This post is something of a companion piece to yesterday’s.
Up until early February 2008, I never gave much thought to the spelling of the word practice. Or practise, for that matter. What happened then, in the last depths of winter, to change that?
I wrote my lesson plan for my first teaching practice on my teacher-training course, that’s what happened. Somewhere within that incredibly detailed plan, I wrote something along the lines of Students practice using the target language.
I spent most of the evening working on the plan, detailing in at-times minute detail what I would do in the 30 minutes I would have to teach. The next afternoon I taught for the first time in my life, and was happy with how it went, and the feedback I got from my observer. Part of his role was to critique the lesson plan, and after relaxing for a while, I decided to have a quick look at it. There weren’t too many notes on it, but I did notice a little red circle around part of a word. Why, that could only be a spelling error!, I thought, must have been a typo. But I looked, and notice that it was the second c in practice that was circled. So I suppose I should have used an s, I said to myself, but it doesn’t matter which you use, does it? I immediately went to the library to check a dictionary, and saw that practice was specified to be a noun. Now knowing what I’d find, I looked down to practise, and saw that it was the verb form.
Aha!, so that’s it, I thought. And I’ve never got confused between the two since (learning from your mistakes is incredibly effective).
NB. If you’re American, feel free to entirely disregard the above, as practice is generally used as the spelling for the noun and the verb in American English.
Would you like to know one simple trick to help you remember which spelling to use? Well then, let me ADVISE you. Are you ready? because here comes the ADVICE…
Do you see?…
It’s the same principle as the difference between advice (noun) and advise (verb). Because they have different sounds (/s/ in advice, and /z/ in advise), we don’t tend to mix them up so often. So if you’re not sure which spelling to use, think of advice/advise. This also applies to licence/license, but you’re probably not going to use them as often as practice/practise.
English-Language Thoughts 
Wow I was never taught to use Practise…a degree in english creative writing education….and I no one ever corrected my spelling. 😉
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Me neither, and it seems like such an obvious, practical thing to teach! I think it’s never become enough of an issue to be pointed out a lot because your meaning is still clear even if the spelling’s wrong.
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[…] of course there are others like advice/advise, practise/practice, and loose/lose, but you know all about those already […]
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I LOVE the final tip!
I never knew this. At least, I don’t think I was taught this.
But now I know, I will have to practice (that was autospelled)
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Me neither, and I don’t think a lot of teachers know it. Nor autocorrect either!
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Wow I can’t believe I didn’t know this! 🙈 shows what you take for granted about your own language. Thanks for the tip!
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My pleasure! Just be prepared to get annoyed now every time you see someone get it wrong 😊.
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Interesting, as always! I’m having a wee bit of trouble grasping the concept as I am American, though I have been known to use UK English spellings of words before (honour/glamour instead of honor/glamor). What gets me the most questions is the way I pronounce “leverage” – “LEE-verage” as opposed to “LEHV-erage”. No clue why I do it, but I always have!
Ah, linguistics. So fascinating!
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That could be from the British English pronunciation of “lever,” which is like “leever,” though “leverage” is still the same :).
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Thanks for making that clear 🙂
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My pleasure, even for native English speakers it’s very confusing :).
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Canadian here and we are often all over the page on American vs English spelling and words. Sigh. Blame Microsoft. I use practice for both noun and verb from where I am sitting.
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I did the same for a long time, and most people don’t even consider that there’s a difference between the two spellings, so I wouldn’t be too concerned about it.
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Well there you go. All the English and writing classes that I have taken, and I never knew this. Once again, I learn. Thanks!
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My pleasure! I’m just glad I learned shortly before becoming an English teacher 😊.
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[…] wasn’t being consistent. Please feel free to go back there and find examples of me not practising what I’m preaching […]
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