Spelling.School · How to spell

How to spell direction

hear itdi·rec·tion/dɪ'rɛkʃən/nounSilent and tricky

What it means: The way or course something moves or points.

In a sentence: The map shows us the right direction to the park.

The part people get wrong

Watch for an unstressed vowel that is hard to hear. Often misspelled as deriction or dirrection.

How learners on Spelling.School have misspelled it: zzz

Same family: directly, directional, director, redirect, indirect. If you can spell one, the shared part carries to the others.

Where it comes from: “Direction” comes from Latin *directio*, from *dirigere* meaning “to set straight” or “to guide.” Over time, the word shifted from the idea of ‘making straight’ to guiding someone’s course, whether on a map or in life.

Patterns it uses: The unstressed vowel (schwa) · -tion, -sion or -cian?

Try spelling it

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