Barely means only just. So if you can 'barely' spell your name, it would mean you can spell your name but only just. Glad to be of assistance.
and i'm here to tell you that you either can or can't spell your own name. How can you only just spell something? Although you'll understand one day.
Unfortunately I agree with this guy. A remember one girl who did struggle to spell her name. So I would class this as "barely"
barely/ˈbe(ərlē/ Adverb: Only just; almost not: "he could barely spell his own name"; "a barely perceptible pause".
.. point proven ... suspect there will now be a 'deafening silence' from a couple of ours - which is, of course, a fine example of an oxymoron - now whilst this is no doubt useful teaching material for Charlie and the other 'teachers' on the board, I think we should move on ..... now who had that mermaid DVD last?
I let Fallen borrow the mermaid DVD, in the hope that it would keep him out of public toilets for a while.
But she could spell it? In that case she can spell her name. I can't see where there could be any middle ground. You either can or can't. If you spell it wrong, then you can't. If you spell it right, then you can. Fairly straightforward.
If that was right there would be no need for the word "barely" in the English language (apart from possibly referring to nakedness). So come on, admit you're wrong, let it go, and watch the mermaid DVD.
Look at the definition. It is "almost not" If somebody struggles to spell their name, comes out with an few wrong letters but then retracts them. Then in the end gets it right then I would say that was "almost not" and therefore the word barely could be used.
It is a bit like exams (you'll have exams in a few years time). You can pass or fail an exam. If somebody passed an exam with the minimum mark to pass then you could use the phrase "barely passed" as it was almost not a pass. barely is used with a success to indicate how well the success was done. So they still passed but it was also barely a pass.
