A sample of 500 misspelled words was drawn from compositions written by students in third, fourth, and fifth grade. Errors were analyzed to indicate the type of misspellings that occur in writing connected discourse, to identify phonemes that cause particular spelling problems, and to identify typical error patterns. Results indicated that most of…

This paper reviews recent research on English spelling and the alphabet, and examines the alphabet in terms of symbols, letter-names, and sounds. English is considerably less phonetic than most Western languages, with many symbols having more than one sound. This factor makes spelling difficult for learners of English as a Second Language (ESL) or…

Discusses a research study designed to determine whether rules drawn from the Stanford spelling study, "Phoneme-Grapheme Correspondence as Cues to Spelling Improvement, are applicable across regional dialect lines. (RD)

This study examined the psycholinguistic implications of using either of two different types of orthography--syllabic and roman--in Native language programs for Cree children with regard to readability, learnability, and the transfer of reading skills to and from reading in an official language (English or French). This study can also be applied…

Examines the present state of the relationship between linguistics and reading, proposes how reading instruction could be improved using currently know linguistic information, and discusses one type of linguistic finding useful to reading specialists. (Author)

A project of computer research on the interconversion of Spanish texts between orthographematic and orthophonematic versions was carried out at Columbia University. That project is described here. (Author/CFM)

A recent study was conducted at Stanford University to determine the degree of correspondence between phonemes and graphemes in English. In past attempts to achieve universal literacy, language reformers have proposed a revised alphabet of one grapheme for each phoneme, a change which anti-reformers have insisted would be costly. Modern linguists,…

Three papers, based on a study done with 160 Wisconsin fourth- and sixth-graders, are presented in an attempt to contribute to the psycholinguistic information needed in developing elementary English language learning programs. The first paper, "A Linguistic Ability Test for Elementary Grades," discusses a written test made up of 15 linguistic…

Examines the role of metalinguistic abilities in the initial stages of learning to read. Indicates that children's ability to acquire low-level metalinguistic skills depends in part on their level of operativity, and that phonological and syntactic awareness play more important roles in beginning reading than does pragmatic awareness. (JK)

This paper seeks to define the relationship between speech and writing as two separate media within language, and suggests the use of the term translation to describe moving from one medium to another. Such a view acknowledges the independence of speech and writing, the possibility of translation in either direction, the possible untranslatability…