Doing away with spelling demons

As far as writing is concerned, spelling errors are often considered as the most costly mistakes committed on papers. So, it has become a recurring concern for students as well as teachers throughout the world. Students struggle to overcome this particular handicap in order to muster standardised writing capabilities. Even tutors at times also find themselves in a spot of bother in helping students overcome misspelling as they too are often afflicted by the same kind of confusions. However, there are few approaches that might help both to gain a semblance of spelling competency.

In Bangladesh, most schools (both Bangla and English medium) use drill-skills and memorisation methods to teach spelling at the primary level. Under this method, students learn spelling but they often remain weak in vocabulary. So, there is a general dissatisfaction with this traditional spelling method since students are prone to forget what has been learnt through memorisation and thereby risk confusing one word with another.

In the west, however, schools have moved away from the formal spelling materials and began using words from different compositions as the only source of words to be studied.

Some of the English medium schools in Bangladesh also follow the modern method of spelling at the beginners' level. They start teaching the sound first and then gradually move on to letters. Under this 'phonic-sense method' students learn to differentiate the sounds made by the same letter.

Suraiya Morshed, Director of Studies at Scholastica said, "Under this system, students learn spelling better and make less mistakes later on in their advanced academic lives." She, however, pointed out that due to improper implementation of the method some students often continue to suffer from the curse of misspellings.

When Wasima Hussain, teaching at the secondary level in a US school, was asked to explain the common causes for misspelling among students, she also blamed it on the 'lack of phonic awareness'. She said: "The students who don't have proper phonic awareness are the worst victims of misspelling."

Meanwhile, Begum Shahnaz Sinha, associate professor of English in Dhaka University said: "Students face spelling problems because there are no unified rules governing the art of spelling. So students, whose mother tongue is not English, find it impossible to iron out their spelling errors."

There is no denying that lack of 'phonic awareness', improper implementation of spelling teaching methods at the school levels and complex spelling rules are prime reasons for misspelling.

But those are only the methodical reasons that create bad spellers. There shouldn't be any disagreement that the main barriers to correct spellings are inattentiveness, indifference and lack of practice by the users of the language.

It is, therefore, unanimously agreed that of all the spelling techniques, 'self-correction' is generally the most effective approach. According to a research finding: "Students using self-correction methods learn an average of one word more each day than those using traditional methods and self-correction methods are effective for the acquisition, maintenance, and generalisation of spelling words." Besides, the tasks under this method can be individually customised depending on the need of individual learners with immediate feedback mechanisms.

Self-correction is, in fact, a natural outcome as students meet their goals and manage their own learning. It can be enhanced if students keep records of their learning or word journals.

There are two self-correction methods designed to improve spelling of students with learning disabilities. The first one called 'letter-by-letter proofing', focuses on the orthography of letters. A five-column paper is used in which the first column contains the list of words to be learnt. The other four columns are blank. Words are dictated by a teacher, a peer or another adult and recorded by the student in the second column. Using a system of four proof-reading marks, the student corrects the word misspelled in the second column and writes those correctly in the third. This sequence is completed in the final two columns. This practice needs to be repeated throughout the week for maximum results.

The second self-correction method -- 'whole-word proofing', is similar to the first one. However, proof-reading marks are not used here. The cells in column two through to five are divided half-horizontally. Students use the upper part of each of those cells to correctly spell a word they have misspelled earlier. They write the words again in the lower portion of the cell. Then they mark correctly spelt words with an 'X' in both the methods. As in the first method, words are practiced on a daily basis. Words that are not spelt correctly by the end of the week are added to following week's assigned words.

Like many great people who had put in active efforts to overcome spelling handicaps, most students find self-correction empowering. Teachers can play a pivotal role in this empowerment process because they act as guides for the development of self-correction. In the end, frequent meaningful reading and writing, self-regulated and corrected learning of high frequency spelling words, spelling patterns and strategies -- all piece together to make the self-corrected spelling puzzle complete.

Rezina Sultana teaches English at the State University of Bangladesh.