Kathryn’s 5-year-old
developed a strong interest in spelling once she learned to spell STOP. After that, she tried to figure out her own words. From the back seat of the car she’d ask, “Mom, what does FGRPL spell?”
“Nothing,” Kathryn said.
Sitting at breakfast she’d suddenly ask, “Mom, what does DOEB spell?”
“Nothing,” Kathryn answered.
This went on for several weeks. Then one afternoon as they sat coloring in her room she asked, “Mom, what does LMDZ spell?”
Kathryn smiled at her and said, “Nothing, sweetheart.”
The 5-year-old carefully set down her crayon, sighed and said, “Boy, there sure are a lot of ways to spell ‘nothing’!”
After a number of attempts to get the customer service agent on the phone to understand his name,
my Asian American friend Appappa decided to spell it out.
“A for apple,” he began. “P for pineapple, p for pineapple, a for apple, p for pineapple, p for—”
The flustered agent interrupted.
“I have a better idea,” she said. “Just tell me how many apples and how many pineapples.”
Little Johnny wasn’t a very good at speller.
One day, during a spelling exam, the teacher wrote the word “new” on the blackboard.
“Now,” she asked Johnny, “what word would we have if we placed a “K” in the front?”
After thinking a few seconds, Johnny said, “Canoe?”
A sixth grade class is doing some spelling drills.
The teacher asks Tommy if he can spell ‘before.’ He stands up and says, “Before, B-E-P-H-O-R.”
The teacher says, “No, that’s wrong. Can anyone else spell before?”
Another little boy stands up and says, “Before, B-E-F-O-O-R.”
Again the teacher says, “No, that’s wrong.” The teacher asks, “Little Johnny, can you spell ‘before’?”
Little Johnny stands up and says, “Before, B-E-F-O-R-E.”
“Excellent Johnny, now can you use it in a sentence?”
Little Johnny says, “That’s easy. Two plus two be fore.”
