Myth 5 English spelling is kattastrofik

If you know how an English word is pronounced and the rough meaning of the word, you should also be able to spell it. If you can’t, don't condemn the English spelling system, you should to figure out how the system works. 

How the alphabet copes.
There’s an ongoing myth that there are only five vowels, that is not true. There are about twenty vowels in the English language. It has to do with the many different vowel sounds. There are several consonant sounds that can also be written in different ways, for example the letter /k/ which has many different spellings: chemist, catch, back, acclaim, key, quay and many more.

Keeping a spelling constant

Some words are made up of several recognizable building blocks, un+reason+able+ness a great example. Recognising these blocks helps keeping the spelling constant.

Look-alike and sound-alikes
You have Words that are spelled differently but pronounced the same (homophones and words that are spelled the same way but pronounced differently (homographs). You also have words with the same spelling and pronunciation, but have a different meaning, those are homonyms.

 

Even native speakers of a language sometimes have trouble with spelling. The best you can do is keep practising and try learning the rules. Reading a lot can help, not only with expanding your vocabulary, but also with learning how certain words are spelled.