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Erin
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| Posted: Jan 01 2010 at 2:41pm | IP Logged
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I've been thinking alot about spelling and the whys of success and various ideas of helping success, such as my suffix/prefix meanderings. Taking out the equation of genuine learning problems and looking at the fact of poor teaching  just what can be done to rectify the problem?
I have a 16 year old who wants to be a better speller, I'm sure something can be done. She is bright, enthusiastic, widely exposed to correct spelling and I suspect my years of buying into invented spelling and not correcting her has produced this result.
Anyhow a thought I've been pondering. Does exposure to lots of early readers = good spellers? We haven't gone the early readers route a great deal, but were they perhaps designed to enforce good spellers? Just thinking about how when I went to school most students were good/fair spellers. Today poor spelling is the norm.
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Erin
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LLMom
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| Posted: Jan 01 2010 at 5:14pm | IP Logged
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Erin,
I don't have direct answers, but I can offer my experience. My oldest dd, 19 is an avid reader and writer. She used invented spelling a lot and it straightened out by itself around age 11 or 12. My next dc, who has a few learning issues, including visual processing, is not a strong reader or writer. At 16, his spelling is plain awful. I have NOT for the most part let him use invented spelling, although I was quite gentle about it. He also didn't like having words "wrong". My 3rd dc, 13, is also a fairly bad speller but he does not have any learning issues. However, he is not an avid reader and writer. He is slowly making progress and I haven't done invented spelling with him either. 4th dc is 10 1/2, an avid reader and writer, but her spelling has not gone through the stages my 1st dc did (or if they are it is a bit slower). Her spelling would be considered below grade level. I use to be a firm believer in invented spelling, and thought we could just rely on spell check but my 16 year old found out you can't rely on that when taking enterance exams for dual credit. It is all computer based but they don't have a spell check. All of my dc at home are using All about spelling now. They are not big into invented spelling. All of this is to say that some children can use it (invented spelling) and it will work out on its own, but I think others may need a bit of help. I don't mind using AAS because it is really a spelling, phonics, handwriting, and copywork (and some reading) program all in one.
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Lisa
For veteran & former homeschool moms
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ekbell
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| Posted: Jan 01 2010 at 10:11pm | IP Logged
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Erin wrote:
| Does exposure to lots of early readers = good spellers? We haven't gone the early readers route a great deal, but were they perhaps designed to enforce good spellers? |
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Going by my experience it would strongly depend how the child learns best.
Reading a lot/early readers can help with the critical skill of knowing when a word is misspelled but that isn't exactly the same as being the same as knowing how to spell the word correctly.
As a young child I was very good at picking out misspelled words but very bad at spelling. [I tended to be reasonably good at recognition and rather bad at recall in a number of areas.]
I've never entirely trusted invented spelling as I know from experience that a consistent misspelling can make it harder to remember and use the correct spelling. Consistently misspell a word often enough and it starts feeling like the correct spelling,
My parents dealt with my horrible spelling when I was a teen by giving me a book 20 000 Words: Spelled and Divided for Quick Reference which mainly consists of words in alphabetical order (short definitions are given for homonyms and other commonly confused words). I still own and make use of this book.
BTW I own a couple of books from an 1960s set of school spellers which give this advice which covers quite a number of learning modes (visual, verbal, kinesthetic)
How to Study a Word
1.Look at the word
-Look at it from left to right
-Look at the letters from left to right
2 Say the word
-Say the word carefully
-Say the letters to yourself
3 Think about the word
-Does it look like or sound like any other word you know?
-Close your eyes. Try to remember what the word looks like This would be a good stage for looking at roots, suffixes, prefixes
4 Write the word
5 Check how you spelled it
-Did you get it right?
-If not, look for the part of the word that was hard for you. write the word correctly.
6 Practice spelling the word
-Write a sentence using the word. Check the spelling in the sentence.
-Start again at step 1, until you are sure that you can spell the word correctly
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stellamaris
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| Posted: Jan 02 2010 at 10:11am | IP Logged
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In my opinion, great spellers are born, not made. This is not to say that one can not improve one's spelling ability, just that some spell naturally well and others have to work hard at spelling. I don't think your approach to curriculum hindered your daughter's learning; if she was a "speller" any curriculum would have worked, it she wasn't so naturally strong in this area, she would have had to work at it more intensely no matter which approach you took.
Also, from my own experience (which is limited, to be sure), I am not sure spelling and reading are related activities (in the brain). I have had outstanding readers struggle with spelling and average readers have no trouble.
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Caroline
Wife to  dh 30+ yrs,ds's 83,85,89,dd's 91,95,ds's 01,01,02,grammy to 4
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Barbara C.
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| Posted: Jan 02 2010 at 12:28pm | IP Logged
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I believe Caroline is correct that good spelling skills are kind of innate. I wish I could remember where I read it...but there was something I read that was talking about how good spellers were more likely to have somewhat photographic memories. Really, in the end, spelling is a matter of memorization skill.
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ekbell
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| Posted: Jan 02 2010 at 2:35pm | IP Logged
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I was discussing this thread with my dh yesterday and commented that I've found one good indicator for if someone is naturally good at spelling. 
When asked how, I brought up the idea that reading a lot naturally leads to being a good speller. He agreed.
I then pointed out that this isn't actually true for everyone (it's certainly not true for me). It was true for him but he is a naturally good speller. As stated in the comments above, some of us simply have to work at the task.
I will state from personal experience it's worth experimenting and working through a number of approaches to see what method of memorization works best for the individual.
As an example I do best if I accept that I need to memorize material in the mode I will be using it - since spelling is used to write words down, I need to do a lot of writing down a particular word to have the spelling down pat (and I will have a fair amount of difficulty reciting the spelling without at least air writing the word). On the other hand if I'm memorizing a passage for a recitation, I'd better be working orally. [phone numbers are annoying as dialing the number doesn't quite equal being able to write it down, which doesn't quite equal being able to tell someone the phone number ]
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Erin
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| Posted: Jan 05 2010 at 6:39pm | IP Logged
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LLMom wrote:
| All of my dc at home are using All about spelling now |
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Lisa
I had a look at this, a question: when you say all, are you talking about your 16 yr old too?
ekbell wrote:
BTW I own a couple of books from an 1960s set of school spellers which give this advice which covers quite a number of learning modes (visual, verbal, kinesthetic)
How to Study a Word
1.Look at the word
-Look at it from left to right
-Look at the letters from left to right
2 Say the word
-Say the word carefully
-Say the letters to yourself
3 Think about the word
-Does it look like or sound like any other word you know?
-Close your eyes. Try to remember what the word looks like This would be a good stage for looking at roots, suffixes, prefixes
4 Write the word
5 Check how you spelled it
-Did you get it right?
-If not, look for the part of the word that was hard for you. write the word correctly.
6 Practice spelling the word
-Write a sentence using the word. Check the spelling in the sentence.
-Start again at step 1, until you are sure that you can spell the word correctly |
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I was just given a copy of a NSW state Education Department book of Spelling written in 1970! and I thought of what you wrote here as they had the same advice. Then I stumbled on
Personal BestSpelling (I had googled 'adult spelling') and they said Personal Best Spelling also uses an improved version of an old standby learning method called Look Say Cover Write Check. This improved version exercises recall which enhances learning. Best of all I can buy it in Australia and you can coose whether to have English or American spelling 
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Erin
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LLMom
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| Posted: Jan 05 2010 at 7:08pm | IP Logged
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Erin wrote:
LLMom wrote:
| All of my dc at home are using All about spelling now |
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Lisa
I had a look at this, a question: when you say all, are you talking about your 16 yr old too?
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Erin,
Yes, my 16 year old uses this (he is on level 5) but he has some slight visual processing issues. LEvel 6, which isn't out yet, is supposed to be high school level spelling.
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Lisa
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4Real Forums : Language Arts Come Alive
Topic: What Makes a Great Speller?
