By Rebecca Flood
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A bizarre "brain break" showing all the different ways to convey the word "empty" has gone viral online, baffling and amazing viewers in equal measure.
A teacher posted a clip from their classroom, revealing that one of their students decided to lead a segment and shared a real head-scratcher.
Posting under The Christian Teacher on TikTok, the educator, who calls themselves "Just your friendly neighborhood Christian Academy Teacher," said: "Kids were blown away by our student lead brain break."
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The video shows a student has written the word "empty" inside a rectangle. They gesture to the word and the class reads it out loud.
The student then removes the "e" and the class reads it again—and it still sounds the same as "empty." Next the "p" is rubbed off, but the remaining letters are still pronounced "empty."
The student removes the letter "y," yet the "m" and the "t" make exactly the same sound—the word "empty."
Finally they remove all the letters, revealing a blank box. The students go wild as they once again shout "empty."
The video, which can be seen here, has been watched more than 10 million times since being shared on Friday, with thousands of people leaving comments to share their own wonderment.
Narxfang wrote: "Low key genius."
Ashley Wagner commented: "Doing this at the next party I go to."
Bri thought: "I was just as amazed as they were the entire time."
"I think we all learned something today," Karah West reckoned.
Nada pointed out: "And that's why the English language is one of the hardest to learn."
To which The Christian Teacher replied: "Yes!" They also added they "didn't think this would go viral."
An article on the website of Oxford Royale Academy, a summer school in the U.K., echoes Nada's point about learning English.
It states: "One of the hardest things about English is that although there are rules, there are lots of exceptions to those rules—so just when you think you've got to grips with a rule, something comes along to shatter what you thought you knew by contradicting it.
"As if the spelling wasn't hard enough, English pronunciation is the cause of much confusion among those trying to learn English. Some words are very low on vowels, such as the word 'strengths,' which is hard to say when you're not accustomed to English pronunciation."
Newsweek has reached out to The Christian Teacher for comment.
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Update 11/17/21, 6:05 a.m. ET: This article was updated to change the photo.
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