whats with this phonetic spelling????

[miku]

while i understand that it helps my daughter to express herself without being hung up on spelling, why arent easy words actually taught as they are spelt???
it seems a little daft to me, as then kids have to 're-learn' words, as they are actually spelt.
I had a little conflab with the teacher, as my daughter is also bi-lingual........as are 90% of kids in the school......waste of brain space or confidence building???

apologies as im sure this topic has come up loadsa times before........thoughts please!!

no expertise at all. I am just trying to use logic. I'm not giving advice. I looked at flummoxednow's sons spellings and tried to analyse why he was getting these spellings wrong. I'm only asking questions and trying to understand, just like ZephirineDrouhin and flummoxednow. My mind is not made up, I am looking for answers, because I find it an interesting problem.

thankyou.will try!

At the risk of getting completely sidetracked, v and f are not quite identical (aside from v being voiced and f not) - to make a v sound one tends to draw the lower lip back slightly under the top teeth whereas with an f the lower lip is in a neutral position. It's much harder to draw back the the lip in this way when the tip of the tongue is against the hard palate in the l position. Try saying lllllvv and then llllff - llllff is much easier

Oh beautiful pink and sweetly scented rose (I don't dare attempt to spell your name again..), who says:

"To teach children that they have it within their power to spell anything just by knowing the phonic "code" seems at face value, very confidence boosting, but it is surely very misleading."

Not only would it be misleading, it would be highly irresponsible to give children that impression. That is why, once the 'alternative sound spellings' are introduced the focus has to be on word specific spellings with plenty of practice in writing the words correctly. Spelling is partly a product of kinaesthetic memory; frequent practice reinforces the unique feel and rhythm of writing a word. If a child has been spelling a word wrongly for a long time they may be able to produce the correct spelling under test conditions, when all they have to focus on is the spelling, but when writing under other circumstances, and having much more to think about than just how the words are spelled, the hand & brain take over and automatically produce the habitual 'wrong' spelling.

Unless the child has been taught to proof read (i.e to carefully read back exactly the word/s they have spelled 'say', not what they think it 'says') or they are so familiar with a word through reading it that they can see at once that it looks wrong and so try alternatives, they will merrily perpetuate the wrong spelling for ever and ever. I have Y7s & 8s who still write 'tack' and 'back' for 'take & 'bake' because it comes automatically to them after years of spelling it wrongly.

It doesn't help that there is still a strong school of thought which says that you shouldn't correct errors because it is demoralising for the child. Would you rather be 'demoralised' by being taught how to correct errors when you make them or by knowing that you are a bad speller at age 12, 13 plus? Low self esteem is a common characteristic of the children I work with. They aren't daft, they know they're doing it wrong. I know that all these children are the product of 'mixed methods' and that most improve significantly with a diet of SP.

thanks, ZephirineDrouhin, that's what I thought when I tried it, but couldn't express what was going on at all

Zephirine-thankyou.sat in alone making lllllvv and llllff noises.

MaizieD, I am glad that you say "the focus has to be on word specific spellings with plenty of practice in writing the words correctly". I quite agree. But this is not phonics is it, and seems to directly contradict your earlier statement:

"All spelling is a matter of building words 'phonetically'; with an unfamiliar word you work out what the sounds are in the word, then spell each one, in order"

"I have Y7s & 8s who still write 'tack' and 'back' for 'take & 'bake' because it comes automatically to them after years of spelling it wrongly.

It doesn't help that there is still a strong school of thought which says that you shouldn't correct errors because it is demoralising for the child. Would you rather be 'demoralised' by being taught how to correct errors when you make them or by knowing that you are a bad speller at age 12, 13 plus?"

agree entirly with this MaizieD. I think the wrong spellings come to them automatically, as you say, because the wrong spellings were never corrected and have now become embedded in the memory. It is very hard to correct them once they have become embedded and have been used frequently. It may even be too late to try and correct them at the age of 12 and 13. It is better to correct them at the earliest opportunity, to prevent them being embedded incorrectly.

Phonics isn't really very new - I was taught using phonics 35 years ago. Not only that, but I was taught using a phonetic alphabet, so had all sorts of funny looking letters to learn in addition to the usual 26.

It wasn't a problem for me.

I remember watching a TV program about phonics teaching a while back - and was struck by the head teacher who said that the children who pick up reading easily would probably do so whatever technique is used for learning and they will be well equipped to go on and succeed. His concern was for those children who are currently being failed by the education system and who leave school functionally illiterate, he felt that phonics was their best bet to help them break the code to reading. He said that they were missing out on so many experiences that those who can read simply take for granted. It made me very sad.

flummoxednow,
looking at the other words that he has misspelt, they all make sense phonetically as far as I can see

enormous - 'enormas'
he is using the 'mas' sound in Christmas

restaurant - 'restroant'
he is saying restaurant quickly and getting restroant

although - 'althow'
he is using the 'ow' in "show"

I would try getting him to write the word "enormous" out 20 times. Physically writing it, rather than just typing it on a computer, will help it to stick in his memory. Then I would test him by saying it and asking him to spell it, every 15 minutes or so. I would also write the word enormous out on a piece of paper with some of the letters missing e.g.

en_m_s

and other variations of the above, and say the word enormous and ask him to fill in the missing letters.

I think these techniques may help to embed the correct spelling in his memory, because it looks like he is having difficulty with soundings since one sound can have different spellings.

I love this thread - thankyou Claig and Zeph for your honest and questioning contributions. I think this is exactly the sort of debate that is needed to move this thing forward. I was taught to spell via look and say (whole word) and my spelling is appalling (as my posts have probably demonstrated!).

Actually I am not a teacher so my knowledge is probably questionable too - although I do have the fount of all knowledge SP living next door (i.e. mum))who has drummed all this stuff into me for the last 15 years. I think as long as we all are up front about where our knowledge becomes flakey (as i did over anlaytical phonics) then we will do fine.

I do have lots of experience of living with dylexics though! My hubbie is extremely dyslexic and by this I mean he has very poor word recognition. You can show him the words "who" and "how" and he cannot automatically point out which one is "who". He also has problems remembering faces. He found learning to read hard but then cracked it aged 7 (with phonics) and became a super reader very fast. He got a scholarship to private school and went on to get a PhD at Imperial. Thanks in large part to spell checkers.

I have two brothers who were diagnosed as dyslexic as young adults. They both have very poor organizational skills.

My two of my kids are probably on the spectrum although now a diagnosis of dyslexia seems to have gone out of fashion.
My 9 year old DD has semantic pragmatic issues. She had a photographic memory and learnt to read extremely easily (I taught her with phonics). She was reading Harry Potter to herself aged 6. She can spell really well if asked to spell out a word. She has terrible spelling in the context of writing. She also has terrible organizational skills and can't plan her work on a page very well. I partly put this down to the fact that she also has hypermobility in her joints (inherited from me). Although there are strong links between hypermobility and the autism spectrum anyway.

Second child (DS aged 7) finds everything easy. Learnt to read via phonics (at home) - second best reader in his class. Only exception is spelling which he has to learn whole word for a spelling test every week. He absolutely hates it. The spelling are fairly random and he often has not learnt the relevent phonic sounds to sound out the words (i.e. they are too hard for the level of SP that they have got to in class). We have resorted to look, cover, check. We use computer games like those at www.spellingcity.com for him to get better at them. He really does not enjoy it though and i wish the school would ditch the spelling test (part of the problem may be being tested).

My third child is only 4 so it is hard to guess how he will turn out but he has trouble searching for words. When he finds one they can be really quirky and charming. I think he might be an artist!! He is struggling with the reading books at school (Floppy phonics - too many words). Luckily mum is working with him at home doing lots of word building and games.

Anyhow i digress.

flummoxednow - those spellings look similar to what my daughter produces in her written work.

My guess is that since we haven't had a synthetic phonics based curriculum for the whole population before we are still developing the appropriate strategies. Early SP is easy. Later on SP is hard to teach well and teachers need to be trained. Equally there must be great strategies for teaching spelling with phonics but they need to be gathered together and shared. Teachers certainly are not using them in schools at present.

The OU are now offering a great online Synthetic Phonics course aimed at Teaching assistants, Parents and Teachers. I am planning to do it. It was designed by Sounds Write who have a great reputation in this area. My mum is a Sounds Write Trainer (i.e. she teaches teachers).

Enuff (-:
Lisa

I haven't read the whole thread so probably repeating, but isn't the whole concept of phonetic spelling in English completely daft?!

In my day, if we spelt a word wrong we had to look it up in the dictionary and write it out correctly ten times. It worked for me.

After posting that, it occurs to me to ask - are children even taught to use a dictionary these days?

ZephirineDrouhin/bruffin/claig and everyone who has responded to my queries.

Thanks for all your useful contibution so far. I have been flummoxed for the past few months, trying to help ds. The lesson I have learnt is that phonetic spelling and look/spell both work. The current emphasis on phonetics works well on most children but there is a group of children who get really confused. Phonetic spelling is only one strategy and it is wrong and unhelpful to some children to insist that this is the only way. This is the 'one size fits all' approach that let some children down.

I am aware that teachers have a lot on their plates and children who are seemingly 'doing ok' will always be disadvantaged as they are left to 'get on'. I will help ds to work this out.

claig, thanks for the last suggestion. Asked oldest ds what strategy he uses. He says rote learning and phonetic spelling when he is really stuck. The difference with my two ds is discipline. Maybe I will try that on second ds.

ds's school uses synthetic phonics, which I thought everyone had to use as their main strategy now?

I approve, as when I was at secondary school, I met a whole load of kids who had been taught ITA at their primaries. None of the poor buggers could spell. The leap from spelling phonetically (i.e. wrongly) to learning the real spellings was far too confusing. Put the poor sods off English for life. And people DO judge adults who cannot spell, however unfair that is.

lisata, thank you very much for a very constructive and open-minded post. I think gaelicsheep has a good point that it is the repetitive writing out of a word and use of a dictionary that helps many children learn how to spell. This old-fashioned method did not work for all children, but it did work for millions of them. Therefore it needs to be considered as a possibility if other methods are not working.

flummoxednow, you know only too well that your son's spelling is at crisis level. This is harming his confidence and setting him back. He is a bright lad and the current method is not working for him. There is no time to waste now, other methods such as memorisation must be tried now before it is too late. We all wish you the best of luck.

Thanks claig, I agree with you. I take comfort from that the fact that he is doing well in all areas of the curriculum despite his poor spelling and writing. Imagine what he is capable of when he cards this

I meant cracks this

Flummoxed he will be capable of anything whether he cracks it or not

Whilst the government instigated an independent review of how to teach reading led by Jim Rose and subsequently accepted Rose's recommendations, various people in the government and industry had already endorsed, financed and promoted Reading Recovery for 'intervention' which directly contradicts the synthetic phonics teaching methods.

This means that the children who are weakest at reading and spelling are most likely to receive intervention of the Reading Recovery ilk - that is, the reading strategies that Rose rejects.

This has been criticised in a recent inquiry by the Science and Technology select committee. The government has yet to respond to the subsequent report.

In addition, the government's guidance for synthetic phonics teaching 'Letters and Sounds' has been adopted by many schools and yet this guidance has flaws and fizzles out towards its latest stages when the teaching of spelling needs to be particularly thorough and intense. Many local authorities are pushing schools towards 'doing' the free government 'programme' and they are failing to evaluate which are the most rigorous and supportive programmes. Instead, advisors, internet fans and teachers are making ad hoc resources to go with Letters and Sounds.

What this means, in effect, is that your English teaching workforce has received mixed messages about their teaching methods and what they should do for intervention, and official people with great authority are pushing a programme because it's the governments - not because it's the best.

There are some areas where teachers have received rigorous training through independent providers like 'Sounds~Write' - a programme that was mentioned earlier.

Wrongly, and sadly, there is absolutely no guarantee as to whether your teaching workforce has received good synthetic phonics training or use a thorough synthetic phonics programme - these are far and few between.

What I am saying, then, is that we have a long way to go before people can attribute children's reading and spelling to the use of leading-edge methods and materials. I suggest many schools are still at the stage of muddling along - or they may have some stronger synthetic phonics teaching in Reception which may fizzle out higher up the school - particularly where spelling is concerned.

Personally, I thought the 9 year old lad did some pretty sensible spelling all things considered.

Spelling needs to be worked at really hard and consistently and teachers are not provided with adequate resources and training to do this - nor is there adequate time spent at school teaching spelling.

It would be interesting for parents on this forum to do a survey of their children's schools to find out exactly what is going on.

Ultimately, with spelling, specific words and word banks need to be taught. Very few schools will teach word banks so that children can recall which words have which spelling alternatives.

Any worried parents need to consider finding a good programme and doing some teaching at home in addition to the school's teaching.

Thanks debbiehep

Straight on the nail (-:

What you say about schools sounds extemely familiar. But as I will remain silent on this one as I am a governor at school and my views needed to be aired constructively and carefully (-:

On a positive note though phonic books is selling an awful lot of decodable readers and the related worksheets! Strangely schools seem to need to spend money when they are about to be Ofsted-ed - maybe one positive to come out of the whole inspection regime (-:

Interesting your comment about ad-hoc resources based on letters and sounds - I will have to read up on the criticisms of Letters and Sounds. I do believe that well designed free resources could be a game changer for synthetic phonics. The problem is how do you get them to be well designed? This may feel like giving away the crown jewels for those in the education business but unless teachers get access to really good materials they are never going to understand what phonics can do. But I am getting way off topic...

Lisa

Dictionaries? Anyone?

Doesn't always work gaelicsheep. DS thought always began with an "O" and my favorite mispelling of his "Awfisherly"

Thank god for spell checkers, DS does most of his homework on PC.

Haven't got much to add to the discussion, but did laugh last night when dd wrote 'potato' but spelled it 'btaito' which is exactly how she says it!!

This is a slight digression but.. I have been thinking of this all morning (yes I have!)

Are some parents too keen to get their children diagnosed as 'dyslexic' just to get extra help. If children cannot spell properly because (to be controversial) they have bot been taught properly, is it their fault? There is another thread in SEN where many parents are asking whether their children are dyslexic when they can read but cannot spell. If they are taught to read and write properly, would UK have less number of dyslexics?

BTW I do not deny the existence of dyslexia.