This is the reading instruction show.
I'm your host as always, Dr. Andy Johnson.
Topic of today's podcast is invented spelling, sometimes called temporary spelling.
Charles Reed, R-E-A-D in 1971, is thought to be the inventor of invented spelling.
Of course, he really didn't invent invented spelling.
He just recognized how important it was in the development of children's ability to
read and write.
However, the term he used to identify this phenomenon, invented spelling, was probably
a poor choice of words.
Because it wasn't long before gaggles of reactionary penguins began squawking and
flapping their wings, claiming that whole language teachers were telling children they
could spell words any way they wanted to.
Based on that term alone, they concluded that students were being taught that spelling wasn't
important, and that they should just invent any old way to spell.
And they pointed to falling test scores, which weren't really falling at all.
And they claimed that whole language teachers were to blame.
And they insisted these penguins that whole language teachers were destroying America standing
in the world and ruining the economy.
Now imagine that whole language teachers must indeed be powerful if they're able to do all
that.
But what about the children who protect the children?
They said, of course, if any of these penguins would have actually taken the dead fish out
of their mouths and bothered to read even one of the many books and articles describing
whole language and writing workshop or emergent writing, they would have soon realized how
silly their preconceived penguin rantings were.
Now it always seems a bit ironic to me that those who get the most upset about whole language
literacy instruction seem to be the most illiterate about whole language literacy instruction.
They seem to be title readers, reading only the titles of things and none of the content.
Now let me tell you the very first thing that good whole language teachers teach their students
on the very first day of school is that you have to read more than the title of the book
or article and able to understand what that book or article is about.
However, to calm the sense of hysteria spreading in penguin world, the term invented spelling
was eventually replaced with the more appropriate term, temporary spelling.
But there are essentially the same thing.
So let's define our terms.
Let's define what's making the penguins so upset during the process of writing.
Students are taught if they don't know how to spell a word, they should give it their
best shot or use enough letters to temporarily hold the idea and tell they come back to edit
the piece.
This is what's called temporary spelling.
It's done so as not to ruin the flow of the writing.
This enables students to focus on the higher order thinking involved in the composing process.
Also, young children are able to write before they've mastered conventional forms of spelling
and is described in many podcasts, editing, as well as spelling in grammar are step four
of the five step writing process, not step five, not step one, two or three, but step
four.
Now, let's look at teaching writing.
Here's a concept that seems self-evident, but apparently it's not self-evident enough.
So let me make it more self-evident.
Spelling is not writing.
Let me say it again.
Spelling is not writing.
Writing is writing.
Spelling involves the expression and transmission of ideas.
Spelling is making sure that you're using socially agreed upon arrangement of letters
in the individual words.
Ideas versus an arrangement of letters.
Writing is something that takes a human being to do.
Writing is something a computer can do.
There are spell checks and grammar checks on your computer, but there's not a writing
check or a good idea check.
However, think of all the bad books and articles that would have been prevented if there were
a writing check or a good idea check.
Now, if you want students to become better writers, you must teach writing.
This doesn't mean we ignore spelling.
However, teaching writing is much different from teaching spelling or grammar or punctuation.
And one of the reasons why students have difficulties in writing is that spelling, grammar and punctuation
are being taught in place of writing.
Again, this does not mean we don't teach spelling, but we teach writing to help students become
better writers.
We teach spelling someplace else.
Six big ideas related to temporary spelling and writing.
Number one, we need to treat real students like real writers.
You want to get our real students ready to be successful in the real world.
In the real world, people aren't given weekly lists of words to spell.
In the real world, editing is step four of the five-step writing process.
In the real world, real writers have messy first drafts and revision.
Real writers focus on editing during the final phase of their writing.
There's a time and a place to look at grammar, spelling and punctuation errors.
And it is not well-drafted.
Idea two, good writing is writing that expresses ideas efficiently and effectively.
Good writing is different from error-free writing.
Attending to the mechanics of writing is very important, but it must occur in the appropriate
place in the appropriate way.
Spelling, punctuation and grammar should be seen by students as elements that help them
transmit their ideas more effectively.
Presenting one of these will dilute or diffuse a message.
Editing a spelling, grammar and punctuation should occur near the end of the writing process,
not at the beginning, after a piece has been revised many, many times.
This is what enables students to see editing in the context of effective delivery of their
message.
Idea number three, temporary spelling enhances the flow of ideas.
Temporary spelling is merely a placeholder for the idea.
You can tell students to underline their temporary spelling so they'll know which words to
attend to during the editing phase of their writing, but not during the draft revision
stages or pre-writing.
Idea number four, learning to spell is a developmental process.
But won't children learn the incorrect spelling of words if they're allowed to use temporary
spelling to hold the ideas?
You ask?
No.
Nonsense.
Papika.
Learning to spell is a developmental process.
We proceed through a series of stages until we become conventional spellers.
There's very little correlation between the use of temporary spelling and students' performance
on weekly spelling tests.
However, there is some evidence to support the idea that the use of temporary spelling
will speed students' development or process through the various spelling stages.
Again, this doesn't mean that we don't engage in spelling instruction.
Instead, we don't engage in useless, silly spelling instruction that gets in the way
of writing.
Idea number five, temporary spelling enables success.
Temporary spelling enables teachers to recognize and value students' ideas.
And it provides a venue for low-achieving readers and writers to experience success.
Often, students who have reading and writing difficulties experience nothing but failure
for the entire time they're in the classroom.
So is it any wonder that they sometimes act out?
Earning success can contribute to students' overall academic achievement.
Success contributes to positive self-esteem.
Self-esteem is highly correlated with students' achievement.
Note that this doesn't mean that high self-esteem causes high achievement.
Just the two are strongly related or co-related.
And the sixth idea, temporary spelling improves phonemic and phonetic awareness.
Temporary spelling improves children's ability to hear letter sounds, sounds within words,
sounds, that's a phonemic, phonemic awareness.
It also improves their ability to make connections between letters and sounds, phonetic awareness.
These are both important prerequisite skills in learning to read.
By listening for sounds and using as many letters as they can to hold their ideas during
the writing process, students become better able to hear and make letter sound relationships.
So two ideas.
Number one, you should do more than read the title of books or articles.
You should actually read what the book or article is about before coming to conclusions
about what that book or article is about.
And number two, spelling, temporary spelling is a good thing in helping children learn
to write.
We want students to become better writers.
We must teach the writing process.
This has been Dr. Andy Johnson and the Reading Instruction Show.