Generic list of homonyms
Replace with personal pitfalls list

Most people (including me) have a list of homonyms that they regularly mix up. They aren't hard spelling words. Most are common words of fewer than five letters.

Homonym confusion is not a true grammar error. However, since the remedies for homonym errors are similar to those for many true written grammar errors, this thread seems a good spot to discuss homonym issues.

Homonyms are words that:

• Share a common spelling but have different meanings. (They may be pronounced differently as well.) OR

• Share a common pronunciation but have different spellings.

Believe it or not, homonym is a non-technical term. Linguists might even say it's a sloppy term.

Precise terms

To be precise, words that sound alike but have different spellings are homophones. Bear and bare are examples of homophones.

To purists, words that are spelled the same way but have different meanings are homographs. Bow and bow are examples of homographs.

Whatever you call them — homonyms, homophones, homographs or spelling demons — they spell trouble for unwary writers.

Errors I see often

Below are sets of words I see confused in student writing most often. There's nothing significant about the order of items on my list of homonyms. I scribble notes about student problems as I grade papers. These just happen to be notes I didn't lose.

• its, it's.

• there, their, they're

• your, you're

• then, than (not homonyms, but regularly confused)

• to, too, two

• for, four, fore

• bear, bare

• for, four, fore

• whose, who's

• lose, loose

• male, mail

• main, mane

• ring, wring

• medal, metal, meddle

• right, rite, write

• wait, weight

• break, brake

• steal, steel

• scene, seen

• cite, sight, site

• peak, peek, pique

• sail, sale

• sole, soul

• war, wore

• wear, ware

• which, witch

• weather, whether

• waste, waist

• tea, tee, T

• die, dye

• wet, whet

Using a generic homonym list

If you don't have time to do a thorough assessment of the mechanical skills of entering students (few of us do), pick a few sets of terms from this generic list of homonyms to use on your "counts off" list. In every class, there are a few students who confuse its and it's or bear and bare.

If you want students to eliminate their errors, I recommend you limit your search-and-destroy effort to no more than five sets of confused words a semester.

If students are slow or really hate writing, make that five sets a year. It is much better for learning and for motivation if students see they mastered some writing component, however small, before year's end.

If Josh masters in seventh grade just the top three sets of terms on my list of homonyms, he'll be doing better than most of my college students.

A better option: IEPs

If you have the same students for more than six weeks, forget the generic list. Instead, require students to compile a list of words they confuse in their own writing.

Where do they get the list? from the errors you flag in their work. Notice I said flag. As the teacher you flag errors in student work by circling, highlighting, or some other attention-getting trick. You make students do any correcting that's needed.

Have students work at eliminating errors in those word choices by the end of the semester or year. Also astound your supervisor by saying you have individual educational plans for each of your students.

Using this option is a bit of a nuisance:

• It involves individualizing instruction.

• It requires some initial bookkeeping on your part.

• It may require your hounding students to get them to track their errors initially.

However, in my experience, the effort pays big dividends.

Having students work to eliminate their personal spelling errors is the only strategy that even comes close to eliminating homonym errors in student writing.

Students can use a computer to help them eliminate errors on their personal list of homonyms. Many of my writing-haters enjoy computer work, so editing on computer is a good option for them.