# Challenges for Writers



## curtis (Apr 5, 2016)

For me, a big challenge is utilizing words that sound alike but have different meanings. When done correctly, homonyms can be very good. When used incorrectly, they can be terrible.


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## PrinzeCharming (Apr 5, 2016)

*Good morning Curtis, 
*
It's 5 in the morning. I went to bed early from exhaustion last night. Thanks for opening up a brand new discussion. You're talking about homographs and homophones. I have included a list below to display all the tricky *homographs*. Can you spot any of them that give you a hard time? 


*Tricky Homographs
*

Homographs are the same (homo) written (graph) word. 









*Homonyms (also called homophones)


*Homophones have the same (homo) sound (phone). 
















*Dye vs. Die
*

So, in the following example, I would rather _*dye *_my hair than watch it *die*.


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## Reichelina (Apr 5, 2016)

PrinzeCharming said:


> *Good morning Curtis,
> *
> It's 5 in the morning. I went to bed early from exhaustion last night. Thanks for opening up a brand new discussion. You're talking about homographs. I have included a list below to display all the tricky homographs. Can you spot any of them that give you a hard time?
> 
> ...



Thank you Anthony. I love the pictures.


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## PrinzeCharming (Apr 5, 2016)

Reichelina said:


> Thank you Anthony. I love the pictures.
> You're unbelievable. LOL.




You know you don't have to quote the pictures, right? It takes so much space! No, not OUTER SPACE! I said OUTER, not OTTER!  See what I did there? 



*Today's ESL Struggles


*During my undergraduate years, I volunteered as a Conversation Partner for the University of Connecticut American English Language Institute (UCAELI). This is where my passion came through to help (university) students engage in English as a second language. After graduation, I became a substitute teacher through a temp agency. The East Hartford Board of Education (same school district I attended from 1995, 2004 - 08') hired me directly as a Bilingual Tutor. One of my students prompted a question about this same challenge. Below are the following words he addressed to me. 


*Bar
Bare
Bear 
Beer
Beard
Bread
Bored
Bra *

The other day in retail, I explained the same situation when a customer was looking for bread. He said he has also experienced this when he was at a campsite. He explained to the guide his concerns for the local bears. Well, it turned out like the following example. 


"What about the _bears_?"

The guide heard, "What about the _beers_?"


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## LeX_Domina (Apr 5, 2016)

Oh yes,I have been deceived by homophones before.As a child I struggled with them becaus eI was over-analyzing.Now,It's habbit at times to write the wrong one,thus leaving me to have to make sure I check well after I write.


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## bazz cargo (Apr 5, 2016)

I love a good pun. Some word play is addictive. "Nice buns," he said to the baker.


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## Blue (Apr 5, 2016)

^ Ha, good one. 
I haven't actually given this much thought, interesting though. I forgot how many there were.


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## Book Cook (Apr 6, 2016)

Most of them are pretty short. How about:

president - precedent (though it depends on how you pronounce the second word)


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## Phil Istine (Apr 6, 2016)

Down memory lane:  When I was about eight years old, there was a spelling test in the classroom.  I always got 10/10.  One day, I only received 9/10.  The required word was 'throne'.  I wrote 'thrown'.  No context was given.  Apparently, some of the words used to be stuck around the classroom windows for several days before the tests.  I didn't notice because I was always busy doing other work - and I knew my spelling was fine even at that age.
So, thank you Mr. Jackman for scarring an eight-year old for life  .


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## PrinzeCharming (Apr 6, 2016)

Phil Istine said:


> Down memory lane:  When I was about eight years old, there was a spelling test in the classroom.  I always got 10/10.  One day, I only received 9/10.  The required word was 'throne'.  I wrote 'thrown'.  No context was given.  Apparently, some of the words used to be stuck around the classroom windows for several days before the tests.  I didn't notice because I was always busy doing other work - and I knew my spelling was fine even at that age.
> So, thank you Mr. Jackman for scarring an eight-year old for life  .



As a long-term substitute teacher teaching ESL students, I didn't want to be _that _guy butchering their grades. If I can sense the proper pronunciation, I'll give them some points. In reality, if they're trying to explain something and I can understand what they're saying, they will go far. If the word is illegible, there's no reason to give them credit for it. So, you would have probably received 9.5/10. However, there's the discussion, "Well, you should have known better! Don't you practice writing them and using them in sentences?"


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## bdcharles (Apr 6, 2016)

PrinzeCharming said:


> "What about the _bears_?"
> 
> The guide heard, "What about the _beers_?"




A friend of mine told me about when she was learning to canoe. The instructor was an Australian and at some point said what my friend heard as "lift! lift!" She duly raised her paddle only to plough into some submerged hazard the could have avoided by going to the, that's right, to the _left._

Ah, language. Why do you vex me so? 



PrinzeCharming said:


> Homophones have the same (homo) sound (phone).



This would have done my head in at school. I would have obsessed over the fact that the homophones for _night _and _meet _are listed as being the same (they're not of course) and that bury/berry and do/dew are not always true homophones (that's the case in some variants of English but not all). Not knowing the effect even a few words of comic sans can have on an educator's brain, I would have suspected the problem was me!

Well played, comic sans inventor. Well played


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## midnightpoet (Apr 6, 2016)

*Bear right, there's a bear; I couldn't bear to bear arms.*:-D


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## Ultraroel (Apr 8, 2016)

It's funny how I never had any issues with this at all. 
Not a native English speaker, but vocabulary should prevent the wrong usage.

The last mistake I made like that was at work 2 weeks ago when I was tired and I wrote an email in which something was not "Aloud".
and my quality manager did not even notice.

Ofc the customer didn't get it.


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