In how many ways can the letters in the word spoon be arranged?

The word ‘spoon’ consists of 5 letters where the letter ‘o’ appears twice. To find the number of distinct arrangements of the letters, we can use the formula for permutations of multiset:

Number of arrangements = \( \frac{n!}{n_1! \cdot n_2! \cdot … \cdot n_k!} \)

Here:

• n = total number of letters = 5
• n₁ = number of ‘o’s = 2

So, the calculation will be:

\( \frac{5!}{2!} = \frac{120}{2} = 60 \)

Thus, the letters in the word ‘spoon’ can be arranged in 60 distinct ways.