If you’re trying to teach someone how to spell, the “old saying” of “I before E except after C” shouldn’t even come into play. For some reason, this phrase came to my mind today. Perhaps it’s because I’ve been working this week with a half dozen people from all over the world — for some of them, English isn’t their second language, it’s their (speaking of the rule) third or fourth.
This Wikipedia entry helps explain this crazy “rule” a little bit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_before_E_except_after_C.
