Thread: Help with spelling

Do you guys have any system, or something like that to learn how to spell words in Russian? I'm having a major problems with "diktanty", yet I simply cannot figure out a better way to prepare for them. Any tips, please?

Really lame cop-out answer, but I was recently sent a program called "Professor Higgins" from a friend in Russia -- it has a whole section of dictation. I don't know if you have anybody that can obtain this or a similar program for you?

thanks for the reply, but not only I don't have anyone who could send that programme to me, but even if I did, I'd probably have to sell my kidney (or both of them, actually) to pay for it
but thanks anyway, 'tis greatly appreciated

Once you learn the rules of spelling you can apply it to each word.

Have you tried Interlex? If you set it to the quiz mode after you set up a glossary of words you find hard, you can test yourself, it presents the word in a loop until you can spell it.

so there actually ARE the rules concering my very favourite aspect of Russian ortography, that is unstressed "o"??? Please do tell, please do! That's the thing that makes me go out of mind.

I'm gonna have to try out the interlex thing, thank you very much

Hey, there are no rules actually about unstressed "o", until it becomes stressed in another case or you can think of a word with the same root where this "o" is under stress. Sorry man

As for tips - read more, and while reading try to feel that by choosing "o" or "a" we Russians want to say something. When I was a little kid, I used to think that when a word I saw or heard was spellt with "o" (документ) it added something solemn to it

My tip is not very easy. It worked for me when I was a child. You can attract your attention to the ways all your difficult words are pronounced. There is a certain but slight difference between [a] proper and unstressed "o". Just mark out the differences as you hear them and try to listen for them in speech. Maybe the tip is for a good ear but I think it's worth following.

There's absolutely no difference between unstressed "o" and "a" when it comes to "european" Russian, I mean Russian that's spoken in
Russia's European part. This way of prononciation is considered most proper, though in some other areas people do pronounce "o" more like "o" and not like "a".

Ah, shame there's no rule I used to always do it by comparison with my native langauge, but then realized I was getting mixed up wether the particular word was LIKE in my language, or the other way round

Let's say I'm writing a dictant, and there comes a word which I have no idea how to spell concering the o's and a's, what's biggest possiblity then? I mean, if I can't count on my knowledge, then perhaps for luck

Rtyom, thanks, I'm gonna have to give it a try next time I'm watching RTR