Teaching Spelling

Aims To think about what the process of spelling involves To explore a range of strategies to support students with spelling Objectives Understand some of the complexity of spelling Know some key ways to help students in the classroom

Spelling Test Definite Oesophagus Onomatopoeia Parallelogram Pharaoh Diarrhoea Separate Mississippi Simile Euphemism

An Overview of Spelling Why spelling is so difficult in English Silent ‘k’ was pronounced in Celtic and Norse words like ‘know’ There are 26 graphemes to produce 40 phonemes; the same letter combinations produce different sounds; the same sounds can be made by different letter combinations Early scribes put marks over ‘u’ to distinguish from adjacent ‘n’ or ‘m’ – became written as ‘o’ in ‘come’ ‘done’ French scribes changed spellings - ‘qu’ for ‘cw’, ‘gh’ for ‘h’ Printing –Dutch printers used own spellings – sometimes adding ‘e’ at end of words to justify text The Great Vowel Shift in the 15 th century, led to a shift in pronunciation of some vowels – e.g. ‘clerk’ Imported words from Latin, Greek, Spain, Italy and the British empire Americanisation of spelling

The Problem with Phonics A fish called ghoti ‘gh’ as in tough ‘o’ as in women ‘ti’ as in fraction Ghoti = fish

What we Know about Spelling The ability to spell easily and automatically enables us to become more effective writers Although spelling is one aspect of writing, many people, including employers, make judgements about our literacy, even intelligence, from our spelling Good spellers take responsibility, checking their own words and using dictionaries The English language is not totally regular, but it is patterned. Working out patterns helps you become a better speller Learning to spell is a developmental process of learning to apply different strategies. It is not a rote learning task

Spelling Myths People used to spell better No research exists to support the notion that there was a golden age of spelling You can’t teach spelling because the English language is so irregular 85% of English spelling is predictable if you know the conventions and patterns If you read more your spelling will improve Only if you are having your attention consciously focused on words that you read If you can’t spell by Year 7 you’ll never be a good speller It’s never too late to learn the strategies

How do people remember spelling? There are four main ways people use to process the spelling of words: Visual – writer responds to shapes of words and patterns of letter strings and thinks ‘Does it look right?’ Auditory – writer ‘sounds it out’, recognising relationships between letters and groups of letters and their assocaited sounds Linguistic – writer is aware of relationships between words, origins of words or parts of words, thinking ‘why is it spelt like that?’ Kinesthetic – ‘motor memory’; writer is accustomed to making specific hand movements to produce letter strings

Spelling Rules and Patterns There are many rules (conventions) and patterns governing English spelling. Some of the key one that Key Stage 1 and 2 students investigate: Consonant doubling: write/writing/written; dine/dining/dinner Adding prefixes and suffixes – e.g. the ‘ible’ and ‘able’ rule (horrible, terrible, drinkable) Rules of pluralisation – when to add –s, -es, -ies, etc… Changing ‘y’ to ‘ie’ – fried, tried Most common ways to form vowel sounds (e.g. ai, a_e) ‘i’ before ‘e’ rule and exceptions Apostrohes of omission Common homophones (to/two/too; their/there/they’re) Students in Key Stage 3 misspelling words in these categories often need to be asked to remember the patterns they have learnt

Spelling Strategies Look at the following list of words. From memory, can you remember any strategies you used or were taught to help you remember the spelling? Diary Unnecessary Remember Definite Vegetable Wednesday Government Handbag Bicycle Biscuit There Liquefy

Spelling strategies Break it into letter sounds (d-i-a-r-y) Say it how it looks (Wed-nes-day) Break it into syllables (re-mem-ber) Look for words in words (I AM in parliament; ‘a rat’ in separate) Use mnemonic (it is necessary for a shirt to have one collar and two sleeves; big elephants can’t always use small exits) Break into prefixes, suffixes (dis + satisfy) Apply spelling rules Use the ‘look-think-cover-write-check’ method to commit to visual memory

Helping with Spelling Always expect them to try first - don’t spell out a word for them Praise the first effort – it is likely it will be 90% right (most misspellings are a letter or two at most) Identify the error, and if it follows a pattern or ‘rule’ encourage students to remember Or encourage students to think about using a strategy appropriate to the word When spelling is correct, encourage them to use ‘Look – Think – Cover – Write – Check’ to learn Use keyword games, wordwebs, root word posters, as starter or plenary activities to reinforce spelling