how to improve spelling

Pre-College Topics High School Life
1

I’m part of a competitive club and will be competing this Saturday. 12.5% of my test is spelling and I’m not great at that. The spelling questions are really difficult. Here’s a few examples:

a. Quicksotic
b. Quixotic
c. Quicsotic
d. Quiccotic
e. Quixcotic

a. Rapscallion
b. Rapscalion
c. Rapscaleon
d. Repscalion
e. Repscallion

a. Buckmensterfullerine
b. Buckminsterfullarine
c. Buckministerfulerine
d. Buckmisterfullerine
e. Buckminsterfullerene

To make the varsity team, I have to score really well on my test, and there’s a lot of competition in the event that I chose because all the other ones are dominated by upperclassmen, and I’m just a sophomore.

This means that I should be getting majority of the spelling questions right, but as you can see, they’re REALLY hard. If you have any tips for choosing the correctly-spelled word, please help! I’m sure the majority of people don’t know what those words mean, but perhaps there are a few tips and tricks to more accurately guess the right spelling.

I know I could do a Google Search, and I’m going to do that right now, but the CC community might be able to help a little bit more too.

Thank you :slight_smile:

2

Do you have a list of specific words to study? I don’t think there are any tricks to learning an odd set of words like you have listed. Make flashcards and type some of the words into a spelling bee app for your phone.

3

It is good to know where the words come from:

Quixotic comes from Don Quixote.

Buckminsterfullerene comes from Buckminster Fuller, the architect.
You would pick ene vs ine because ene is a chemistry suffix.
You woudl pick fuller vs. fuler because if you have a short vowel, then typically you have a double consonant after it. Bat, Batter.

a. Rapscallion
If you know how to pronounce it, then you would pick this one. Rap vs Rep
if you have a short vowel, then typically you have a double consonant after it. so scallion vs scalion.