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Practice sentence for the USCIS writing test: 'Washington is the capital of the United States.' Which word below is most commonly misspelled?

Reviewed by Jordan Morley, Editorial Lead at 247SimpleTests. Written by the 247SimpleTests Editorial Team from the official source material cited on every question.

Correct answer

Capital / Capitol — applicants frequently confuse 'capital' (the city that is the seat of government) with 'Capitol' (the building where Congress meets); Washington, D.C. is the capital city

  1. A Capital / Capitol — applicants frequently confuse 'capital' (the city that is the seat of government) with 'Capitol' (the building where Congress meets); Washington, D.C. is the capital city
  2. B The
  3. C United
  4. D States

Why this is the answer

CAPITAL vs CAPITOL: CAPITAL (with an A) = the city that is the seat of government: 'Washington, D.C. is the capital of the United States'; CAPITOL (with an O) = the specific building where the US Congress meets: 'Congress meets at the Capitol building.' Memory trick: The CAPITOL building has a DOME — both have an O. The USCIS writing test may dictate either — know both spellings. Common writing test sentences: 'Washington is the capital of the United States'; 'Congress meets in the Capitol'; 'The President lives in Washington.'
Source: USCIS Citizenship Writing Test — Capital vs Capitol

Practice more questions

This question is from our US Citizenship Test Practice practice test. Take the full practice test to test your knowledge across all Writing Test Sentences and other topics.

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About this topic: Writing Test Sentences

In the writing test the officer reads a sentence aloud and you must write it so that it has the same meaning; spelling, capitalisation and punctuation errors are tolerated unless they change the meaning. The words come only from the official USCIS writing vocabulary list. This is one of 25 Writing Vocabulary questions on writing test sentences, each with a full explanation on a single study page.

New to this exam? Our Citizenship exam guide explains the format, scoring, and how to prepare.

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