

Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae.

The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by itslef but the wrod as a wlohe.

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If you can read English well, you probably had no problem reading the previous paragraph. Amazing, yes?

That turns every English department upside down. So we don’t have to know how to spell every word in the dictionary.

Death to the Spelling Test!

It turns out that once you learn to read a language well, you look at the whole word, not the letters. This is why you can still understand words with terrible spelling.

You can have a lot of fun with this (and drive your Spanish teacher nuts at the same time) by making your own crazy-spelled words and then show them to your teacher, the next time he or she wants you to take a spelling test.

That doesn’t mean that spelling is completely unimportant though!  Standard spelling is indeed useful for some things.

From the very beginning, young students are drilled in reading, writing, and spelling in any language -- even Spanish.

Language Learning Has to Start Somewhere

It’s all about basic spelling. So when studying Spanish, for instance, be sure you sound out your words, especially when it comes to reading and writing.

But once you pass that ‘first’ stage, don’t get discouraged when you can’t remember how to spell ‘lamentablemente’ (a major mouthful). It matters more that you understand the word. That is ultimately what language learning is all about: understanding.

So Is Sleplling Improtent?

For beginners, yes. For intermediate users, not so much.

Mark Twain once said, “It’s a very small mind that can only think of one way to spell a word.”

It is, however, improtant to udnerstnad taht there’s so mcuh mroe we can lrean aobut raednig and lnagauge laernnig….

So be prepared.

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Spelling Doesn’t Matter When Learning a Language
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