Making spelling instruction effective, fun, practical, and meaningful is a challenge faced by many teachers. Spelling is traditionally taught with prepackaged word lists using a test-practice-test method, which results in little transfer to independent word use. Because spelling is an important component and gauge of literacy skills, students need…

Children with spelling difficulties are limited in their participation in all written school activities. We aimed to investigate the influence of word-prediction as a tool on spelling accuracy and typing speed. To this end, we selected 80 Grade 4-6 children with spelling difficulties in a school for special needs to participate in a research…

Analysis of the Rinsland vocabulary list indicated that while the list was dated, it was more than adequate for purposes of classroom instruction. (RB)

A study analyzed whether a word study instruction based on open sorting would allow children to have more conventions or strategies available for spelling words in their written work. Subjects, all 22 third-grade students in a suburb of a large midwestern city, were given the Qualitative Inventory of Word Knowledge as pre- and posttests. Three…

Studies context as a significant aid to the learning and retention of words. (RB)

This booklet is the Teacher's Manual for "Spell-Write" (Revised), a text to aid students in New Zealand in writing, spelling, and word study programs. "Spell-Write" (Revised) will be used predominantly in Years 4-7 classrooms. The overriding principle which has been retained in this revised edition is that of…

The main purpose of this study was to structure and compare two series of grapheme-phoneme correspondence and phonics generalizations. The first series of correspondences and generalizations is designed for seriously disabled readers in grades 3-9 and was derived through a phonemic analysis of the first 1,500 words of the Heritage list ( The…

The purpose of this investigation was to develop a method for improving the spelling skills of college freshmen. Parallel spelling units were devised, which covered the same minimal skills concepts. After a spelling pretest, the students in the sample could choose to study the material either by classroom drill or by using a self-instructional…

To determine the effect of proofreading on spelling, a study was conducted with middle- and upper-middle-class students in four sixth-grade classes in two schools in Austin, Texas. Two classes were used as control groups, and two as experimental groups. Teachers of both groups participated in the planning sessions to prepare 14 lessons with…

To help children develop a concept of "words," this document introduces parallels from languages other than English so that children, especially those learning English as a second language, can become aware of similarities across languages and recognize links between their first language and English. Answers to questions often asked by…

"Sort Stories: Leveled Reading Supplement to Words Their Way: Word Sorts for Letter Name-Alphabet Spellers" effectiveness was tested using five English language learner (ELL) students in the fifth and sixth grade. "Sort Stories" uses the word lists and accompanying clip-art from "Words Their Way" in developmental, grade-level specific, short read…

Intended to be used by secretarial science students in a single skills laboratory, this performance based instructional unit on spelling contains ten assignments covering the following areas: pronunciation, homonyms, often confused words, compound and hyphenated words, "ei" and "ie" words, silent "e" words, prefixes, suffixes, word endings, and…