Remember learning “I before E except after C” in grade school? I recently came across a longer version of this little ditty that includes other exceptions. The poet bug in my veins fiddled with it some to make it rhyme better.

I before E

except after C

or when sounding like EYE

as in HEIDI and STEIN

or spoken like SAY

 as in NEIGHBOR and WEIGH

Most Americans were taught to memorize the first part of this poem. Our teachers probably thought  getting us to spell a few I-E words correctly was at least a start given the vagaries of English. Now, of course, students can just ask Siri or Alexa.

There are tons of exceptions to the I-E "rule", partly because English is so wonky, partly because our language is sprinkled with words from many other tongues. Here's an example to illustrate some of these exceptions, one that would totally frustrate ESL students.

The heinous foreigners cried heigh-ho as they seized their meister’s sleigh and eight feisty reindeer.

Want a little refresher spelling test? Insert the letters E and I in the correct order in the following words. Have fun! 😊 

1.    s - - z e

2.    n - - t h e r

3.    r e c - - v e

4.    h - - g h t

5.    f r - - n d

6.    b r - - f

7.    d e c - - v e

8.    l - - s u r e

9.    m I s c h - - f

10.  w - - g h t

11.  - - g h t

12.  r e c - - p t

13.  s l - - g h t

14.  f r - - g h t

15. t h - - r

16.  n - - g h b o r

17.  c - - l I n g

18.  s h r - - k

19.  r - - g n

20.  p - - c e