Building Great Spellers 

In the age of spell check and autocorrect, some might argue that good spelling is an obsolete skill. However, spelling is still a crucial aspect of reading and writing, and so the skills required for good spelling are critical for successful reading and writing. If students can spell well, they will be able to read better and use a more extensive vocabulary, allowing them to focus on formulating and communicating their ideas rather than worrying about spelling words. Yet spelling is not a skill that comes naturally to everyone. Instead, it needs to be taught explicitly, just like reading and writing.

Based on their InitiaLit spelling assessments, it was evident that our students had made progress in their spellings, yet some were still struggling to apply the explicitly taught spelling knowledge and skills when writing in various situations. So when our University of Technology partners presented us with an opportunity to engage in an Action Research Project at the start of the year, we decided to use this project to focus on developing strategies to help students better apply their InitiaLit knowledge when spelling words in various writing contexts.

Using findings from professional readings on current theory and practices as well as ongoing collaboration with our colleagues, we began the process of designing, implementing and measuring the impact of a range of interventions to determine how best to tackle this challenge. 

In Prep, the students began to practise writing the letters and sounds introduced in the PreLit lessons using a variety of strategies and activities, such as, skywriting, rainbow writing and ‘roll and write’. In doing so, we aimed to reduce the demand on students’ working memory, or ‘cognitive load’, so they would be able to write the letters with fluency and ease.

In Kindergarten and Year 2, the students began to practise writing the ‘tricky words’ on mini whiteboards regularly throughout the week, to assist them with spelling these high-frequency words from memory. Each time a new set of ‘tricky’ words was introduced, the students would learn to write these words by saying the letters aloud as they wrote them. Explicit emphasis was placed on the ‘tricky part’ in the words to help students learn that these words cannot be segmented into sounds as a spelling strategy but instead must be learnt by rote.

The students further practised spelling the ‘tricky’ words by engaging in weekly dictation writing, where they were required to write a dictated sentence containing a mixture of both decodable and ‘tricky’ words. This allowed the teachers to monitor the words that the students were still struggling with, so that additional practice could be provided during subsequent lessons.

In Year 2, the students also began to edit their own work using a coloured pen, each time they completed their weekly dictation writing. The students were taught to read back over their writing, circle any errors, and provide the correct spelling of misspelt words, particularly the ‘tricky’ words. This important skill not only encourages the students to take greater responsibility for their work while also practising a vital part of the writing process.

The implementation of these targeted intervention strategies, designed to support students’ learning and address the ‘cognitive load’, yielded remarkable academic accomplishments and success. The efficacy of these strategies was evident in the noteworthy enhancement of student performance as indicated by the InitiaLit assessments. Furthermore, teachers observed a heightened proficiency in the application and accuracy in spelling tricky words within students’ written text types and dictated sentences. Notably, Year 2s demonstrated an increased application toward incorporating editing and proofreading techniques in their review of written texts. Given the success of these interventions, we are now keen to embed these practices across P-4 and further research evidence-based approaches to teaching spelling in the upper primary years. Stay tuned! 

Donna Mattick, Stephanie Yiorkas, Clare Wood, Rebecca Saba