— name that word-tune — every word hides a melody; your ears are the decoder.
Every letter of the alphabet sits on a rung of a pentatonic ladder (the five-note scale G·A·B·D·E, repeating and climbing across two-plus octaves). a hums on the lowest rung, z twinkles near the top. A word is played by sounding its letters left to right, one note each, on a steady beat — so the same word always sings the same tune, forever. Deterministic. No dice. Learn the ladder and you can literally hear spelling.
HEAR IT: a mystery word's tune plays — name the word. SEE IT: a word is shown — pick its melody's shape from three contour cards (peeking at a card's sound costs points: the dreaded hint tax). PHRASE PRACTICE: famous little phrases play as tunes — tap their words back in order. Miss a question and the show plays the true tune for you: every miss teaches.