English spelling origin (OT?)

[Mark A Mandel]

On Thu, 12 Dec 2002, James E. Clapp wrote:

#My own problem in spelling "science" as a child was not with vowels
#but with the consonants.  I asked my grade-school teacher how to
#spell the word, and she told me to look it up in the dictionary.  I
#looked under "si..." and "ci..." and couldn't think of any other
#letter that makes an "s" sound, so I had to admit failure.  Then she
#tipped me off about the "sc".
#
#Thank goodness I never had to look up "schism"!

The one that drove me bonkers was "phthisic"!

-- Mark A. Mandel