STORY: Why is English so hard to spell? There are clear differences between how words are written and how they are said. If English is your first language you may not realize it’s not that normal. In ...

Tear in eye your dress you’ll tear. So shall I! Oh, hear my prayer, Pray, console your loving poet, Make my coat look new, dear, sew it? Just compare heart, beard and heard, Dies and diet, lord and ...

There are about a million words in the English language, but do you know the longest word in English? You may think it’s antidisestablishmentarianism, at 28 letters ...

Spelling lists. Spelling tests. Spelling bees. Adults of a certain age who remember anything about elementary school likely recall spelling as central to their literacy instruction. That’s not ...

English is a bit of a pickpocket. According to some estimates, nearly 80 percent of it consists of foreign loanwords — terms that have been borrowed from other languages. This hodgepodge of influences ...

And should you blame not your study skills, but the language itself? The news release was ludicrous: A group called The Spelling Society wanted us to know it was hanging out outside the Scripps ...

Consistently poor spelling can indicate that a child has dyslexia or another related learning challenge. If that's masked by ...

Could spelling reform help English literacy rates? Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by Frankieleon/Flickr. Listen to Episode 235 of Slate’s The Gist: Subscribe in iTunes ∙ RSS feed ∙ Download ∙ Play ...

School board members, superintendents, curriculum supervisors, and principals don’t seem to understand twenty-first century revelations from cognitive psychology and neuroscience on the importance of ...

For many Americans, spelling bees are a part of growing up in the United States. The challenge is obvious. From the moment kids begin to learn to read, there are clear differences between how words ...