The correct spelling of the word "TIOTE" can be explained through its phonetic transcription in IPA, which is /tiəʊti/. The first syllable "tio" is pronounced as /tiəʊ/, with a long "o" sound and a schwa sound. The second syllable "te" is pronounced as /ti/, with a short "i" sound. Therefore, the spelling of "TIOTE" follows the English language's pronunciation rules that a vowel sound followed by a consonant sound is represented by a single letter in most cases.