The Foundation of writing

“There’s no substitute for knowing how to spell correctly on your own (Steimle 102).”

Well said.

I recently came across the above quote in Josh Steimle’s book 60 Days to LinkedIn Mastery and was pleasantly surprised when I did because I have had countless discussions with people about the importance of humans knowing how to spell correctly. When you don’t have strong spelling skills, you (and oftentimes spell-check) don’t know if a “correctly” spelled word is misspelled in your sentence (e.g., adverse vs. averse, all ready vs. already, canvas vs. canvass, discreet vs. discrete, disburse vs. disperse, every day vs. everyday, let’s vs. lets, lightening vs. lightning, naval vs. navel, stationary vs. stationery, etc.).

Reading that a Wall Street Journal and USA Today bestselling author shares my belief in the importance of humans having strong spelling skills was validating. As Steimle stated, “When you spell incorrectly, people assume you lack command of your language, are inattentive to detail, and may be incompetent in areas other than spelling (Steimle 102),” which is how he feels when he comes across spelling (and grammar errors) in people’s LinkedIn profiles.

Although developing strong spelling skills is a tedious and sometimes arduous process, it is a process that I don’t bypass with my students because spelling is the foundation of writing, and nothing spectacular or long-standing can be built on a weak foundation.

~ Christina Caputo

Founder & Owner of ★ W O R D S