English spelling is broken. There are (1)____________ (COUNT) examples, such as comb, bomb, and tomb, or height and weight. The English Spelling Society exists to repair our broken spelling. The Society is working on a way to (2)_____________ (SIMPLE) current English spelling in order to improve access to (3)_______________ (LITERATE).
Why English spelling is (4)_______________ (EXCEPTION) (5)____________ (REGULAR)
English as a language is (6)______________ (RELATIVE) simple to learn. But its spelling system is (7)______________ (POSSIBLE) the most irregular of those based on an alphabet. Not only is it hard to predict the spelling from the pronunciation, but it is not always possible to predict the pronunciation from the spelling, for example thorough.
English words derive (8)_____________ (MAIN) from old German and Norman French, and its alphabet of 26 letters makes it (9)________________ (POSSIBLE) to represent each of its 46 speech sounds with just one symbol. But that is not the only reason why many English spellings are irregular. In other languages, as pronunciation changed, the spelling changed too. However, in spite of the many ways in which English pronunciation has evolved over the centuries, words have often maintained their original spelling, which reflects the original pronunciation, but not how many words are pronounced today. For example, blood /blʌd/ used to be pronounced to rhyme with good /ɡʊd/.
The (10)_____________ (ECONOMY) and social costs of English spelling
Children in English-speaking countries take almost twice as long to learn to read and write compared to children in other countries. A (11)___________ (LONG) time needed for learning to read and write means less time for other subjects.
There has been much expensive research into how to teach reading and writing in Anglophone countries, but there is no standard method, and much (12)_______________ (AGREE), about how best to teach English literacy.
Education is the (13)____________ (PROVE) best way to prevent (14)____________ (CRIME) from (15)____________ (OFFEND). In countries where the literacy rates of (16)____________ (PRISON) are (17)____________ (GENERAL) higher, improving their education while behind bars is also much easier. The poor literacy skills of many English-speaking (18)_____________ (OFFEND) make this more difficult, and repeated returns to jail more likely.
1. countless
2. simplify
3. literacy
4. exceptionally
5. irregular
6. relatively
7. possibly
8. mainly
9. impossible
10. economic
11. longer
12. disagreement
13. proven
14. criminals
15. reoffending
16. prisoners
17. generally
18. offenders
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