Let’s settle this question once and for all: Is spelling really harder than reading?
If a child can read a word, he should be able to spell it, right? This is a common question.
Spelling is more difficult than reading for three reasons:
Reason 1:
Reading involves recognising words, while spelling involves “synthesising” words.
Reason 2:
There are more possible spellings for most words than there are possible ways to read them.
In English, we have 26 letters, but 42 sounds and more than 250 ways to spell these sounds. When a child is faced with several potential spellings for a single sound, the best he can do is “3 P’s” and i.e practice, practice, practice. And this point leads us to the 3rd reason…
Reason 3:
Students spend much less time spelling than they do reading. Less practice time equals more difficulty. By practice I just don’t mean sending a list of words home on Monday to be tested on Friday; that’s not practice. Nor is getting children to write their spellings 10 times, even if they have to do it in rainbow colours! That’s not practice.
BUILDING BLOCKS NECESSARY TO DEVELOP SPELLING
1. Articulation: Clarity of speech sounds and spoken language. A child needs to be able to say a word correctly in order to be able to write it. If a child cannot articulate a particular sound they may end up writing the word the way in which they say it (e.g. if a child says a ‘w’ instead of an ‘r’ they might write ‘ring’ as ‘wing’ which creates a totally different word and affects the meaning of what the child is trying to write).
2. Phonological awareness (sound awareness): In order to be able to spell words, a child first needs to be able to hear how sounds go together to make words (e.g. c_a_t = cat), the individual sounds in the word (i.e. initial, final and middle sounds) and to be able to break words into their individual sounds (e.g. cat = c_a_t).
3. Understanding spelling rules: Understanding spelling rules (e.g. vowel teams, digraphs, magic e, bossy r etc) will help a child have greater success at attempting words.
4. Recognition of tricky words: There are some words that frequently appear in a child’s vocabulary that defy phonics. If a child is able to read these words, they will be more successful at spelling them.
SOME COMMON SPELLING DIFFICULTIES
When a child has trouble remembering some letters in a word that he can read easily, it may indicate that he “ignores” those letters when he reads the word, relying instead on the initial letter and the context in which the word appears, to “read” the word. Or it may be that the letters used to spell the word don’t conform to his knowledge of letter-sound correspondences, so they are hard for him to remember.
When a child has trouble figuring out spelling of a word he can say, it may indicate that he has trouble hearing each separate phoneme, or that he lacks sufficient knowledge of letters that represent those phonemes, particularly vowels.
When he reads, he will tend to guess an unfamiliar word based on context cues and by reading just some of the letters in the word. As a result, he doesn’t notice or remember much about the other letters.
When he writes a word, he represents a few sounds correctly but he overlooks other sounds, and he sometimes adds extra letters unrelated to any sounds in the word.
FEW STRATEGIES PARENTS CAN TRY AT HOME:
1) Practice Phonemic Awareness (hearing individual sounds in words) and letter sounds. Let your child hear what it sounds like to break words up into their individual sounds. Show them what happens when you change a sound. For example, say the sounds in pig separately (p-i-g), then say the word. Then say the sounds in big (b-i-g) and say the word. Put it on paper so they can see the change. Have your child practice breaking words apart and blending them together.
2) Allow Beginners to Spell Phonetically — When first learning to spell, allow children to spell words exactly as they hear them. Teach them to say each each sound in a word and write down the letter or letters that represents each, until they have spelled the word. For example, they might spell lemon as l-e-m-i-n. Then review the word with them and talk about which letters they can change to make the word correct (help them figure out the correct replacement letters if needed). You can practice this several times with different words. Let them rewrite the word the correct way and compare the changes.
3) For children who have trouble writing, allow them to use magnetic letters or letter tiles or make your diy candy sticks or cards etc to create the word, such as the ones below, or let them write on a whiteboard, blackboard, doodle pads etc . The idea is to present them variety of medium so that the learning remains interesting and fun.
4) Teach Children to Notice ‘Digraphs’ in Words – Have your child practice writing several words that use the same digraph to establish a sense of identifying the bit and writing the correct sound.
5) Learn Spelling Rules - Few strategies for remembering common spelling rules include the following:
keep the rules in a place where the child can easily refer to them when spelling, such as in his desk or on a pin board
discuss the rules when reviewing spelling errors with the child (for instance, if you and your child are editing his work and you see he spelled kite as kit, give him a gentle reminder about the magic e and have him read and say the rule out loud. After reviewing the rule, have him rewrite the word he misspelled
make flash cards of the rules, with the name of the rule on the front and some examples at the back.
teach children to edit their work and use repetition – Encourage children to review their work carefully. It is much easier to notice spelling errors when re-reading work, than to notice them the first time around when the mistake is made.
6) Encourage them to test their spelling – Create spelling lists or spelling flash cards. You can create them for your child, with your child, or encourage your child to create them himself.
Teach Your Child To Test Their Spelling Using These Four Steps:
· Look at the word and pay attention to the spelling and what the word looks like
· Cover up the word with his hand or turn the flash card around.
· Visualise the word in his mind, and then spell the word aloud, in his mind, or on paper
· Check the flash card or list to ensure his spelling was correct. You can show your child an example of how to do this and then let him practice on his own.
7) Allow children to practice spelling words in a way where they can easily make corrections, replace one letter for another, or fill in missing letters. Examples: using a dry erase or chalkboard – for an activity, try writing a word but leaving some letters blank (have your child fill in the missing letters-providing him/her with guidance as needed). As he/she improves, make it more challenging. If your child has trouble thinking of the missing letter, try giving a choice of three letters to choose from.
8) Read with your child and encourage your child to read as much as possible. When you come across a word with a certain pattern or rule, you can point out the word to your child/students and reiterate the rule.
9) Play games like Junior Scrabble or Word Bingo etc
Keep in mind that every child is different. Some respond to several strategies, others respond to a few, while others may not respond to any of these strategies.
Remember to always stay calm when working with a child. If you get frustrated with them, they may start to feel anxious, angry, inferior even stupid, which will lead to a less productive learning session. Keep practice sessions short (15 to 20), unless the child is eager to keep going.
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