Yes, spelling should be taught

Abstract

There is little doubt that some students are very good spellers. I recall, in my first year of teaching, teaching a 9-year-old student whose spelling was nearly perfect. In a recent study of 7-year-old spellers we encountered a speller who was able to spell equally well. She could correctly spell Latin based words such as ‘extraordinary’ and ‘imagination’ (Nicholson & Dymock, 2018). We also know that many children struggle with spelling. In the same class of 7 year olds there were students who were experiencing difficulty spelling common everyday words such as school [scool], what [wat], have [hav] and said [sed]. Why some children in the same class are good spellers and others are not, despite being exposed to the same learning experiences, is not easy to answer. What we do know is that teaching spelling helps students to write. Rightly or wrongly spelling makes a first impression - either good or not-so-good.In addition, it is not only important for the writer to know what they have written – the reader must also be able to read the text. Would the envelope below make a positive first impression or a less-than-positive one (see Figure 1)?