There are at least 15 ways of spelling the speech sound ‘sh’

Different letters are used to represent identical speech sounds:
  • nation
  • ocean
  • sugar
  • special
  • Russia
  • passionate
  • expansion
  • liquorice
  • Schweppes
  • machine
  • ratio
  • crêche
  • conscience
  • unconscious
  • shhhhhhhhhh
Individuals may perceive ‘letter clusters’ differently, but spell words correctly because of ‘orthographic knowledge’ and visual memory / recall.		 The child or adult who knows

‘sh’

can spell

shed, ship, smash.

But without highly developed orthographic skills will write:

stayshun
oshun
shuger
speshal
etc