The Spell of Spelling

   Oglan's article “Writing and Spelling” opened up my eyes to a variety of factors about spelling. For example, some of the rules of spelling are very irrational and were created on arbitrary decisions by people such as William Caxton and Noah Webster. With these irrational rules spelling is a process that needs to be practiced.  Although spelling is a big factor of writing they are actually two different cognitive processes.

     I never knew that there were 3 types of spellers. The reluctant speller is someone I can relate to. I am a weak speller and sometimes use the safe word that I know how to spell.  As a teacher it will be important to encourage these spellers to go past their comfort zone. To do this the article suggests that I have them work with writing partner, a parental volunteer, and have word walls, dictionaries and charts. I also need to make it clear that spelling doesn’t make a good writer but the content of the work.

    The developing speller uses two strategies to spell. Spelling the word as it sounds and visually looking at how the word is spelt. It Is important that this type of student practices spelling correct words in order to internalize it. This student will eventually turn into independent spellers and may be called on others for assistance.

     Students with issues such as, ESL need extra help when it comes to spelling. It is important for them to read and have conversation about stories and combine drawing with spelling in order to establish English words.

       In Lawrence R Sipe's article, "Invention, convention, and intervention: Invented spelling and the teacher's role," the idea of expectations in brought into play. While a student named Kelly will spell words correctly with her reading teacher she does not spell them the same with her regular teacher. This is due to the fact that the expectations for her regular teacher are not as high and therefore she does not try as hard.  

      It is important for teachers to support child’s willingness and desire to write and not inhibit. One way for teachers to do this is by scaffolding. She can help the student discover how the word is spelt by making it clearer without giving the total word away. I think it is important that the teacher doesn’t give the whole answer away and rather when a student asks a question the teacher respond back with a question that fosters their thinking to find the answer.

     Some of the activities I found to be interesting include the have a go chart. This is where students recognize a word that is spelt wrong within their text.  They then attempt to spell the word correctly with assistance from a teacher or peer. If the spelling is wrong the teacher has them look the word up in the dictionary or spells it for them. Finally they copy the word to see how it is spelt. I think this is a good process to use because the student not only tries to spell the word themselves but will end up with the correct spelling and practicing that spelling. Practicing the correct spelling is a strategy that is pointed out in the last article to be helpful.