Spelling Ability Research Articles

Implementation Takes Time: Reduction of Literacy Problems in Schools Implementing an Early-Literacy Intervention

Early-literacy interventions might prevent reading problems in the long term, but effects are rarely examined at scale. In this study, we examined whether the large-scale implementation of the Dutch early-literacy intervention Build! reduced the percentage of readers with difficulties and improved mean reading skills at the school level. Transfer effects to spelling and reading comprehension were also examined. Over the course of 6 years, schools not implementing Build! (61–126 schools, depending on the outcome measure) were compared to 72 to 145 schools that introduced Build! during the project. Per year, intervention schools were modeled as using or not using the intervention. Using difference-in-difference models, we examined changes in literacy skills from the moment the intervention was introduced. Findings indicated that there was no immediate effect of the intervention. However, after the intervention had been used for 2 years, the percentage of children with difficulties in reading, spelling, and reading comprehension started to decrease and the mean reading and spelling ability increased. Results suggest that large-scale evaluations of interventions should be continued for several years, as effects might show several years after the implementation of the intervention.

Spelling morphology in Hebrew: Comparing monolingual and bilingual children

AbstractBilingual children are at risk for gaps in literacy in the societal language compared to monolingual peers. However, most research has focused on reading achievement, and only few studies have investigated spelling abilities, with contradictory findings. Here, we compare Hebrew spelling skill and its predictors in bilingual and monolingual elementary school children, immersed in Hebrew as a societal language. Specifically, we examined the morphological elements in Hebrew spelling. Monolingual children outperformed bilingual children in spelling accuracy, in both 2nd and 4th grade. In addition, phonological awareness and morphological awareness were significant predictors of spelling for both groups, but their relative contribution differed across the groups. Finally, even though bilingual children had lower morphological knowledge than monolingual peers, both groups showed the expected developmental pattern of spelling function letters more accurately than root letters. This pattern in Hebrew spelling acquisition is driven by the morpho-orthographic regularities of the language. These results support previous findings emphasizing the role of morphology in Hebrew spelling acquisition, extending them to bilingual children. We suggest that examining the linguistic backgrounds of children and the unique characteristics of the language and orthography are crucial for reaching a nuanced understanding of bilingual spelling acquisition.

The Effects of a Morphological Awareness Intervention on Reading and Spelling Ability of Children With Dyslexia

This paper examines the effects of a morphological awareness intervention on the word reading and spelling skills of Grades 4 to 6 children with dyslexia. Sixteen children in eastern Ontario, Canada, received 20 hours of morphologically oriented instruction spread over 6 weeks and eight served as controls, and all received a battery of reading and spelling tests before and after the intervention. Students were taught the nature of morphology and the types of morphemes, how words could be assembled from morphemes or deconstructed into morphemes to make meaning from print and access the correct pronunciation, and how to use morphology in reading and spelling words. Repeated measures analyses of variance and analyses of covariance indicated that the experimental group showed significantly larger gains than the control group on measures of morphological awareness, morphological decoding, morphological analysis, and morphological spelling. There were no significant effects on word reading (fluency and accuracy) or on standardized spelling measures.

On the relationship between word reading ability and spelling ability

On the relationship between word reading ability and spelling ability

The Use of Textism and Students’ Spelling Ability

Textism, or SMS language, is the abbreviated and informal language often used on digital communication platforms. While textism had gained popularity and efficiency in modern communication, its impact on language skills, particularly spelling abilities among students, had become a subject of interest for researchers. This study explored the relationship between textism and the spelling ability of Junior High School students during the School Year 2022-2023. The study used a descriptive-correlational research design involving 238 students selected through a stratified random sampling method. The data was collected using a Modified-Textism Questionnaire and a Researcher-made Spelling Ability Test. Mean, Standard Deviation, and Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient were the statistical tools used in the study. Results showed high textism usage regarding shortenings, contractions, clippings, acronyms and initialisms, letter and number homophones, non-conventional spellings, and onomatopoeic spellings. The students’ spelling ability was good, reflecting their mastery of word formation rules and conventions. The study found a significant relationship between contractions, homophones, clippings, and spelling ability, but no correlation was observed for shortenings, acronyms, non-conventional spellings, and onomatopoeic spellings. The study further revealed that heavy reliance on textisms could decrease spelling ability over time. Future studies may investigate additional linguistic aspects of textism, such as syntactic structures or grammar usage, to comprehensively understand its impact on students’ spelling ability.

Research on Strategies for Improving Primary School Chinese Pinyin Ability Based on Blended Learning

The teaching of Pinyin is the basis of Chinese teaching in primary schools. The level of Chinese spelling ability will have a direct impact on students’ future learning and cognition of things. How can we better improve the classroom quality of primary school Chinese and the learning efficiency of students? This is a question that needs to be considered. In the teaching process, blended learning can fully leverage students’ subjectivity and teachers’ leadership, thereby improving students’ overall level. Through conducting educational quasi experiments, selecting the same teaching content for teaching design, selecting research subjects, and setting up experimental and control groups in the experiment, the experimental group adopts a mixed teaching mode, while the control group continues to use traditional teaching mode. Finally, test questions are used for summary evaluation and interviews with parents. The implementation effect is summarized through data analysis. The experimental results show that compared with traditional single classroom teaching, The blended learning classroom is lively and interesting, effectively solving problems such as students’ difficulty in reading tones and overall recognition of syllables. From this, it can be seen that the blended learning mode is one of the effective ways to improve primary school Chinese spelling ability. During the learning process, tasks are assigned online before class, materials are collected, and various teaching methods are used to analyze and expand after class. Students use blended learning mode to preview online, expanding knowledge in offline classrooms, this learning model also provides ideas for teaching other teaching content.

Equivalence of Computer- and Paper-Based Administrations of the SCHNAPP Spelling Test in German for Six-Year-Old Children

Abstract: The SCHNAPP Spelling Test is a novel screening instrument to identify at-risk children with poor spelling abilities in German at the beginning of primary school. Although originally developed as a computerized test to be administered on tablets, in school settings paper-pencil methods are often still preferred. Therefore, the present study on N = 390 children from first grades in Austrian primary schools examined the equivalence of computer and paper-pencil versions of the test. After demonstrating unidimensional measurement models in both assessment conditions, analyses of differential response functioning on the item and test level found no substantial testing mode effects. These results indicate that the SCHNAPP Spelling Test can be comparably used as a computer- or paper-based instrument in school assessments.

Clinical Teaching sebagai Penangganan Disleksia pada Peserta Didik

Dyslexia is a term that is related to the pattern of learning difficulties of students and is accompanied by characteristic problems in word recognition and accuracy, poor decoding and weak spelling abilities. Dyslexia can be experienced by students at all levels of education. Dyslexia should not prevent students from getting learning like other students. Thus the teacher must find the right subscription to overcome the learning difficulties of dyslexic students. In compiling this article, the authors use qualitative research and focus on literature studies. The author collects through documentation activities, namely collecting all information about dyslexia in books, journals, theses and other reading sources. This study aims to determine the definition of dyslexia, the characteristics of dyslexia and the factors that can affect dyslexia. The author also aims to inform readers about dyslexia subscription assistance which is termed clinical teaching. This article shows that clinical teaching can be one of the subscriptions for dyslexic students to find the weaknesses they face so that teachers and parents can create learning that is in accordance withthe characteristics of dyslexia and they can increase the potential that exists in dyslexic students.
 Keywords: Dyslexia, Clinical Teaching, Students

ECRIMO, an app to train first graders' spelling: Effectiveness and comparison between different designs

The present study assessed the effectiveness of the ECRIMO educational application designed to build first‐grade level spelling skills. We tested whether using the app to teach spelling would be as effective as providing the same training using traditional paper exercises. The effect of integrating gamification into mobile learning apps, which has been little studied in the context of young children, is also investigated. A pretest/training/posttest design was implemented with 311 first‐graders divided in four groups: no training, paper training, the ECRIMO app with gamification features, and the ECRIMO app without gamification. Spelling, reading and phonological awareness abilities was measured at both pretest and posttest. The training was conducted over a 7‐week period (4.40 hours in total). The experimental design allowed us to answer three questions: (1) Is spelling training effective regardless of the medium used? (2) Is training through the app as efficient as paper‐based training? (3) Does gamification impact students' learning performance? Mixed‐model analyses revealed (1) a positive effect on the training outcome depended on the initial spelling ability of participants, (2) a comparable efficiency between autonomous training using the ECRIMO app on tablets and the same training provided by teachers using paper exercises and (3) a marginally positive effect of gamification that is greater for the weakest students. The present study proposes an original and pertinent experimental design to test the relevance of educational applications. The design features of learning apps can impact students' learning differently depending on their initial level. A critical step should be verifying that using online apps for training is at least as effective as the same training using paper exercises. Practitioner notesWhat is already known about this topic A significant number of children experience difficulties in reading and spelling from the first years of learning. The use of new technologies to support classroom teaching is rapidly developing as a topic of interest for educational professionals and researchers. Evaluations of new technologies developed to enhance literacy skills suggest that many factors can vary their effectiveness. The effectiveness of a digital educational application can be enhanced or undermined by design choices, such as gamification. What this paper adds Spelling training with the app ECRIMO seems effective for first year students, especially those with the lowest and middle level. Comparable effects of both the tablet‐based and paper equivalent training on participants' spelling were found. The use of gamification in ECRIMO could be more suitable for the weakest students. Implications for practice and/or policy Educational technologies should be evidence‐based and should be evaluated with both a passive and an active control group. The design should be carefully considered and tested, as it may be advantageous for some students and disadvantageous for others. The use of digital technology in education can be beneficial for classroom practice, when the activity can be carried out in total autonomy, leaving the teacher available for a group of pupils with specific needs.

Spelling Proficiency of Children with a Resolved Phonological Speech Sound Disorder Treated with an Integrated Approach-A Long-Term Follow-Up Randomized Controlled Trial.

Phonological developmental speech sound disorders (pDSSD) in childhood are often associated with later difficulties in literacy acquisition. The present study is a follow-up of the randomized controlled trial (RCT) on the effectiveness of PhonoSens, a treatment for pDSSD that focuses on improving auditory self-monitoring skills and categorial perception of phoneme contrasts, which could have a positive impact on later spelling development. Our study examines the spelling abilities of 26 German-speaking children (15 girls, 11 boys; mean age 10.1 years, range 9.3-11.2 years) 3-6 years after their successful completion of the PhonoSens treatment. Spelling assessment revealed that only 3 out of 26 participants developed a spelling disorder. In the overall population of fourth-graders, one in five children showed a spelling deficit; in another study of elementary school children, with resolved pDSSD, 18 of 32 children had a spelling deficit. Thus, the applied pDSSD treatment method appears to be associated with positive spelling development. Multiple regression analysis revealed that among the potentially predictive factors for German-speaking children with resolved pDSSD to develop later spelling difficulties, parental educational level and family risk for developmental language disorder (DLD) had an impact on children's spelling abilities; gender and the child's phonological memory had not.

Does participating in a daily handwriting without tears curriculum for 4-weeks improve a first-grade student’s spelling abilities: Single-subject ABA design

ABSTRACT COVID−19 and remote instruction negatively impacted student’s handwriting. This study aimed to determine if the implementation of a rigorous handwriting curriculum has an impact on a first-grade students’ ability to spell. This study used a single-subject, ABA quasi-experimental design. The study was completed by a first-grade teacher, with consultative support from an occupational therapy practitioner. The study was completed in a single first-grade general education classroom. Participants were recruited through convenience sampling and were eligible if they were in the principal researchers first-grade classroom. The total number of participants was 15 first-grade students of which six were boys and nine were girls, ages six to seven. Intervention was implemented in small groups for 20 minutes/day, five days/week, for a total of twenty-sessions. The Primary Spelling Inventory was administered pre- and post-intervention to measure the student’s spelling abilities. Paired sample t-test indicated statistically significant difference between pre- and posttest scores. Participants demonstrated an average improvement of 5.27 words after receiving the intervention, with 14 of 15 students demonstrating an improvement in pre- and post-assessment scores. Implementation of a handwriting curriculum improves a first-grade student’s handwriting skills and positively impacts spelling ability. Evidence supporting systematic approaches to improving handwriting contributes to teachers and occupational therapy practitioner’s professional reasoning when selecting specific intervention tools, in addition to determining appropriate dosage of intervention. Evidence can be utilized by occupational therapy practitioners to support classroom teachers and influence curricular decisions at the administrative level when determining curriculum to address handwriting. Occupational therapy practitioners can highlight the positive impact that mastery with handwriting can have on academic areas such as spelling.

On the role of morphology in early spelling in Hebrew and Arabic.

It is well known that learning to spell is a complex and challenging process, especially for young learners, in part because it relies on multiple aspects of linguistic knowledge, such as phonology and morphology. The present longitudinal study investigated the role of morphology in early spelling in two Semitic languages, Hebrew and Arabic, that are structurally similar but differ in the phonological consistency of phoneme to letter mappings ("backward consistency"). Whereas Arabic mappings are mostly one-to-one - allowing children to rely mainly on phonology to spell words correctly, Hebrew has numerous one-to-many phoneme-to-letter mappings that are governed by morphological considerations, thereby precluding a purely phonological spelling strategy. We, therefore, predicted that morphology would make a more substantial contribution to early Hebrew spelling than to Arabic spelling. We tested this prediction in a longitudinal study of two large parallel samples (Arabic, N = 960; Hebrew, N = 680). We assessed general non-verbal ability, morphological awareness (MA), and phonological awareness (PA) in late Kindergarten and spelling in the middle of the first grade with a spelling-to-dictation task. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that after controlling for age, general intelligence, and phonological awareness, morphological awareness contributed a significant additional 6% variance to Hebrew spelling but only 1% to Arabic word spelling. The results are discussed within the framework of the Functional Opacity Hypothesis (Share, 2008), which we extend to spelling.

Pengaruh Proses Menulis dan Kognitif terhadap Kemampuan Menulis Teks Naratif Siswa

This study aimed to investigate the aspects of an individual's writing process that play an important role in improving the quality of writing products, as well as the role of individual cognition on the quality of writing products. A factorial analysis design was used in this study. The results of this study, first, the aspects of spontaneous revision and vocabulary revision affect the quality of writing. In addition, it was also found that students with better reading ability tended to do more intensive online revision. Second, the process aspects that affect the quality of students' narrative writing are spelling ability and the number of revisions. In addition, students' cognitive abilities also have a significant influence on their writing ability. The aspects of cognitive ability that influence are oral language ability, reading, vocabulary selection, capitalization, and spelling. The process aspects that play an important role in improving narrative writing skills are spelling and reading cognitive abilities. The processes that contributed significantly to improving writing quality were oral language ability, attention, and working memory.

Reduction in right lateralized N2 error response to stroke order violations in poor Chinese word spellers: A study on event-related potential markers for Chinese reading and spelling

Stroke order knowledge is critical for Chinese reading and spelling acquisition. Previous studies have demonstrated enhancements of the N2 and P3 event-related potential (ERP) components at the Pz electrode to stroke order violations of Chinese characters in younger adults. However, it remained unclear whether similar ERP responses could be found in children. The current study investigated the ERP responses to stroke order violations of Chinese characters in children and examined the associations of the ERP responses with children’s Chinese reading and spelling performance. A total of 26 Grade 2 Hong Kong Chinese children observed stroke-by-stroke displays of Chinese characters and judged whether the Chinese characters were written in the correct order. The ERP results showed larger anterior N2 and posterior P3 at the midline electrodes to the incorrect strokes than to the correct strokes. In addition, a smaller right lateralized temporal N2 response to the incorrect strokes was found in poor spellers as compared with good spellers of Chinese. The effect of the right lateralized temporal N2 response on reading performance was fully mediated through spelling ability. These results demonstrated increases in the anterior N2 and posterior P3 responses to stroke order violation of Chinese characters in second graders and suggest the right lateralized N2 response as a potential neural marker of Chinese literacy development in children.

An Online Approach for Dyslexia Screening to Test a Child

Dyslexia is a learning disability, which manifests itself in a limited reading and spelling ability. Dyslexia, when not diagnosed early could have serious implications in later life, such as limited educational and professional development. The method involved the application of the psychometric tool Dyslexia Screening Test – Secondary (DST-S) and the observation of disability specific traits, such as handwriting. The male child’s psychometric screening test score (1.0) indicated a strong risk at dyslexia. The implications of the results and the potential addition of the two absent test items are taken into account to view possible result differences.

The Role of Writing Process Components and Cognitive Components in Improving the Quality of Narrative

This study aims to study the relationship between the writing process through an online learning system and students' writing products. This study also studied cognitive factors in the process component and the final product of writing. The study used a factorial analysis design because it aims to determine what factors contribute significantly to narrative writing skills. The students who became the sample were 125 students comprising 60 males and 65 females. The research findings show that the writing process component has a significant contribution to the quality of students' narrative writing. The process components that affect the quality of narrative writing are spelling ability and the number of revisions made by students. Cognitive components that affect students' writing skills are oral language skills, reading skills, selective attention, capitalization, and spelling. Thus, this component of the process of writing narrative text is only correlated with the cognitive abilities of spelling and reading, in contrast to the quality of the final product which is correlated with spoken language skills, attention, and working memory. The implication of this research is to strengthen the cognitive role in narrative writing; teachers must encourage students to be active in spoken language and optimize reading teaching in the learning process.

The contributions of reading and phonological awareness for spelling in grade three isiXhosa learners

Background: One factor which is consistently highlighted in research on literacy is the lack of understanding of how literacy develops in the Southern-Bantu languages. In particular, little is known about spelling in the Southern-Bantu languages such as isiXhosa.Objectives: Through the use of an initial exploratory study and a conceptual replication study, we examined the relationships between reading, phonological awareness, and spelling in isiXhosa grade 3 learners. The initial exploratory study sought to describe the relationships between reading and spelling, and phonological awareness and spelling in a sample of 49 grade 3 isiXhosa learners. We then conceptually replicated this study with a larger sample of 200 grade 3 isiXhosa learners. We expected that both reading and phonological awareness would be related to spelling and that the strength of the relationship between reading and spelling, and phonological awareness and spelling would vary with spelling ability, due to the changes that occur in the development of spelling.Method: Cross-sectional, quantitative secondary data were used from two different projects to answer the research questions. Tasks of phonological awareness, oral reading fluency and spelling were developed and administered to the participants.Results: We found that reading was a replicable predictor of spelling for grade 3 isiXhosa learners and that phonological awareness was influential only at the mid-range of spelling performance.Conclusion: Our findings emphasise the importance of the reading – writing connection, and lend support for what has been found for other consistently written languages, adding to the growing body of knowledge of universal predictors of spelling development.

Improving Students’ English Spelling Ability Through Activity-Based Teaching-Learning for Standard VII

This paper’s problem is improving the spelling ability of Standard VII students of a selected Higher Secondary School in Pune. The primary reasons behind the low ability of spelling highlighted by teachers of the English language are 1. Irregularities in classes/guidance/practice during covid-19 related periods, 2. Lack of interest in practicing spelling due to online and limited classes, and 3. Lack of motivation to work on spelling at home. Studies on improving spelling include Language games, storytelling, activity-based learning, specialized guidance, and so forth. The research methodology consists of identifying an issue with spelling ability, planning ac- activities to improve spelling, implementing/action, and checking the effectiveness of the activities by reflecting on the results. The researcher conducted activities with the help of school teachers. The researcher used activities like word breaks, word journals, personal dictionaries, and dictation with test scores to interpret results. For analyzing data, the researcher used test scores and compared them with two situations, pre-test and post-test conditions of an experiment. Activities implemented were found beneficial to increase interest in getting essential skills in English like spelling and confirmed by the results. Similarly, this study showed significant improvement in spelling using activity-based teaching-learning.

Using language games to improve the spelling ability of primary four pupils of Kormantse Methodist Primary ‘A’

Using language games to improve the spelling ability of primary four pupils of Kormantse Methodist Primary ‘A’

Associations between maternal exposure to surgery or pregnancy exposure to fluorinated anesthetics and children's cognitive development and educational outcomes.

A transgenerational, epigenetic effect of anesthesia, particularly fluorinated agents, has been examined in rat models, but translation to humans is unclear. This study examined associations of maternal lifetime exposure to anesthesia and pregnancy exposure to fluorinated anesthetics with child cognitive and educational outcomes. Women in the US Collaborative Perinatal Project (1959-1963) reported lifetime history of surgeries, and the obstetric record captured pregnancy exposure to anesthetics. Children were followed to age 7 for global cognitive ability and educational outcomes (n=47,977). Logistic and linear regressions were adjusted for maternal and child birth years, race and ethnicity, smoking, education, parity, study site. Many outcomes were not associated with exposure to maternal surgery that occurred at various life stages. However, maternal surgery in early childhood was associated both with being in a special school or not in school (adj OR=1.42; 95% CI 1.02, 1.98) and with slightly better cognitive ability across childhood (e.g., WISC IQ (adj β=0.59; CI 0.13, 1.04) (especially among boys)). Maternal surgery in puberty was associated with slightly lower IQ (adj β= -0.42; CI -0.79, -0.05) and poorer spelling at age 7. Children's prenatal exposure to fluorinated anesthetics was associated with slightly better spelling ability (adj β = 1.20; CI 0.02, 2.38) but lower performance IQ at age 7 (only among boys, adj β=-1.97; CI -3.88, -0.06). This study shows inconsistent evidence of effects of maternal exposure to surgery or prenatal exposure to fluorinated agents on child developmental and educational outcomes Residual confounding by indication and socioeconomic status may explain observed associations.