Keep Calm and Spell On ( 12th - 13th October. 2017 )

“Research has shown that learning to spell and learning to read rely on much of the same underlying knowledge — such as the relationships between letters and sounds — and, not surprisingly, that spelling instruction can be designed to help children better understand that key knowledge, resulting in better reading” (Moats, n.d., para. 3). In light of this, last week’s lectures focused on the stages of spelling, how to teach spelling and how it links to reading and writing. 

We learnt that there are five stages of spelling and these stages overlap with the stages of  reading and writing development, since a child’s spelling skills are aided by reading and expressed in writing. The image below outlines each stage of spelling development and some of their characteristics. 

Image showing the different stages of spelling development for the word "pleasurable"

We also learnt about what we can do as teachers to help students with their spelling at each stage. For instance, at Stage 1 (Emergent Spelling Stage) we learnt that we should emphasize the concepts of print and at Stage 5 (Derivational Relations Spelling Stage), we should reinforce strategies to help students to remember the correct spelling of difficult words.  

   

Additionally, we discovered some general activities that we can use as teachers to teach spelling with our future students. The use of dictionaries was one of the activities that caught our attention. When we reflected on our personal experiences in the classroom, we realized that majority of our students do not know how to use a dictionary. Dictionaries are very useful tools which aid spelling, pronunciation of words and build vocabulary but students can not reap these benefits because they do not understand how to use them.  

One thing that was reinforced in last week’s lesson was teaching spelling words in context. We understand that we must use these spelling words in the context of  sentences, paragraphs, poems and more instead of isolating them. Once again, we realized that we cannot teach our students as we were taught. We were taught spelling by the teacher calling random words for us to write but, we know that we have to model how to use the spelling words in the context of sentences to our students. Using these words in context will also help them in their writing. Additionally, we learnt that we should teach our students spelling rules as well as the structure of words.

Image depicting a spelling rule

 One thing that we liked from last week’s sessions was the spelling strategy ‘ LOOK, SAY, COVER, WRITE, and CHECK’ that the lecturer taught us. We liked that she gave us the opportunity to use this strategy during the session to spell the word ‘pandemonium’.

Image showing the Look, Say, Cover, Write and Check spelling strategy

    We also liked that the lecturer questioned us about the information that was read before it is explained. For instance, “why do you think students or children prefer to use uppercase letters?”. This was something we never thought about before and we discovered that it is because uppercase letters are easier to write.

Although we were pleased with the overall delivery of last week’s lectures, for future sessions we suggest that the lecturer uses activities related to the topic we are expected to learn about to introduce the lesson. We think that the lecturer could have given us a mini spelling exercise to test our spelling abilities before teaching last week's lesson. This activity would not only help us to improve our spelling skills but also widen our vocabulary.