Spelling is a subject that has been the nemesis of parents and teachers since Socrates began asking wigh. I think it’s because we figure proper spelling is accomplishable and correct answers ubiquitous, unlike with trigonometry or dance. There just simply is no reason for misspelled words.
“Once a pona time I was posed to go wit my famle to et pasgetti.”
We note the misspellings right away, but may not credit the writer where it is due. In the example above, a lot is right with it. The word “once” has been learned or copied correctly, the child knows one word from another as evidenced by the spaces between them, long vowels are used, first and most last sounds are being heard and translated to graphic form, the student knows what a sentence is and that it needs punctuation at the end.
That’s quite a list of accomplishments for beginning writers. Students trapped in the notion that writing is spelling would simply pen something like, “I like my mom. I like my dad.“ This is why it’s great when students aren’t afraid to write what they are thinking, instead of only writing what they are spelling. “Better to do something imperfectly, than to do nothing perfectly.” (Great quote from a not so great fortune cookie.)
We often see students who sit paralyzed during writing time, thinking that at six and seven years old the way they compose isn‘t good enough unless an adult finds no errors. This leads to pretty boring pieces of writing, when you consider the list of words little kids can spell. The child who comes in understanding that writing is about getting ideas out of the head and on paper, are the kids who write expressive, funny, insightful, sweet and powerful pieces that may need to be translated by the writer to the reader, but that’s what editors are for.
My grandmother, the English teacher, would be wagging her finger at me right now if I didn’t add the part about how students must be forced to memorize, use word lists, dictionaries, spell checks, and other resources to put the letters in standard order for others to read. This takes time, but a student who writes for a purpose will approach the assignment with a much more open attitude about editing. Writing about your favorite socks may not appeal to every child and on top of that, if writing is synonymous for spelling strings of words perfectly, the results suffer as much as the writer seems to.
There are ways we adults can impact the way their children spell, so right from the first day of snack be aware of the sounds they are hearing. Cut from your spoken vocabulary sloppy pronunciations like, ‘cause for because, go ‘head for go ahead, ‘budder for butter, rilly for really, tuhday for today, ‘g night for good night, etc. Pasketti isn’t so cute when it’s still being said in 2nd grade, so repeat it correctly from the start. When your child is learning to spell, speak carefully as though English is your second language and you‘re trying to get citizenship. People do judge us on our spelling, if all they have is written word. It’s like clothing wrapped around our ideas. We don’t want to send our kids out into the world with ripped up thoughts. So when those spelling words come home, take a look at them and be conscious of how you pronounce them.
And please, spread the word as I continue my nationwide mission to cure one minor spelling ill. Just because words may end in s, you don’t always need apostrophe’s.
