Have you tried this method of teaching spelling?

Sometimes I’m surprised at how children try to learn their spelling. They show problems with writing, spelling and often other academic areas but also demonstrate inefficient strategies for learning. Recently, a mom and her daughter showed me that when spelling had to be learned, the little girl had to write out the words several times – over and over again. Does this work? Not always – and it’s so tedious! Mindless repetition (known as ‘rote learning’) does little to permanently anchor anything in long-term memory. What is needed is active learning.

A good example of active learning applied to spelling is described by Don Blakerby in his interesting book ‘Rediscover the joys of learning.’[1] Here is his explanation of why this is an effective method and a summary of the strategy he recommends (p.2-28).

All good spellers share one characteristic way of remembering words. They create a very clear internal picture of the word. To teach them how to do this, follow these steps:

Have the learner think about how to divide the word into syllables. These don’t need to be the correct syllables because it is more important for the child to think how the word can be composed of several syllables. For example, she may want to divide the word ‘tonight’ into to – ni – ght. Then she looks at the word to try to remember what it looks like. If the word is long, she might want to make a picture of each syllable and then put all the pictures together. Ask her if she can see the word written on paper or a white/chalk board in her mind. If she says she can (as young children usually do because they have strong visual learning abilities) then you know you’re on the right track.
When using this method, I find that it helps to have the child analyse the word and identify the possible problem syllables. In the above example, she might well realise that the ‘ght’ ending might cause problems. This is part of the active learning as she is engaging with the learning material.
Now, from her mental picture of the word, she should close her eyes and spell the words BACKWARDS (from right to left) out loud to you. Check that the spelling is correct and ask her to do this several times.
Once she can spell it backwards, have her sound the word out while looking at the mental picture of the word. This ‘hooks’ the sound of the word to the internal image of the word.
Then ask her to spell it from left to right off the mental picture she has.
At this stage, she can write it down – to practice the way she will have to spell it out for the spelling test.
Go to the next spelling word and repeat these steps.

Once all the spelling words have been learned in this way, practice by choosing words off the list and asking the learner to spell them. After practicing a word six to eight times, she should be able to just say the word, see the mental picture and spell it correctly without having to spell it backwards. If this is done over a few days, the words should be saved in long-term memory.

You might want to practice this new strategy by beginning with small and more familiar words. Gradually increase the size and complexity of the words on their spelling list.

Remember that the reason you have the learner spell the word backwards is to assure yourself and the learner that she has a clear mental picture of the word. They can’t smoothly spell the word backwards unless they can see it clearly.

As the learner develops her ability to visualise the words, she can drop the process of spelling it backwards because she will learn to know when she has a good picture.

Integrated Learning Therapy practitioners try to uncover the causes of learning difficulties. In some cases, however, we enjoy empowering learners with proven, practical learning skills and strategies to help them succeed at school. If you would like to receive more posts like this, remember to LIKE and SHARE our Integrated Learning Therapy facebook page.

Visit our website www.ilt.co.za to read more about our approach, the accredited attendance and correspondence courses we offer to teachers (and parents) and to find a practitioner near to you and learners who may benefit from their help.

[1] Published in 1996 by SUCCESS SKILLS, Inc. www.nlpok.com

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Martin Doherty, writing for The Conversation, says that at the age of about four, children reach important milestones in brain development.

One of these is a huge improvement in understanding others’ thoughts and feelings. This is the start of empathy. Another is in spatial thinking—understanding how objects are positioned and related. This is the beginning of the ability to read maps.

Martin and his colleague, Catherine Sayer, conducted a study with 175 two to five-year-olds to explore how children are able to use scale models to figure out where something is in the real world. At about four, children are able to use a scale model of a room to work out where something is. We thought that this might result from children’s understanding of how one thing can represent something else. But we actually found that four-year-olds’ ability to use scale models came from their spatial abilities.

At the same age, children start to understand that someone’s behaviour is due to what that person believes, not necessarily what is really the case. This has interesting consequences.

If you’ve played hide-and-seek with young children, you may have noticed that they aren’t always very good at it. They love the ritual of looking in all the wrong places first, but beforehand they may tell you where they are going to hide, hide in the same place every time, or not be especially hidden.

After their fourth birthday, they get much better at hide and seek. They understand that the seeker looks in the wrong places because they don’t know where the hider is.

At about three to four children also start to tell lies. They realize they can make someone believe something that isn’t true.

Understanding symbols

Martin’s earlier research with fellow psychologist Josef Perner suggests that four-year-olds don’t just start to understand how others’ minds work. Figuring this out is part of the development of an understanding of “representation”—that symbols, like thoughts, words, or pictures, can be used to stand for something else.

Children start to think about how words relate to objects. This means, for instance, knowing that “animal” can refer to something you already have a name for, such as “rabbit”. This might help children learn the new word.

Their ability to use a understand the components of pictures also improves around this age. Very young children use a lot of trial and error to complete a jigsaw, picking up random pieces to see if they fit. By the time they are about four years old, they start to use the picture as a guide, trying to connect lines and match bits of colour, while checking the guide picture on the box lid.

Developmental experiments

Another ability children develop at around four is using scale models. A classic set of developmental experiments involved a model of a regular household room. The real room had typical furniture—sofa, table, cupboard and so on—and the model had miniature versions laid out in the same way.

Children were shown where something was hidden in the model and told to find an object hidden in “the same place” in the room. Children of around four can find the object using the identical layouts. If shown a sticker under a particular chair in the model room, for example, they can go straight to the “same” chair in the other room. This is the fundamental understanding required to read maps.

Adults see scale models and maps as representations. Maps represent a town or a country. A scale model of, say, the Eiffel Tower represents the real thing. At first, Martin suspected children’s ability to use scale models is more evidence of understanding representation at this age.

He was wrong. Instead, the researchers found that this ability is based on a development in children’s spatial abilities that also occurs at about four. This is the ability to think about spaces and where objects are within them. Spatial abilities help with maths skills, and good spatial ability is linked to an interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Their experiment was simple. They compared the model room task with a test of understanding how representation works. The two abilities develop around the same age, but they found they were not related. Children who could do one task couldn’t necessarily do the other.

They also had a test of purely spatial ability. Children who passed the model room task also passed the spatial task. So it looks like the model room task relied on children‘s spatial thinking.

They don’t yet know why two important but apparently unrelated abilities arise at the same time. Perhaps it’s related to changes in the growing brain at this interesting age.

Provided by The Conversation.

Image supplied by Freepik.