Math is deemed the crazy one with problems we don’t understand. Ever tried to solve this?

A bus had some people on it.

23 people got off the bus.

14 people got on the bus.

There are now 67 people riding the bus.

How many people were on the bus at 9:00 am?

Tricky, right? Yet the truth is our language has to be one of the world’s worst math story problems. Check this out.

Or how about this?

The truth is our language is hard.

How 26 letters can make 44 sounds doesn’t seem mathematical possible. Then let’s add in the fact, 1 letter…cough…cough c doesn’t even make its own sound and 2 more…q and x just combine two other letters sounds. So it change the problem to 23 letters making 44 sounds. I don’t know how to explain this mathematically.

But here’s what I do know. Our language is hard as it truly is a mix of this and that from several languages across hundreds of years.

However, it is possible to make sense of all these letters and sounds.

Most importantly, we can’t let the facts of our language stop us because we have students who need us to navigate the tricky stuff for them and then teach it in a way that is practical.

So maybe you aren’t a self-declared word nerd like myself. That’s why I’m here to navigate this all for you to help you teach your students.

So let’s start with this: I made a chart that breaks down our 44 sounds and their different spellings just for you.