Download Teaching Spelling

Teaching Spelling
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
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Definite
Oesophagus
Onomatopoeia
Parallelogram
Pharaoh
Diarrhoea
Separate
Mississippi
Simile
Euphemism
An Overview of Spelling
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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 15th 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
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A fish called ghoti
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‘gh’ as in tough
‘o’ as in women
‘ti’ as in fraction
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Ghoti = fish
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What we Know about Spelling
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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?
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There are four main ways people use to process the spelling of
words:
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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
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Spelling Rules and Patterns
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There are many rules (conventions) and patterns governing English spelling.
Some of the key one that Key Stage 1 and 2 students investigate:
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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)
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Students in Key Stage 3 misspelling words in these categories often need to be
asked to remember the patterns they have learnt
Spelling Strategies
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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?
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Diary
Unnecessary
Remember
Definite
Vegetable
Wednesday
Government
Handbag
Bicycle
Biscuit
There
Liquefy
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Spelling strategies
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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
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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