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Monday, September 23, 2019

Pow Gasol and OW and AU-AW English spelling frequencies




Can you read the poster on the left?

Who can't deny that Pau Gasol was the POW =  Player of the week in NBA jargon.

The nick name is Pow Gasol, Power Gasol, Pow in short.

The other partner in spelling is OU, as in house, mouse, sound, 
pronounce, announce, 
sound as in profound, ground,  
ADD: 6 others




If the onomatopeic spelling clearly offers the sound of the word, ...how would you pronounce WOW! 
(meaning exclamative surprise: What a wonderful thing!)

ou-ow -1 /au/ ow, town, power
TOWN + down, brown, town, 
HOW, now, cow, cowboy, clown, 
FLOWER +vowel, towel, tower, flower, power, 
crowded, powder,


au-aw /o:/  pause and law, audio and awful  
Very regular indeed. Here is the list.
 draw, drawer, awe, lawyer,  …
August, Laurie, autumn, cause, sauna, author, auxiliar, auto-, saurus, …
(names) Laura, Paula, Claudia, Paul, Paula, .. Austria, Australia,



Obviously, there are some irregularities with stressed syllables. Here you have a challenge:  Can you collect another 4?

With OW: (adjectives) slow, low, (verbs +nouns) show, snow, know, growWith AW:  aunt, laugh, ...... , but not many.

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