Spelling Problems? Learn How to Make Spelling Easy
September 14th, 2009I often hear from parents that are concerned about their child struggling to learn to spell. In fact Kathy B. writes about her son, “He reads well, but cannot copy from the board or from a book without many spelling errors. The spelling issue is very evident in his written expression also.”
Typically when a child has difficulty with spelling it is due to problems with the auditory processing areas of auditory discrimination, auditory closure, auditory memory, auditory visual integration. Visual processing may also impact spelling, specifically visual memory problems.
However, learning to spell doesn’t have to be hard. All children can learn to spell when you teach spelling in an auditory, visual, and tactile method that teaches the structure of the language at the same time.
One of the hidden secrets of spelling is that we only put letters together 8 ways to make words. See an example of how I teach the first of the 8 spelling patterns.
Hope this is helpful.
Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET
P.S. Be sure to leave a comment below or ask a question to your right.
Hi
I love the way you have broken the most used 500 words into vowel patterns. That really makes it simple to teach the words and kids can hold on to the spelling that way, too.
I wish we could order ON LINE. Will you be setting that up in the future?
Hi Anne,
We are working on getting it set up – I just don’t know how long it will take – may be a few more weeks or a month??? But, in the meantime we are taking orders over the phone.
Bonnie Terry, M. E.d, BCET
Thank you, Bonnie. I’ve just blogged on the relationship between auditory and visual spelling strategies at http://penningtonpublishing.com/blog/spelling_vocabulary/visual-spelling-strategies/
Just read your article. I’m glad to see that you understand the relationship the auditory system has with spelling. So many people don’t understand that. I typically tell parents that when their child has a spelling difficulty it is more often than not due to a problem with auditory processing. That is exactly why Making Spelling Sense combines auditory processing and visual processing when teaching spelling. It combines the auditory sound-symbol relationship as well as other areas of auditory processing with the 8 spelling patterns, making spelling much easier.
Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET
Thanks!