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CS 012 544

Laminack, Lester L.; Wood, KatieSpelling in Use: Looking Closely at Spelling in WholeLanguage Classrooms.National Council of Teachers of English, Urbana,

ISBN-0-8141-4663-596138p.; Foreword by Sandra Wilde; Afterword by LucyCalkins.National Council of Teachers of English, 1111 W.Kenyon Road, Urbana, IL 61801-1096 (Stock No.46635-3050; $8.95 members, $11.95 nonmembers).Guides Classroom Use Teaching Guides (ForTeacher) (052) Books (010)

MF01/PC06 Plus Postage.Classroom Techniques; Elementary Education; *LanguageAcquisition; *Language Experience Approach; MiddleSchools; Parent Teacher Cooperation; *Spelling;*Spelling Instruction; *Student Evaluation; TeacherBehavior; *Whole Language Approach; Writing(Composition)

Providing a practical look at the role of spelling inthe overall language arts curriculum, this book helps those whointeract regularly witn young children understand how learning tospell is part of the broader fabric of learning to write in wholelanguage classrooms. After an introduction, chapter 1 providesopportunities to explore how teachers' beliefs about language andliteracy learning impact how they view their students' writing.Chapter 2 introduces three teachers who tell their personal storiesof transition from a traditional approach to spelling instruction toincorporating the study of spelling in use in their whole languageclassrooms. Chapter 3 provides suggestions for developing ways tosystematically study and assess children's spelling in use. Chapter 4presents the "nuts and bolts" of spelling instruction in a wholelanguage classroom. Chapter 5 provides practical help incommunicating with parents about the teaching of spelling in use. Thefinal chapter responds to questions that teachers most often askabout spelling instruction. Contains 19 references. (RS)

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Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be madefrom the original document.

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3

NCTE Editorial Board: Pat Cordeiro, Colette Daiute, BobbiFisher, Brenda Greene, Richard Luckert, Bill McBride. AileenPace Nilsen, Jerrie Cobb Scott, Karen Smith, Chair, ex officio,Dawn Boyer, ex officio

11

in Whole to*tagettas.sroorns

Lester L. LaminackWestern Carolina University

National Council of Teachers of English1111 W. Kenyon Road, Urbana, Illinois 61801-1096

q.

Manuscript Editor: Precision Graphic Services, Inc.

Production Editor: Mario Welshons

Cover and Interior Design: Precision Graphic Services, Inc.

Compositor: Precision Graphic Services, Inc.

NCTE Stock Number: 46635-3050

© 1996 by the National Council of Teachers of English. All rights reserved.

Printed in the United States of America.

"The Star" reprinted with the permission of Simon & Schuster Books for

Young Readers, an imprint of Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing

Division from DON'T READ THIS BOOK, WHATEVER YOU DO! by Ka Ili

Dakos. Text copyright © 1993 Ka Ili Dakos.

It is the policy of NCTE in its journals and other publications to provide

a forum for the open discussion of ideas concerning the content and

the teaching of English and the language arts. Publicity accorded to any

particular point of view does not imply endorsement by the Executive

Committee, the Board of Directors, or the membership at large, except in

announcements of policy, where such endorsements is clearly specified.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Laminack, Lester L., 1956-Spelling in use : looking closely at spelling in whole language

classrooms / Lester L. Laminack, Katie Wood ; with a foreword by

Sandra Wilde, afterword by Lucy Calkins.p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.ISBN 0-8141-4663-5 ( pbk.)

1. English languageOrthography and spellingStudy and teaching

(Elementary)United States. 2. Language experience approach in

educationUnited States. I. Wood, Katie, 1964- . 11. National

C(nincil of Teachers of English. Ill. Title.

1131574136 1996

372.6'32dc20 96-28685CIP

6

For all the children I put through spelling drills, exercises,and tests. I cringe when I remember those stars on the wall.Forgive me please, I didn't know better then.

And for Sandra Lawing, Dayle Keener, and Carol Suttoninsightful teachers, masterful kidwatchers, diligent advocatesfor children and teachers, valued colleagues, and treasuredfriends.

LLL

For all the children who helped me see their brilliance, and formy parents, Paul and Christine Wood, who helped me to seemine, and for Jim Ray, who balanced everything out.

7

KW

Foreword

Acknowledgments

ix

xiii

Introduction 1

1. SpellingWhat's All the Fuss? 5

2. Teachers' VoicesStories of Transition 21

3. Assessment First: Planning for a WritingCurriculum Tnat Deals Responsiblywith Spelling 41

4. Structures and Routines: ClassroomPossibilities 75

5. Communicating with Parents 89

6. Questions and Possibilities 107

Conclusion 113

Works Cited 119

Afterword 121

Index 123

Authors 129

In the last twenty years, few areas of elementary school cur-riculum have changed more than spelling. Many of today'steachers grew up in the era of half an hour a day spent on

spelling out of a textbook, with "creative writing" only on Friday

afternoons, if at all. In the early 1980s, the writing revolutionbegan, fomented by Donald Graves (1983), a revolution thatwould have been impossible in the primary grades and limitedin upper grades without the invented spelling that we were be-ginning to learn about from Charles Read (1975) and others. Butthe spelling books were still firmly in place in most classrooms.Gradually, however, teachers began to question twenty words aweek (and all the activities that went with them) that were un-related to the writing process. They began to look at childrenwho were actively thinking about how words are spelled andusing a variety of useful strategies to come up with thespellings of words as they wrote. The teachers saw that chil-dren's spelling improved as they got older through seeing morewords in print as part of extensive reading.

And these teachers' practices began to change. Theystopped using the textbooks (and their districts stopped buy-ing them). They placed spelling in the context of writing ratherthan in its own lengthy time slot every day. They paid attention

ix

Speiln i Use

to what children were doing and began teaching mini-lessons(with a whole class, with small groups, and with individuals)to prod students to the next step in their learning. LesterLaminack and Katie Wood's book both reflects and advancesthese changes in how we help children learn to spell.

Spelling, although a small piece of the writing process, is ofgreat concern to teachers, parents, and th- general public, soa great deal has been written about it. Spelling in Use, however,makes a number of unique contributions that make it espe-cially valuable for classroom teachers. Those who write aboutspelling sometimes get caught up in the complex ins and outsof how the English spelling system works and how we mightteach children all about it. Laminack and Wood, by contrast,stay focused on children, the writing process, and the every-day life of the classroom, so that common sense is this book'scentral quality (yet a common sense grounded in theoreticalknowledge).

There are several highlights of their thinking that all teach-ers interested in helping children learn to spell better shouldkeep in mind:

Kidwatching is crucial and central. The best instructiongrows out of paying close attention to what children aredoing: looking at their spellings, noticing how theycome up with spellings, and asking them about spelling.

"Curriculum watching- is also crucial and central: notic-ing that words learned for a test don't always transfer towriting, but that learning a good spelling strategy hasbroad application.

An informed, attentive teacher can create a powerful, ef-fective curriculum in which spelling grows out of chil-dren's Own explorations with spelling as they write.

This book has many highlightsvoices of teachers de-scribing how their spelling practices changed over time, varied

#

forewordKi

ideas for working with parents, mini-lessons that iliumir.ate butdon't prescribe, close looks at children's writing accompaniedby tools for assessing their growth as spellersbut I believethat teachers will prize it most for its combination of inspira-

tion and practical sense, its deep knowledge that any curricu-lum works best when teachers pay attention to kids and thenact on what they've learned from them.

11

Sandra Wilde

any significant people helped us along the way as SpellingIn Use came to be. First we would like to thank Dr. MaryRose and the North Carolina Department of Public Instruc-

tion for recognizing the need for a book like this. Spelling InUse began as an NCDPI resource docu-nent for teachers inNorth Carolina.

We would like to thank the teachers in the original thinktank who helped us develop ideas for the original NCDPI docu-ment. Sandra Lawing, Carol Sutton, Dayle Keener, and NormaKimzeyyour brilliant insights were (and continue toinvaluable.

We also wish to thank all the teachers and children whoinvited us to work with them in their classrooms and providedus with the examples and writing samples.

Thanks to Shirley Bateman and Merry Woodard who sup-port us daily with warm smiles, even when we don't deservethem.

Dawn Boyer. Thank you for believing in this project from thestart and for all your advice along the way. You have beena valuable mentor and have become a treasured friend. Thanksalso to Mario Welshons for your continuous support andguidance.

12

0

In whole language classrooms, instruction in spelling hap-pens every day. This instruction is carefully and thoughtfullywoven into and around the fabric of the work children do as

writers throughout the day. Because this instruction looks sodifferent from traditional spelling lessons, many adults havedifficulty understanding how children are learning to spell inwhole language classrooms and why approximations are val-ued and even celebrated when they are not "right. With hewknowledge available about how children learn, all of usteachers, parents, students, administratorsare rethinking,and rewriting a history of schooling that has sought to makeall learning linear and sequential.

Through many enccunters with children over severalyears, we have come to better understand how our instructionneeds to follow children's real work as writers. Like many ofour whole language colleagues, we are learning to get curricu-lum behind young writers so that it can propel them forwardrather than block their paths. The journey has not always beeneasy or comfortable. We've shared many worries about,. hether children were "getting it" and whether we were "teach-ing it" enough. But time and again, children have shown us, asthey have developed theories for how language works, that if

13 1

2 Spelling in Ilse

we trust them as learners and support them through our teach-ing, they will learn more than we could ever plan for in a neatseries of lessons planned apart from their lives as writers.

In the very heart of this book, we share the stories ofteachers who've been on this journey of new understandings.They share a common vision for the writing curriculum intheir classrooms. These teachers are not ignoring instructionin spelling. They are not oblivious to the need for writers touse conventional spelling in order to communicate powerfullythrough writing. Their focus is on the broader picture, theneed to develop young writers who recognize the value oftheir own words and ideas. These teachers help their studentssee spelling as one of the many resources at their command tocommunicate with the world. In short, the focus of theseteachers is on spelling in use rather than on spelling as an iso-lated fragment of the overall language arts curriculum.

The purpose of this book is to help those who interact reg-ularly with young children understand how learning to spell isa part of the broader fabric of learning to write in whole lan-guage classrooms. This book is written primarily for class-room teachers and provides a practical look at the role ofspelling in the overall language arts curriculum. The focus ison developing competent writers, with spelling as one aspectof that development. In this focus, spelling is seen not as a sep-arate subject but as one facet of the writing curriculum.

Spelling in Use is organized into six chapters. In Chapter 1 weprovide opportunities for you to explore how your own beliefsabout language and literacy learning impact how you view yourstudents' writing. We offer you the challenge to consider a moreholistic point of view as you think about your own instruction.

Chapter 2 introduces three teachers who tell their personalstories of transition from a traditional approach to spelling in-struction to incorporating the study of spelling in use in theirwhole language classrooms. Alongside each story is a runningcommentary that highlights the significant turning points inthat teacher's professional development. This commentary

14

Introduction 3

reveals the guiding assumptions that influenced the curriculardecisions each teacher made throughout her transition. Thischapter closes with a summary that demonstrates how thechanging views about spelling in these classrooms led to signif-icant changes in the writing instruction. Eventually, all threeteachers shared a common view of spelling in use as the bestinstructional approach for their writing workshops.

In Chapter 3 we provide suggestions that help you developways to systematically study and assess children's spelling inuse, and then use these assessments to plan whole-class, small-group, and individually appropriate instruction. As you readthis chapter, you will be encouraged to reconsider the tradi-tional linear planning structure of curriculuminstructionassessment. We suggest instead a "research, decide, teach"frame (Calkins 1994) in which assessment is thought of as re-search into what children are doing with spelling in their writ-ing. Information generated from this assessment informsdecisions about what to teach. We feel this kind of "assessmentfirst" planning should be the norm for all writing curriculum de-velopment enacted by wise classroom teachers, not just in re-lation to spelling. Also embedded in this chapter are specificsuggestions and vignettes from several classrooms thatdemonstrate the "research, decide, teach" model.

In Chapter 4, we present the "nuts and bolts" of spelling in-struction in a whole language classroom. There is a sampleschedule to demonstrate how spelling instruction might be or-ganized and how time might be managed in the classroom.Several examples are provided, and classroom vignettes areused to illuminate strategies that are commonly used byteachers and students in whole language classrooms.

Chapter 5 provides practical help in communicating withparents about the teaching of spelling in use. The chapter cov-ers four areasworkshops for parents, conferences with par-ents, individual letters to parents, and classroom newsletters.The chapter ends with a summary of the information we oftenshare with parents in newsletter formats.

15

4 Spelling in Use

In the final chapter we respond to questions that teachersmost often ask us about spelling instruction. We hesitate tocall our responses "answers" in any singular sense. Instead,we demonstrate our thinking process as we suggest possibili-ties for finding the answers to these questions in the work chil-dren do as writers. We believe the questions cannot beconsidered apart from the young writers they address.

16

`--

Spelling What does that single word call to mind? Many of usthink of spelling drills, writing "each word five times, makinga sentence with each word, and writing a paragraph with

those sentences. Maybe you remember exercises A, B, C, D, apractice test on Wednesday, and the real test on Friday (unlessyou scored 100 percent on the practice test). You may recallspelling bees or that red sp mark inside the circle hoveringabove some word on your page.

Perhaps the lenses we use to view spelling are somewhatfoggy or out of focus since we remember spelling drills, exer-cises, and tests, as do most adults. Our educational historiestremendously influence our adult perceptions of any situationthat involves teaching and learning. Our histories also limitour own abilities to assess our personal learning. For example,if we consider ourselves decent spellers today, rememberingthose drills, exercises, and tests, we are very likely to attributeour knowledge to that style of instruction.

BEST COPY AVAILABLE

17 5

6 Spelling in Use

Consider the story below written by Carl, a second grader.

hove 4 buil (1.. his naAvne. is1-ie is 6 .veokr-Sola

He ko6 a 61/0: nose-. Fie. ;5brcfm, Hei5 nose. 'Is

.R.DO C.All pull rh ca down 10.13.3. can pmll Y LAF hi ILMe.. anti B.-L- arejooci -6'ict-4 S

I have a bull dog. his name isB. J. He is 6 years oldHe has a black nose. He isbrown. Heis nose is flatB. J. can pull me down hill.B. J. can pull me up hill.Me and B. J. are good friends.

What are your immediate reactions to this piece? What do younotice? Take a few moments and jot down your first thoughtsin the space below.

FIRST REACTIONS:

Look again at Carl's piece and think about Carl's teacher. Whatwould you say the teacher values in Carl's writing? Make a list ofthose things and indicate the evidence you find in Carl's piece:

Spelling-What's All the f ass')

Now consider this piece from seven-year-old Jason, also asecond grader.

ha yo-o, -POr pick, r)3 t

piAnp for tA .\/'01.4. Played fhefiro,n2 very good.r Iilce music

c1454. Are we .gooi

2..11;yviil, Ore_ i-a (earn

hAv ploty the piArto,

Thavt ya4 for (.onThls,

t Vit0 intiarik5irg to be

n P rat of every baily.

l'ou are very 9 ON

5iner. Who toll- y0,4 -1-0

the pickno?We like you.

Have yol4 ever bcn

The Irloy:-`-lea. love, ),/o..4

201 Steppe StreetMarion, NC 28752

Dear Ms. Goff,Thank you for playing the

piano for us. You played thepiano very good. 1 like music

class. Are we good singgers?

1 will like to learnhow to play the piano.Thank you for coming.It was inbarusing to beinfrut of every body.You are a very goodsingger. Who tolt you to playthe piano? We like you.Have you ever ben inthe hospitle? I love you.

Love,

Jason

What are your immediate reactions to this piece? What do younotice? Take a few moments and jot down your first reactionsin the space below.

FIRST REACTIONS:

19

NW-

8 Spelting In Use

Now look again at Jason's piece and think about his teacher.What would you say Jason's teacher values in writing? Make alist of those things and indicate the evidence you find inJason's piece.

As you read Carl's story you probably noticed the neatness,the conventional spellings, the spacing between words, and theuse of punctuation. You may be thinking that this is a prettygood piece to get from a second-grade student. Look closely.Carl does have the conventions present in his writing, but atwhat cost? Whose voice is heard? What evidence do we have ofhis use of strategies for using language to express the experi-ences and ideas of his life? Look more closely. Read the piecealoud. Who do you hear in the piece? Is it the voice of a child? Ordoes it sound more like the pages of a primary reading program?

As you read Jason's story you probably noticed all thespelling "errors" immediately. That's what most adults notice.By looking into the familiar face of "error," however, we fail tosee into the reflective eyes of approximation. Jason's piece hasall the qualities we so cherish in Carl's story. Look closely andyou will see the letter formation, the spacing between words,the use of capitalization and punctuation. It's all there and it isused conventionally.

One surface difference is the spelling. Look more closely.Did you notice that there were 82 words in Jason's story? Didyou also notice that of the 82 words there were 53 differentwords? Did you notice that of the 53 different words 46 werespelled conventionally? That's rightthere were only 7 con-structed spellings! There are words very similar to thoseused by Carl, words such are, is, the, I. Now note the wordsfor which Jason constructed a spelling, words such as embar-rassing, singer, taught, hospital. When would most children

20

Spelling-Bat s RR the Fuss?

meet these words in a traditional spelling program? Howwould they be encountered? Would they spill over into thewriting of individual children? Why are they missing from

Carl's writing?You may find it interesting to know that Carl, whose piece

was written in April of his second-grade year, had come toknow reading through a basal reading program. He had cometo know spelling through a spelling book with daily exercisesand a weekly spelling list. Writing meant responding to ateacher-selected topic. Notice the similarity between Carl'swritten language and the "language" of many preprimer,primer, and k.arly readers in a basal program.

.lason, wh.)se piece was written in September of his second-grade year, had come to know reading through the words of

the authors of children's literature. He had come to knowspelling as an outgrowth of his writing, which was a way of

finding information and sharing new insights and stories.Jason had power over words, a power that let him say what hewanted to just as he would in speech. In his letter to the musicteacher, Jason focused on the message, telling what he felt wasimportant and appropriate, using the words he chose to ex-press those ideas. In his writing, Jason controls convention tosay what he wants to say. Carl, on the other hand, limits hischoice of words to those he can spell.

What is important about the stories of Carl and Jason?They help us gain new lenses for looking at children's work.Through these lenses we can see into the thoughts and lan-

guage of the child's own life and begin to understand the worldfrom the child's frame of reference. It enables us to stop star-ing into the familiar face of "error" and counting the "mis-

spelled" words, "haphazardly used" punctuation marks, and"random" capital letters. It enables us, instead, to look deepinto the reflective eyes of approximation and see the child'sgrowing understanding of voice, audience, and the purposesfor writing. We see the child's movement toward controllingconvention rather than being controlled by it so that the childcan say what he wants to say as a writer.

21

10 Spelling a Ise

It is clear that writers are greatly influenced by what theyread. Frank Smith (1988) put it this way: "We learn from thecompany we keep." This is evident in the work of Carl andJason. Carl writes in the style of the basal readers he knows,and Jason finds his own voice to express his knowledge. Whatgives Jason the ability to put his voice on paper? RalphFletcher (1993) contends that writers need mentors and thatthe best mentors young writers can have are the authors ofchildren's literature. Jason learns through reading that writingis an act of expressing what you know. He has had numerousdemonstrations of how language works in reading, writing, lis-tening, and speaking. He is comfortable with his knowledge,his language, and his ability to control written language wellenough to communicate. Jason's level of comfort, his willing-ness to risk constructing a spelling for words he wants towrite, comes from his assurance that his teacher will look past"error" and into the reflective eyes of approximation.

Spelling Ds an Extension of Children's Language Deuelopment

We have begun to see some changes in how schools approachthe beginnings of reading with the attention given to emergentliteracy. We now need to extend that acceptance of world knowl-edge, language competence, and concepts about print devel-oped before schooling to our classroom practices with spelling.

We can't change our educational histories but we can beginto think about spelling as an extension of children's overall lan-guage development. Children do not learn oral language in oneschool year. Nor do they learn to listen and speak through ase-ries of lessons arbitrarily ordered into an artificial hierarchy ofscope and sequence. Instead, children become producers andconsumers of oral language via their initiation into a commu-nity where significant persons around them produce and con-sume language. In such a setting, children are spoken to as ifthey understand, and they approximate the language used

22

Spelling-What's Alt the fus0 11

around them to communicate their own needs and thoughts.As individuals, children are treated as language users, fullycompetent members of the community. When children approxi-mate language conventions in speech, adults tend to focus oncommunication. Adults restate a child's speech, ask questionsfor clarification, or respond normally as if to signal that thechild's approximation is an appropriate and acceptable form.In each case the focus is on exchange of information, the con-struction of shared meanings. In short, the child is treated as aspeaker. If this process begins at birth and forever continues inthe development of oral language, should we not expect that itwill be true of written language as well?

Because our educational histories limit our ability to viewlanguage learning as a natural process, we attempt to struc-ture written language learning into discrete stages which caneasily be organized into a series of lessons. We attempt tomake school for our children what we remember it being forourselves. It is important to note that, as developmental stageshave been identified, there has been a tendency to organizecurriculum and instruction around those stages and theircharacteristics. Such thinking about discrete stages tends toundermine the notion that there can indeed be continuousprogress through normal development, and forces unrealisticexpectations for some children.

There is also danger in trying to identify children's levels soas to instruct them through that level and on to the next. Thisline of thinking assumes that when one new stage begins, allprevious ones have been forever completed, and those aheadare yet beyond reach and should become the next goal for in-struction. This is not to say that there is no predictable patternof (level, ,prnent in moving from a child's first scribbles to con-ventional spelling in the process of becoming a competentwriter. It is just that we cannot assume that spelling developsin a lock-step progression from one stage to the next. For ex-ample, functional writing (including constructed spellings) is astrategy that all writers use all of their lives. It is not a stage awriter outgrows with convention being the end goal. We donot, through a series of lessons, activities, or assignments,

0 3

12 Spelling ie Use

move a child along the continuum and through the stages toproduce a writer who controls spelling by a given target dateor grade in school.

If gaining control of conventional spelling does not pro-ceed in a neat progression of stages, then how do competentwriters learn to spell? Smith (1988) contends that "[t]here isonly one way for anyone to become a speller and that is to findout and remember correct, i.e., conventional spellings." Ac-cording to Smith, the only way it is possible for adults to writethe scores of thousands of words they know is that theylearned these spellings from reading: "The source of the infor-mation that makes us writers and speakers must lie in the lan-guage of other people, accessible only through reading and inlistening to speech." Competent writers did not learn to spellthe thousands of words they know one at a time. There wereno single moments when competent writers suddenly came toown the spelling of each individual word they know, thoughmost traditional spelling instruction is based on this false,one-word-at-a-time assumption.

At issue is the role of the adult in the natural develop-ment of the child's progression toward conventionalspelling. We are less concerned with developing competentspellers than we are with developing competent writers.Therefore, it is more important to determine the strategiesused by writers to produce spellings of words they need tocommunicate than to peg individuals as working at a pal tic-ular level of development. Sandra Wilde (1989, 1992) con-tends that we should observe children's spelling strategiesto gain insight into how spelling works in general and howindividual children learn to control spelling as they growinto competent writers. To this end, Wilde (1989) states ihatas we look at children's spellings we must be guided bythese four principles:

1. Spelling is evaluated on the basis of natural writingrather than tests.

2 4

Spelling-What's Ill the fuss'? 13

2. Spelling is evaluated analytically rather than as merelyright or wrong.

3. Spelling is looked at in terms of children's strategiesrather than in isolation.

4. The teacher should evaluate spelling as an informedprofessional rather than as a mechanical test scorer.

This frame would have us focus on how children arrive at thespellings of words (conventional or not) rather than concentrat-ing on whether the child arrived at the correct spelling. Amongthe primary goals of such a program would be to develop com-petent writers who use spelling to communicatewriters wholearn to control conventions rather than being controlled byconventions. Toward this goal, Wilde (1989, 1992) identified fivespelling strategies used by writers that must be valued byadults. From lower to higher level, these strategies are:

Placeholder: "1 just wrote it that way."

Human Resource: "How do you spell people?"

Textual Resource: "I need the dictionary."

Generation, Monitoring, and Revision: "Say is s-a-y, huh?"

Ownership: "1 know how to spell rodeo."

Higher-level strategies reflect an increasing reliance on one'sown resources as a speller, yet may not produce more conven-tional spelling. Higher-level does not imply better.

Similarly, Bouffler (1984) has identified the following tenstrategies:

1. Spelling as it sounds

This refers to what is generally known as phoneticspelling and is based on the assumption of a direct

14 Spetlinq in Use

letter-sound relationship, e.g., "stashon" (station);"sisers" (scissors).

2. Spelling as it sounds out

This strategy was identified as being used by childrenbut was not seen used by adults. It involves the exag-geration of sound, so the phonetic features not nor-mally represented are heard and represented, e.g."huw" (who); "hafh" (halt).

3. Spelling as it articulates

This strategy makes use of the articulatory aspects ofsound, particularly place of articulation. Sounds artirepresented on the basis of where they are made, e.g.,"brif" (brief); "chridagen" (tried again).

4. Spelling as it means

This strategy represents semantic rather than phono-logical units. It underlies much standard spelling, e.g.,sign-signal; nation-nationality. Non-standard example:"wasuponatim" (Once upon a time).

5. Spelling as it looks

All spelling involves this strategy to some extent. As itsname suggests, it uses graphic patterning, or visual mem-ory, e.g., "oen" (one); "shcool" (school); "nigt" (night).

6. Spelling by analogy

This strategy is based on the principle that what hasbeen learned in one situation can be applied to an-other. e.g., "realistick" (realistic); "reskyou" (rescue).

7. Spelling by linguistic content

The spelling of a word may be affected by the linguis-tic environment in which it occurs. It is not altogether

26

.14

Spellihq-lllhat's Ill the f uss)15

surprising to find any written immediately under theword envelope as eny.

8. Spelling by reference to authority

The authority may be other children, adults, or otherwriters (i.e., other written books or material). Whenother books, such as the dictionary, are used, we mustemploy all or some of the other strategies to find theword we are trying to write.

9. Opting for an alternative surface structure

If we do r.Jt know how to spell a word, we use a wordwe know we can spell.

10. Placing the onus on the reader

This strategy is used when text is handwritten. Thewriter makes tlie spelling indeterminate and leaves itto the reader to decide whether, for example, it is ieor ei.

Broadening the repertoires of spelling strategies employedby writers enables them to become more independent. Inde-pendence leads to more powerful writing. From this perspec-tive, one role of the adult is to provide children withcontinuous demonstrations of various strategies for spelling.Consider the natural way adults tend to provide such supportin the development of oral language. In this progression,adults provide demonstrations of language functions andforms, engage the child in conversations (uses of oral lan-guage), and respond to the child's approximations, giving the

child further demonstrations regarding both function andform (Cambourne 1988; Cochrane, Cochrane, Scalena, and

Buchanan 1984).If we believe that spelling is part of writing, and that writ-

ing is part of the child's overall language development, wewould approach spelling development in much the same waywe would any facet of language development. Toward that goalwe would encourage and support purposeful writing in the

27

16 Spell mg in Use

classroom. We would encourage children to attempt spellingsindependently before seeking assistance from an adult. Theclassroom would be filled with print resources and no strategywould be considered off-limits. And, as Wilde (1989) suggests,all strategies would be supported; no one strPtegy would belooked upon as being "better" than another. Strategies wouldbe employed as they are needed. Children would write fre-quently for their own purposes using the words they select asthose most appropriate for expressing their ideas.

To teach from this perspective, the teacher must knowchildren, their histories, their personalities, and their develop-ment. It is only from this knowledge that we can teach intowhat the child knows and is trying to do. It becomes our re-sponsibility as teachers to determine what the child can doand to use that information to make decisions about what toteach and how to teach it. Teaching then becomes a cycle ofresearch, decide, teach (Calkins 1994). Our goal would be tohelp children grow into the hope we have for them as compe-tent writers in their lives beyond our classrooms.

As professional educatot s, our assumptions about how chil-dren learn directly influence our classroom practices and ourinteractions with and expectations of the children we teach. Webelieve that children learn most naturally under the followingconditions (Cambourne 1988, 33; Cambourne and Turbill 1991):

Immersion: Learners need to be immersed in texts of allkinds.

Demonstration: Learners need to receive many demon-strations of how texts are constructed and used.

Engagement: Engagement occurs when learners are con-vinced that: (1) they are potential "doers" or "perform-ers" of the demonstrations they are observing; (2) theywill further the purposes of their lives by engaging withthese observed demonstrations; (3) they can engage andtry to emulate without fear of physical or psychologi,.alhurt if their attempts are not fully "correct."

2 b

Spelling-What s ill the f uss'i1?

Expectation: Expectations of those to whom learnersare bonded are powerful coercers of behavior. Weachieve; we fail if we expect to fail; we are more likely toengage with demonstrations of those whom we regardas significant and who hold high expectations for us.

Responsibility: Learners need to make their own deci-sions about when, how, and what "bits" to learn in anylearning task. Learners who lose the ability to make de-cisions are "depowered."

Use: Learners need time and opportunity to use, em-ploy, and practice their developing control in func-tional, realistic, non-artificial ways.

Approximation: Learners must be free to approximatethe desired model"mistakes" are essential for learn-ing to occur.

Response: Learners must receive "feedback" from ex-changes with more knowledgeable "others." Responsemust be relevant, appropriate, timely, readily available,nonthreatening, with no strings attached.

What Does This Look Like in the Classiocin?

When children are immersed in demonstrations of how textsare constructed and used, the classroom becomes a placewhere written language permeates the curriculum. Childrenare constantly using writing for various purposes such as mak-ing entries in writer's notebooks, jotting notes for their projectfiles, documenting the growth of a plant on the window sill, orsigning in each morning as they arrive. For example, considerthe functions of language identified by Halliday (1975) and theclassroom possibilities they imply.

00

18Spelling in Use

Functions of Oral language Examples Classroom Possibilities

INSTRUMENTAL LANGUAGE(communicating basic needs,gaining information, and solv-ing problems)

"I'm thirsty; I need a drink ofwater.""I'm starting over becausemessed up.""Please give me some yellowpaint."

sign-up sheet, catalog order,grocery list, wish list, planninglist, business letter, memoran-dums, proposals

REGULATORY LANGUAGE(controlling behavior of othersand the world around you)

"You put your truck over thereand put a load on it and thenbring it back to the warehouse.'

directions, labels, rulesfor a game, signs, rules andregulations, procedures,advertisements

INTERACTIONAL LANGUAGE(language to establish andmaintain relationships withothers)

"Will you play a song with me?""Let me help you find the bookabout Mars.""Joe, will you read with me,please?"

personal letters, jokes, andriddles, greeting cards, notes,invitations

PERSONAL LANGUAGE(language to develop andmaintain one's own uniqueidentity; say "who you are")

"We went to my cousin's houselast night.""That was a scary story.""I can finally ride my bike!"

journals, diaries, auto-biographies, eyewitnessaccounts, trip logs, editorials

INFORMATIVE LANGUAGE(language to represent theworld to others; impart whatone knows)

"Blue and yellow make green.""Not all newborn animals havetheir eyes closed.""Electricity made the bell ring.""The nails are heavier than thechips."

news articles, concept books,science logs, recipes,directions, posters, maps,booklets

HEURISTIC LANGUAGE(language to speculate andpredict what will happen)

"Do you think the butterfly'swings are inside thecaterpillar?""I wonder if this will float.""Where does the sun go atnight?"

question charts, hypotheses,reflective journals, exit slips

AESTHETIC LANGUAGE(language for its own sake, toexpress imagination, to playand have fun)

"I'm the mommy. Come homenow."Once upon a time ...

fiction tales, plays and skits,fairy tales, poetry

Language functions adapted from M. A. K. Halliday (1975). Explorations in the functions of language.London: Edward Arnold. Examples from North Carolina Department of Public Instruction (1989).Grades 1 and 2 Assessment: Communication Skills. Raleigh, North Carolina. Classroom possibilitiesfrom Norma A. Kimzey, Western Regional Technical Assistance Center-NCDPI, workshop handout.

30

Spelling-What s fill the f uss7 19

In addition to engaging children in the many functionaluses of language, it is important to bathe them in the languageof authors they admire and introduce them to many new au-thors. Authors of children's literature (picture books, chapterbooks, poetry, nonfiction, etc.) become the mentors for stu-dent writers in the classroom. Language is one of several signsystems through which children construct new knowledge andexpress their understanding and questions. It is their ques-tions that guide their inquiries and projects, it is their experi-ences in the world and with the language of authors that giverise to their topics, and it is the opportunity to use language inrelevant ways that provides them with an awareness of andneed for the conventions of written language. If we don't havechildren writing for their own purposes, we will not know whatthey can do or why they do it that way. We cannot assess thestrategies used by children if all they know of writing is filling

in the blanks, copying off the board, and mindlessly proceed-ing through the exercises in a workbook. Until children takerisks with language to say the things they have a need to say,we will not have windows into their understanding of how lan-guage works.

31

In this chapter three teachers will tell their stories of makinga transition from a very traditional, text-bound, linear ap-proach of spelling instruction to teaching spelling in use.

Each of these teachers brings two decades of classroom expe-rience to this discussion. Day le Keener teaches second gradein a small city school system. Carol Sutton, a former kinder-garten teacher, has taught fifth grade for the last several yearsin a rural county school. Sandra Lawing is a CommunicationSkills Helping Teacher working with teachers throughout aschool system. Her most recent classroom experience was asa K-1-2 multi-age teacher. We hope these teaching stories canserve as a mirror in which you see many of your own chal-lenges reflected.

The overlaps in these stories are important because theyuncover common shifts in thinking that occur as teachersmake changes in the writing curriculum to address spelling inuse. You will notice the following common themes in the sto-ries. First, each teacher had to learn more about wrilimi in

order to think differently about spelling. Each teacher had to

22SpelUng In he

learn to observe children very closely to understand thechanges that needed to be made in her spelling instruction.Each teacher acknowledged at some point that her traditionalspelling instrudion was not helping her students' spelling inuse. Finally, the most important common theme in these sto-ries is the fact that each teacher has many lingering questionsabout how to best help children grow in their knowledge ofspelling in use.

In the following narratives, the teacher's story will be inthe left column, accompanied by a running commentary in theright column. The commentary highlights the changes in eachteacher's thinking that led to changes in classroom practice.

Doyle Keener's Story

I taught for several years treatingspelling and written language as sepa-rate. isolated subjects. I valued the text-book because I needed it as my guideand decision maker. I valued only stan-dard spelling. To me, a word wasspelled either right or wrong. I typicallyintroduced the words on Monday, as-signed the daily exercises, and gave thetest On Friday. When I think back, Idon't remember children's spelling er-rors. However, I didn't provide manyopportunities for any errors to occur.The children did language exercisesfrom the textbook. They copierl sen-tences, filled in blanks, and occasion-ally completed matching exercises. Iavoided creative writing until ab-solutely necessary because I knewcouldn't write well. I felt so insecure. Ithought, "how could I help children'?"

33

The language curriculum v,as viewed as afragmented and separated entity. Theteacher viewed language as a subject to betaught, studied, and tested, rather than as afunctional tool for communicating one'sway through life.

Children's voices, student ownership, andspelling in use were not valued. Instead, thetextbook, the manual, and standardspellings were valued.

The teacher's insecurity as a writer placedlimitations on the opportunities she pro-vided for children.

Teacheis Uoices-Stones of transit lon

A turning point came when I par-ticipated in a writing project and en-tered graduate school. Some books Iread first were: Writing: Teachers andChildren at Work by Donald Graves,Reading without Nonsense by FrankSmith, and What's Whole in Whole Lan-guage by Ken Goodman. I began hav-ing the children write self-selectedtopics every day, keep writing foldersof work in progress, share stories inteacher-supported helping circles,peer edit, and conclude with a finalteacher-editing conference. The chil-dren published their favorite pieces ofwriting from those they had workedthrough the entire process. I noticedthat when I valued the children's ap-proximations in spelling, it freed themto take risks and to use more precise,interesting words. A stronger "voice"started to appear in their writing. Theformer skills I taught in isolation wereall embedded in the children's writing.1 conferenced individually and in smallgroups. and had mini-lessons asneeded. I started to trust myself tomake decisions about what the chil-dren needed to learn next. The chil-dren had a motivation and enthusiasmabout their work that had not existedbefore I provided writing opportuni-ties. Even though I accepted the chil-dren's individually constructedspellings, I continued to give spellingtests. I started noticing another pat-tern. The same children made thesame grade from week to week. I could

23

Professional development (e.g., participa-tion in a writing project, graduate school,professional reading) provided a neededknowledge base and a boost to self confi-dence that enables the teacher to work withthe children in a writing community.

A slow transfer of ownership to children re-garding topic, word choice, audience, andform. Writing is becoming something chil-dren do rather than something they simplyknow.

A focus on writing frees the children frombondage to words they know how to spell.They begin to see themselves as writers andfocus more on choosing powerful words andthinking about what they want to say. Inshort, the teacher began to trust the chil-dren as writers.

The teacher began to carefully observe chil-

dren as writers.

The children were growing in their developing

sense of themselves as readers and writers.

34

24 Spelling in Use

predict the outcome of the test. Thetest took me thirty to forty minutes toget the children ready, give the test,collect the papers, and begin anotheruse of this time. Most importantly,there was no transfer of learning totheir writing. Over the past few years Ihave tried many methods and strate-gies. First, I tried content words in so-cial studies and science. Then Ifocused on high-frequency words.This year I have been conscious aboutputting appropriate print in the class-room. In the writing center there is aword box with high-frequency wordsfor each letter (i.e., words on a card,etc.). The materials that are stored inthe classroom are labeled. As we havediscussions (math, science, etc.), thestudents develop a list of words theyneed for that unit of study to helpwhen they record their observations,thinking, and conclusions. At the firstof the year, I chose four or five wordsin a spelling pattern (_ight). I did thissimply as a management system that Icould handle at the time. The childrenand I developed activities and gamesto practice the words. Now the chil-dren are using their pieces of writingor recordings in the learning log to se-lect words that look close, but notquite right. The children are coming tome and saying,."I found 'my' word" (inbooks they were reading). One childcorrected his words in a story he hadwritten. Both of these experiences

35

The teacher began to recognize that thespelling tests were only measures of short-term memory with little or no carryover intothe habits of children as writers.

There was a shift in the source of the words;however, the teacher still controlled thelists and owned the curriculum.

The teacher faced issues of time, manage-ment, routines, and trust.

A slow transition from focus on words anda study of spelling for writing to using

spelling in writing.

leachers' floices-Stories of Transition

were student-initiated. Now the wordsbelong to the children. I don't know ifthe children were ready (some stillaren't) or if it was more what I shouldhave done all year. I still have ques-tions about how to manage all thechildren's growth and progress. And Istill don't know if this is what I shouldbe doing. I do know that the children'sspelling approximations tell me whatthey know about print, letter sounds,chunks, and endings. What I do in thecoming weeks will depend on new in-formation I learn or what I learn fromthe children.

Carol Sutton's Story

25

This questioning stance is at the heart ofreflective practice. Reflective teachers areconstantly examining their current prac-tices and trusting children as their curricu-lar informants.

"I went to the mall yesturday." How wellI remember seeing a sentence like thatas I would read an entry in a student'sjournal. I also remember the over-whelming sense of frustration thatwould come over me as I would noticethat the misspelled word, "yesturday,"had been in the list of words that hadbeen in our spelling textbook the previ-ous week. What else could I do? Weekly,each student had to write every wordfive times and even had to use the wordin a sentence. In addition, the word hadto be looked up in the dictionary andwritten with the definition beside it. Irarely skipped any of the activities in

3 6

Early in the teacher's transition there was asense of frustration with the lack of carryover.

The program was sequenced, highly orga-nized, and very easy to follow. It providedthe teacher with a sense of security and re-moved the need for her to make profes-sional decisions based on specificknowledge of the children in her charge.

26 Spelling in Use

the spelling book. A on Monday, B onTuesday, and C on Wednesday were reg-ular assignments each week. We evenplayed games and had spelling beeswith the words! I felt that I was teachingspelling, but I continued to be awarethat students who could make a perfectscore on Friday's test couldn't spell thesame words the next time they neededto write them. Why were my studentsnot better spellers? What could I do dif-ferently?

As I reflect on the communicationskills program several years ago in myfifth grade classroom, I can rememberthe activities of a typical day. In addi-tion to spelling, the schedule always in-cluded a reading lesson from a basaltext. There were very few "real" booksin our room, and most students neverread anything but the reading assign-ment. Lessons from our English text-books addressea language grammarand mechanics skills. Workbooks andworksheets which accompanied eachof our books were used on a regularbasis. Occasionally my students wrotein journals, but most "creative" writingoccurred only when I assigned the stu-dents a topic, explained how much hadto be written, and announced the duedate. To be honest, my job was not per-sonally challenging, and many times itwas actually boring. Was it any wonderthat my students were not enthusiasticabout reading and writing?

37

The focus was clearly on individual words,not on the building of ideas through writing.

The focus of the curriculum was the text-books, not the students' growth as readersand writers. There were no obvious connec-tions between reading, writing, and spelling.There were separate textbooks for each, andeach was taught as a specific and separatesubject.

Teachers' Uoices-Stories of Transition 27

During this time, I began hearingabout something referred to as writingprocess. My initial reaction was thatthere was not enough time in the day tocover all of the material, and I certainlycould not add anything else! The veryidea that I could work with individualstudents was preposterous!

Fortunately, my sense of frustrationwith my current teaching strategies ledme to continue listening to ideas aboutusing a process approach to writing in-struction. I signed up for an in-serviceand began by simply involving my stu-dents in finding their own topics. Whilestudents were busy working in theirspelling and English books (I was notready to give them up!), I would meetwith a student to discuss his or herwriting, mainly focusing on the me-chanics of the piece.

As I began allowing students tochoose topics for writing stories andreports, I noticed that they had more

Frustration was growing with the currentpractices. Such frustration can lead to fearof change that can either immobilize or be-come the catalyst that pushes a tpacherf3rward. In this case it helped the teacherseek new ideas and professional develop-ment opportunities.

The focus is shifting from spelling as con-tent to writing as a process. With a new in-vestment in their writing, both the students

interest in their work. As a result, most and the teacher began to see a better rea-students began writing more, and Ibegan to be aware that spelling in-struction could take place as I helpeda student to edit. It was not difficult todetect when a student was experienc-ing difficulty with a particular spellingpattern (doubling consonants, for ex-ample) and make the student aware ofit. Since the pieces of writing were im-portant to the students, they weremore interested in what I was saying

son to study the conventions of language(e.g., spelling, punctuation, etc.).

The teacher sees that she can plan forspelling instruction from what she observesin her students' writing. This marks the be-ginning of a move away from textbook-driven instruction.

38

28 Spelling in Use

about their spelling. I was able to makeconnections that were impossiblewhen teaching a list of words from aspelling textbook that had no personalmeaning to the writer.

I was still concerned, however, thatI was leaving too much to chance. I feltthat I could now give up my spellingtextbook, but not without replacing itwith a list of words that I would teachto the students each week. Words froma reading story or a science unit wereassigned each week, and students wereto memorize them for the test on Fri-day. I guess I thought that studentswould find the task easier since thewords I chose were from academicareas which were already being ad-dressed. What I thought would happendid not, and again I felt a great deal offrustration.

At this time in my transition, I hadso many questions which continued togrow every day. As a result, I beganreading books and articles and attend-ing conferences and in-services that ad-dressed writing. It seemed to me thatthe only lasting spelling instruction thatwas taking place in my classroom waswhen it came from an individual's writ-ing. Nothing I heard or read told meevery step to take. Every word that Ineeded to say was not in bold-facedtype. I learned, however, about waysother teachers implemented theprocess of writing in their classrooms,and I got enough s,ggestions so that I

39

There was a change in the source of thewords selected for spelling, making themmore connected to the active curriculum.However, the teacher still c'ontrolled thewords available to the children. There wasno ownership for the child as the teachermoved from spelling textbooks to contentarea vocabulary. Although the teacher rec-ognized the need for change, the focus wasstill on words.

The teacher was slowly coming to under-stand that she would have to be the in-structional decision maker if she was tofocus on spelling in use. Toward that end,

she realized the need to shift the focus fromstudying words .Jor spelling to writing.

leachers hices-Slories of Transition

could begin trying some new strategies.Tliked the challenge of making decisionsconcerning what a student knew andwhat he or she was ready to learn next.The main thing that I learned was thatstudents learn how to spell as they readand write, not as they commit a list ofwords to their short-term memory. Mychallenge was to create an environmentin my classroom so that students wouldwant to read and write!

My classroom today is very differ-ent. As I see the connections betweenreading and v riting and have learnedto trust myself and my students more.I have gradually given up the basalreading text and have developed aclassroom library. Students are learn-ing to be better readers and writers(and, yes, spellers) as they are al-lowed to choose what they want toread from books that were written byquality children's authors. Opportuni-ties for writing occur throughout theday as my students respond to the lit-erature. write letters to pen pals, andkeep logs in all of the other contentareas. They also are continually draft-ing. revising, editing, and publishingpieces of writing.

As students are reading and writ-ing, I am conferencing with individualsand small groups. I am able to makesuggestions concerning content, andwhen the student is ready to edit, I canteach all of the spelling and languageskills that are appropriate for this

29

The teacher has a new theory base for herbelief system. This will come to impact her

future instructional decisions.

The teacher provided many opportunitiesfor reading and writing so that spellinggrowth could occur. The spelling curric.tlumis now generated by the work of youngreaders and writers; the teacher no longerabdicates her professional judgment to thedistant authors of some spelling textbook.

The teacher is in transition toward a morecomprehensive literacy program. There is

emphasis on creating a balanced writingprogram to develop spellers.

4 0

30 Spelling in Ilse

child. As I mentioned earlier, the in-struction is now connected to some-thing that is personal and meaningfulto each child, instead of being a setskills taught in isolation.

Large-group instruction in spellingstill occurs. I teach mini-lessons to callattention to a pattern that is giving diffi-culty to a large number of students. Ialso use this time to discuss variousspelling strategies so that students willhave :xmle choices of what to do whenthey don't know how to spell a word.Students also focus on a few wordseach week as they choose some wordsthey know are giving them difficulty intheir own writing. Personal dictionarieskept by each student are also helpful.

In addition, I think it's importantthat 1 contMually convey to my stu-dents thc importance of conventionalspelling any time they are writing foranother person to read. My expecta-tions are clear as students write piecessuch as pen pal letters and thank-younotes and prepare them for publica-tion. One way that I assess grades forthe report card is how well variouspieces are edited for spelling.

The story of my transition does notend here. It will be a continual processof change and growth as I learn moreabout the connection between writingand spelling. I am always questioningmy current methods and searching formore efficient ones, but I believe thatdeliberate and systematic teaching and

41

There is a focus on strategies instead ofwords. The teacher provides mini-lessons todemonstrate the strategies writers use tospell words they do not yet "own."

The teacher now helps the children focus ontheir writing audience rather than viewingwriting as simply a display of their controlof convention.

This questioning stance is at the heart of re-flective practice. Wise teachers are con-stantly examining their current practices andusing children as their curricular informants.

iPaCheis DOICesSIOTIOS of IransItion 31

testing of a list of spelling words is inef-fective. As in the past, my transitionwill continue to be slow but also excit-ing. Also, I will not discard current tech-niques for spelling instruction until Iunderstand the rationale for a newpractice and can explain it to adminis-trators and parents. My goal is to becontinually moving toward a total com-munication program where spelling isnever viewed as an isolated subject andwhere children view themselves first asreaders and writers and then as capa-ble spellers.

Sandra hawiny's Story

Anthony was my best spelling teacher.In twenty years of teaching. with someof the best spelling "teachers" I couldhdveGraves, Calkins, Wilde, peers,and mentorsAnthony was theteacher who made the most significantdifference in my knowledge of spellingdevelopment. He was a second graderin my class the second year of my try-ing the writer's workshop. I knew verylittle about writing or spelling or howchildren learned either one. Anthonytrusted me anyway.

He was a small, beautiful boy withblack hair and big, almost black, eyes.

The teacher's theory base for her belief sys-tem is clearly valued.

42

32 Spelling in Use

He was still trying to make sense ofprint--with writing, especially. He wasvery tentative and didn't take risks eas-ily. The words in his meager attemptsat stories would often begin with theappropriate letter and ji t as often endwith ony. It took me a little while to re-alize that when he had no idea of theconventional spelling, he used the fewsafe letters he already knewthose inhis name!

I began to watch more closely An-thony's progress as a speller and writer.With many spelling support systems inplacemeaningful print, lots of booksand reading, strategy lessons, etc.An-thony gradually began to use some ap-propriate ending letters. His progresswas beginning to show on spelling testsas well. Unfortunately, there was nograding on progressonly on right orwrong. His test grade was always fail-ingwhich only undermined any risktaking that was necessary for contin-ued confidence and growth. I was be-ginning to understand that the spellingtest was neither a fair nor accuraterecord of children's progress asspellers; it was serving no purpose toAnthony as a writer or to me as ateacher. I shudder to think of the emo-tional trauma I was causing Anthonyeach week at te .t time. I knew it wastime to tackle the issue of using thespelling test as an indicator of spellingprogress. It was time to value spellingfor its usewithin the context of each

43

The teacher was an observer, a kidwatcherwho viewed the children in her charge ascurricular informants.

The teacher is building a theory of the childthat will help her make appropriate instruc-tional decisions.

As the teacher came to recognize that thespelling tests were neither fair nor accurate,her knowledge of writing was also growing.It was at this point that she began to valuespelling in the context of writing.

moachers mous- Stories of Transition

child's writing. I had already made thestep out of a spelling text and had beencreating a class list of words from thechildren's writing. I was confidentenough now to give up the spelling testaltogether. Could I find enough supportfrom the administrators and parents?

I began reading a lot about writingand spelling so that I could present my"case" to the principal. I saved samplesof children's writing to show progressover time. I talked with peers, mentors,and some parents, When I felt I wasready to present my case and defendmy beliefs, I went to the principal. Withher support, we discussed a campaignto help the parents better understandour view of spelling and writing. We

wanted them to know that we still val-ued spelling but only within the con-text of real writing. We agreed that onthe report card we would not eliminatethe word "spelling" but would includeit with the writing grade. I wrote a let-ter to the parents offering my time forconferences. 1 made copies of articlesto share with them. I put together sim-ple writing portfolios showing eachchild's progress in spelling and writing.I was ready.

It was a successful campaign. Mostparents remembered their experienceswith spelling tests. Many felt they werenot good spellers despite years of hav-ing used spelling textbooks. For themost part, as long as parents conki beassured that their children were making

33

The transition becomes an issue ot develop-ing a theory base. This comes about throughreading, attending conferences and work-shops, and participating in ongoing conver-sations with peers and mentors. In addition,the teacher was constantly reflecting on herpractice in the classroom.

Note that most adults know about schoolthrough their own histories as students. Formany (teachers and parents), this becomes

a barrier in even considering any innovative

practice.

4 4

34

progress, they supported our decision.They felt the experiences their childrenwere having with writing were muchmore comprehensive, beneficial. and abetter use of time than the spelling ac-tivities they had known as children.When parents reviewed publishedbooks and written stories side by sidewith a list of isolated words, they feltthe stories and books gave everyone abetter picture of what spelling was forthan the test did. And the stories gaveeveryone something far more valuableto save, share, and celebrate. Of course,there were some parents who contin-ued to have concerns and who still,after eight years, feel their children arepoor spellers because they didn't havespelling tests in second grade!

Removing the fear of the test eachweek gave Anthony added confidencewith his writing. Although he was stillvery tentative as a writer, he began tak-ing more risks and using more strate-gies with his spellingclassmates.books. placeholders. It was a relief anda boost to his writing to know that hecould go back later and "fix it up"anoption he didn't have on the spellingtest. I'm sure that by placing so muchvalue on the test. I was giving Anthony,a child who had limited knowledge ofprint, the idea that conventionalspelling was a must at all times. Yes, I'msure Anthony's spelling grade wouldhave probably improved with the tests.

45

Spelling in Use

The focus had become developing the chil-dren as writers.

One year of innovative practice can no morebe blamed for a child's failure eight yearslater than it can be credited for another'ssuccess.

By demonstrating that she valued writing,the teacher enabled Anthony to focus onwhat he had to say. Spelling now had afunctionto permit him to communicateto an audience beyond himself. His focuscould be on learning to control conventionsto accomplish his own

The teacher recognized that shifting theemphasis from words to wt. .ing was essen-tial to facilitating the development of read-ers and writers.

leachors limes-Stones of Iransinon

However, those tests were hiding andhindering his knowledge of writing andcrippling him as a writer. I was unknow-ingly putting obstacles in Anthony'spath to learn instead of providing thescaffolding and support he needed.

Anthony trusted me to know whatwas best for him. I could have very eas-ily let him and many others down. I'mglad Anthony was my teacherbut notbecause of what he taught me aboutspelling. Because Anthony taught me toput the childnot the curriculum, text-book, or gradefirst. I learned to in-volve, teach, trust, and value the child.

My experiences with Anthonytaught me to keep a proper perspectiveand a watchful eye on my students.Somehow my impact on Anthony'sprogress as a speller pales in compari-son to the significant impact he had onmy progress as a teacher and a learner.

35

As they make instructional decisions, teach-ers must be learning advocates for theirstudents, teaching into their strengths in-stead of exposing their weaknesses.

The teacher's transition involved her becom-ing a teacher-researcher. She was a colearner

in a community of scholarship who learnedto "research, decide , and teach."

Parallel Changes in Spelling and Writing

One of the most significant insights for these three teachers asthey made changes in their spelling instruction was recognizingthe need to make major changes in their writing instruction.Each teacher arrived at a point where "spellinlf lost its identifyas a distinct curricular area and became an integral part of theoverall literacy Mstruction throt4.1,1i the writing workshop. Thechart that follows highlights the parallel changes the teachermade in the writing and spelling curriculums and instruction.

4 6

35 Spelling in Use

Spelling Writing

Use spelling textbook, exercises A.B,C. D,word list; write each word five times, coverand write, look up words in the dictionaryand write definitions, use each word in asentence, combine the sentences into aparagraph, play spelling games (e.g.. base-ball) with the words; do a practice test onWednesday and final test on Friday.

Using worksheets/English book, exer-cises, copying from charts/board withemphasis on handwriting, grammar.copying basic sentence structures, copy-ing to correct capitalization, punctuation.

Keep the spelling textbook, drop the exer-cises (A,B,C,D), and continue with thepractices described above.

No change.

Let go of the spelling textbook; keep a listof words selected by the teacher, usuallytaken from the content areas (math, sci-ence, social studies, health, and occasion-ally from stories from reading); doing someactivities or games, writing words fivetimes each. looking up definitions, usingthe words in sentences; doing a practicetest on Wednesday, and final test on Friday(teacher believes this is integratingspelling in the curriculum).

Keeping the English textbook/work-sheets; children are writing in responseto teacher-selected topics (creative writ-ing once a week). length determined bythe teacher.

The teacher still is selecting a few wordsfrom the content areas and layering inhigh-frequency words, emphasizing pat-terns/rules selected by the teacher; contin-uing the practice test on Wednesday andfinal test on Friday; may be using activitiessuch as word walls or making words: let-ting go of writing each word five times.writing definitions, and writing sentences.

4 7

Rigid, teacher-controlled attempt to imple-ment writing process (Mondayprewrite.Tuesdaydraft. Wednesdayrevise.Thursdayedit. Fridaypublish):Macher assigns some topics and Occa-sionally allows choice from a set of topics.

, Teacher occasionally allows children tochoose topics for "creative writing."

Teachers' VoicesStories of Transition 37

Spelling kiting

Moving away from selecting words fromthe content areas, the teacher now selectssome words and the class adds somewords for the list; teacher drops the prac-tice test on Wednesday, but continues thefinal test on Friday.

The teacher is beginning to trust the chil-dren more as writers, allowing morechoice over topic and form; more writingis occurring; the teacher is providing moreopportunities for writing.

The teacher selects some words for thewhole class and each child selects somefor an individual list,

Children are choosing topics for writing;the teacher demonstrates more trust inthe children as writers and continues afocus on process with guidelines thatpermit flexibility to allow the children tomove through a piece of writing at theirown pace. The class is moving towardthe writing workshop.

Children are selecting words for personallists and are testing with a partner or self-testing; the teacher is focusing on the childas a writer with emphasis on his or hercontrol over language; spelling is seen as apart of the child's overall language compe-tence.

The teacher is learning more about man-agement and organization of the writingworkshop.

There is more emphasis on writing; chil-dren identify words from their own writingto address in their spelling study; lists arenow made with a purpose of discussion andfurther study rather than for testing. Thereis an emphasis on teaching and learningstrategies for spelling; children are correct-ing words in their writing by using sourcesin the room.

The teacher is shifting responsibility forimprovement of writing to the child. Writ-ers are now in charge of their own work.

4 6

38 Spelling in Use

Spelling Writing

The teacher is teaching strategies, offer-ing mini-lessons through a balanced writ-ing program. Spelling is seen as a serviceto writers: writers strive to control con-ventional spellings rather than being con-trolled by them. Children are responsiblefor their spelling, going through writtenpieces and editing with a partner beforepublishing to bring words for the groupdiscussion on strategies and things toknow about spelling. There is an empha-sis on spelling in use; the teacher is look-ing at progress evident in the children'swriting samples: attention is given toaudience, purpose, and form; the teacheris conferencing with small groups andindividuals.

Children are working on their writingevery clay; they talk about their writingwith others (peers and teacher); childrenmake most of the decisions about theirwriting (topics, genres, audiences, revi-sionshow and when, publishingwhen). The teacher decides whichmini-lessons are appropriate for whichchildren and when; the teacher confersevery day to make curricular decisionsfor the class and for individual children;the teacher is guided by conferenceswith children, professional resources,and his/her vision for the children aswriters; the teacher lets children makedecisions about their writing and he/shemakes decisions about teaching.

At this point, students are reading dailyfrom a variety of genres for various pur-posesauthor studies, topic studies,personal inquiries, literature studies.

4 9

:

leachers' Voices-Stories of Transition

The Star

Tonight,I'll wait until

The sun has finished

His homeworkAnd gone to bed.

Then I'll tiptoe outsideAnd climb

My apple tree.

From the highest branchI will search the night

For my special star.

I will pluckIt from the sky

As if it were an appleOn my tree.

Then I'll put it in my pocket,And keep my secret

Hidden

Until our spelling test.

Tomorrow,

When my teacherGives out the stars

To all the good spellers,I won't be sad,

Because I'll have

One, too.

50

Ka Ili Dakos

39

II t Fi t:f Witi iTh t D L iwith Spelling

3,-;;-.*V

The key to dealing responsibly with spelling in any successfulwriting program is assessment of spelling in use. Teachersmust have ways to systematically study and assess children's

spelling in use and then use these assessments to plan bothwhole-class and individually appropriate instruction. Curricu-lum and instruction in spelling must be connected to children'swriting if it is to be effective. We do make a distinction here be-tween assessment and evaluation. Assessment of spelling in useis an attempt to understand how young writers are dealing withboth familiar and unfamiliar spellings they encounter in theirpersonal writing so that instruction can improve. Evaluation, on

BEST COPY AVAILABLE 41

5 1

42Spelling in he

the other hand, is an attempt to value or devalue children'sspelling use and does not, we have found, lead to better instruc-tional decisions. Evaluation may have a place alongside assess-ment, but it certainly has no merit of its own.

Planning for this kind of writer-centered curriculum inspelling takes place in a frame that always begins with as-sessment research, moves to curricular decisions, and then toinstructional interactions. This of course rearranges the tradi-tional linear planning structure of curriculum first (Whatshould I teach?), instruction second (How will I teach it?),and assessment last (Did they get it?). Instead, in this "re-search, decide, teach" frame (Calkins 1994), assessmentcomes first and is not about "Did they get it?" but "How arethey using it?" Assessment is thought of as research intowhat children are doing with spelling in their writing. We askquestions such as, "What strategies are they using? Whatrisks are tht y taking? How is reading influencing spelling intheir writing?"

Questions such as these give much-needed insight toteachers as they make curricular decisions that are appropri-ate for both individual children and the larger community ofwriters in the classroom. These decisions are embedded in thework of young writers, and they are tied directly to a visionteachers hold for their students as competent writers and forthe place of spelling control in that vision. For example:

Sharisse's fourth-grade teacher observes and notes thatSharisse looks up each unfamiliar spelling she's using asshe is drafting. She uses this observation to plan a les-son on placeholder spelling.

Marcus's first-grade teacher studies his papers and seesthe wide range of "risky" words he uses to say what hewants to say in his writingwords like "exactly" and"pretend" and "carefully." She plans a mini-lesson inwhich Marcus will share with other students how hegenerates the spelling of any word he wants to use.

52

9ssessmeM firs! Planning for a Writing Curriculum That Beals Responsibly with Spelling 43

Instructional interactions that teach writers about spellingoccur in several formats, including one-to-one conferences,small groups, and whole-class gatherings. Instructional inter-actions also take a variety of forms ranging from strategy shar-ing to focused discussions and inquiries. For example:

After one writer struggles with the spelling of "boating"(he wants to double the t) as he writes about a boatingaccident, Roberto and his third-grade students becomeinterested in the doubling of final consonants when suf-fixes are added. They make a chart in the room wherestudents write any "doubling the consonant" wordsthey find as they read and write over several days.Studying the patterns of the words they've collected,the students generate "rules" that will help them inmost cases with this spelling pattern.

A second-grade teacher has noticed a group of studentswho seem to rely only on "sounding out" as a generat-ing strategy. She gathers them at a table and explains tothem that words are like "people's faces" and that writ-ers try to remember what words look like as theywritejust like the faces of people they know. She tellsthe students that if they want to use a word they've onlyheard, but have never seen "in person" as they are read-ing, they may then rely on "sounding out" as a strategy.

We feel this kind of "assessment first" planning should bethe norm for all writing curriculum development enacted bywise classroom teachers, not just in relation to spelling. Em-bedding our curricular decisions in chikken's Writing requiresthat we think of assessment as research into what our studentsare doing and move this research to the forefront of Our plan-ning. The following sections are organized in this "research,decide, teach- frame. Each section includes practical class-room possibilities to help teachers begin to work wit I un this

nontraditional planning frame.

rJ

44 Spelling in Use

lesearch

Observing and Researching

To begin an assessment program of research which informsspelling curriculum, teachers must become habitual kidwatch-ers and observe students as they write. As teachers observechildren at work on writing, they may ask questions to helpun( terstand what they see writers doing, they may takes notesthat will help them plan later instruction, and/or they mayhelp a student with a spelling "bug" as they see it occurring.These teachers are trying to capture spelling in use as theysystematically watch their students write in order to plan in-struction from this. All of the examples in this book showteachers making instructional decisions based on what theysee their students doing as writers. The curriculum growsfrom the work of real writers. It is extremely important here topoint out that we focus on spelling decisions in this book be-cause that is our topic. These teachers, however, are makingall kinds of curricular decisionseverything to do with theirwriting curriculumas they watch children write and interactin the writing workshop. They are planning for and teachingon-the-spot lessons on revision, writing structures, genre in-formation, voice, and so on. These teachers believe that chil-dren hold the clues to a writii,g curriculum that will makesense in the room.

Observing Young Writers

With less experience to support them, young writers mustfocus more deli berat ely on generating spellings as theywrite. By observing young writers in action, wise teacherscan often determine which strategies the children are usingto generate spellings in their writing. The following are some

5 4

Assessment hrst Planning for a Ikting Curriculum That Beats Responsibbj unth Spetimq 45

observational guidelines that will help teachers as theythink about the strategies children are using.

Does the child's mouth move constantly as he or shewrites?If so, the child is probably relying primarily on"sounding out" to spell. When a child begins to movehis or her mouth only on more challenging words, tWsis a sign of growth because the child is calling up this re-source only when others prove insufficient.

How quickly is the child writing?If the writing is ex-tremely slow and labored, the child may be overly con-scious about generating spellings or may not haveenough useful strategies to help with generations.Either difficulty can inhibit growth as a writer. If thechild is writing very quickly, she may not be drawingheavily enough from the supports that are there to helpher. What we want is a steady, thoughtful pace to ayoung child's writing.

Listen to the child's interactions as he writes. Does he useothers as resources? Does he see himself as a resourcefor others? Again, look for a balance in the conversa-tions about spelling. You want children to see eachother as resources for lots of help as writers, not justspelling help. But if a child seems overly focused on get-ting spelling help from others and is not taking enoughrisks on his own, you may need to reinforce the otherstrategies.

Follow the line of the child's vision as she writes. Do younotice that the environmental print in the room is directlyinfluencing the child as she writes'? If so, does it seem tobe a positive influence (helping occasionally) or a nega-tive one (closing down risk taking)? Sometimes, print thatis meant to help a child actually hinders her growth. Forexample, a box or a dictionary of "words I want to knowhow to spell" may become the only words the child willuse as she writes. If so, this list may need to go.

46 Spelling in Ilse

Some Questions to Ask Writers About Spelling

Young writers in classrooms where assessment precedes cur-riculum are accustomed to their teachers asking them ques-tions of process. Writers who are frequently asked processquestions must think about the ways in which they are work-ing, and this helps them access their own strategies. Like ob-servations, the information these questions yield helpsteachers make curricuiar decisions. The following questionsare examples of strategy questions.

Flow do you think of the ways to write words?

What do you think about when you come to a word thatis difficult for you to spell?

Do you notice spellings as you read?

What are sonic of the words that are very easy for youto spell?

Do you ever change a word if the spelling doesn't lookright to you?

Are there words you can spell without even thinkingabout them?

Do you think that spelling is easy or hard? Why? (An-swers often offer many insights.)

Researching Pieces of Children's Writing

Artifacts such as writing samples should be periodicallycopied and saved with accompanying observations about thechild's spelling in use. These documents and teachers' obser-vational notes may be kept in folders for individual studentsand should be used in place of grades to communicate to chil-dren and parents about writing growth and the role of spelling

Assessment f irst Planning for a [tilting Curriculum That Deals Responsibty tuith Spelling 41

in that growth. Again, we will make the point that we highlightspelling because it is the purpose of this book to do so, but wefeel these assessment practices are sound ones for all dimen-sions of children's work as writers.

When wise teachers look at children's writing samples,they frame their looking as research and, with regard tospelling, are curious about matters such as generating andplaceholding strategies, risk taking (spelling a difficult word),and ownership (words that have become automatic). Two as-sessment tools, one a question and one a formula, are usefulfor looking at children's writing samples and understandingthe growth of children as writers.

A Question: "Generating Spellings." When you see noncon-ventional spellings, make sure your question is, "What smartthing has this child done to generate this spelling?" Childrenspell in ways that make sense to them. The teacher's role is toidentify this making sense and, based on it, either confirmsmart strategies and/or show children how to do somethingthey are not yet doing as writers. For example, when seven-year-old Catherine writes "Lejens in the Pole" (Legends in thePool) as the title of her new scary story, her teacher realizesthat Catherine ha3 spelled pool based on what she knowsabout another word pattern that sounded similar and was fa-miliar to herrole, pole, hole. Her teacher confirms that this isa smart strategy to use when Catherine is unsure of a word,and she goes on to show Catherine how pool is, in fact, lift anumber of other words she knowstool, fool, cool, and, ofcourse, school.

A Formula: "Index of Control." An index of control gives aresearching teacher a numerical measure of a writer's controlover the spellings the writer chooses to use in his or her writ-ing when given the opportunity to write in his or her Ownvoice. The index of control is a helpful way to see whether awriter is controlling convention or is being controlled by it.Because the index of control generates numerical data on a

57

48 Spell leg te Use

writer, there is a danger that this data could be misused togive children grades. We feel strongly that this research toolshould not be used in this way. If writers learn that there arepenalties tied to their risk taking, they undoubtedly will takethe safest course as writers and use only those words whosespellings they own.

You will find that using the index of control is a time-con-suming process, but the data it provides (as later samplesshow) is invaluable. Because of the time investment, however,we recommend that an index of control be done periodicallythroughout the year, more often with writers who are strug-gling or who present you with teaching anomalies wherespelling is concerned. Here are the six steps for finding anindex of control on a child's writing sample:

1. Collect samples of the student's writing over a specifiedperiod of time.

2. Count the number of words in each sample.

3. Count the number of different words in each sample.For example, if the word work appears in a piece eighttimes, it will be counted only once.

4. Of the total number of different words, count the num-ber of those spelled conventionally (as in the dictio-nary).

5. Of the total number of different words, count the num-ber of those words for which the writer constructed aspelling.

6. Divide the number of words spelled conventionally(Step 4) by the total number of different words (Step 3)to determine the index of control.

A. # of total words

13. = # of different words

58

Rssessment f irst Planning for a Writing Curriculum That Deals Responsibly with Spelling 49

C. = # of those spelled conventionally

D. = # of constructed spellings

Index of Control = C divided by B

Index of Control =

Keeping Track of Individual Spelling Growth. You may findit helpful to develop a record sheet for documenting growth inspelling control over time. A record sheet might include thefollowing useful information about writing samples through-out the year:

1. growth in the total number of words used in a writingsample

2. growth in the number of different words used in thesample as an indication of increased written verbalfluency

3. growth in the writer's index of control

4. the writer's continuing focus on communication ofmeaning and sensitivity to word choices

Over time, you may notice that a student shows increasesin the total number of words and the number of differentwords, and maintains or increases the "index of control." Insuch a case, you would note that the student shows develop-ment as a speller in that the total number of words spelledconventionally is increasing. This pattern indicates that thewriter is concerned with the expression of ideas and is willingto continue taking risks with unknown spellings while gainingcontrol over an increasing number of words used frequently inwriting.

If you should notice that a student's writing shows nosteady increase in either the total number of words or in thenumber of different words paired with an increasing index of

5

SO Spetling in Use

control, your conclusions should be quite different. This sce-nario could indicate that the writer has shifted the emphasisfrom expression of ideas and word choice to "using words Ican spell." This focus may result in "better" spelling in the in-dividual's IA itten products, but it may also result in loss of thewriter's voice, restricted word choices, and less elaboration ordetail. If this happens, you lose powerful opportunities to notethe writer's strategies, strengths, and areas of need as a childdeals with spelling in use.

You may find it helpful to list constructed spellings. Orga-nize them into categories on the basis of similarities inspelling patterns (e.g., -ake, -ight patterns or words where the

f sound is spelled ph, etc.). This clus-tering will be helpful in determiningwhich patterns are most unfamiliar tothe write: and where instruction willbe most immediately relevant.

As an example, try using thismethod on the following writing sam-ple. Anpie, the writer, is a seven-year-old in a small rural school where sheis in a K--1-2 multi-age classroom.When reading over this piece, whatdo you notice immediately?

Wkci+ ct A/L,rs.

S c orvie_Orle . dl-

kelps ?erpie ./YkAr_s&._s Hel,p

Doctors ind , 4ct (PIG'S

/Vurs 9 J k

When peofk Sic k

NiArscs lie IF

work r. hos.? and

lVL4rsej orn s and Doc.fori

oCri c_ s. opuash.te,

NiArses.

G

What is a NurseShe is someone thathelps people. Nurses HelpDoctors and, farmases.

Nurses get sick too.When people get sickNurses help them. Theywork in hospils andNurseing homes and Doctor'soffics. We apuashateNurses.

The End

Dssessment first Planning for a !tinting Eurricuturn That Deals Responsiblg with Spelling 51

Many adults immediately focus On the "errors" that are obviousin the piece. For example, they tend to notice the misplacedcapital letters and misspelled words. We would like you to takea moment to look closely at Angie's writing sample and recog-nize the knowledge this young writer brings to the piece.

Make a list of the words Angie uses in her piece. As youcomplete the list, note the variety of words used and thespellings. We find it helpful to write the piece in columns, sepa-rating conventional spellings from constructed spellings, andplacing a tally mark ( /) next to the word each time it is re-peated. (We also provide the conventional spelling for eachconstructed spelling.)

Conventional Spellings Constructed Spellings

What is / farmases (pharmacists)

a Nurse hospils (hospitals)

She someone Nurseing (nursing)

that helps offics (offices)

people / Nurses //I apuashate (appreciate)

Help, help / Doctors

and // get /

sick / too

when them

they work

in homes

Doctor's We

The End

Using the index of Control formula for Angie's piece, noticethe following:

61

52 Spelling in Use

A. 41 = # of total words

B. 31 = # of different words

C. 26 = # of different words spelled conventionally

D. 5 = # of different words with constructed spellings

26 divided by 31 = .8387 x 100% = 83.8%

Index of Control = 84%

By using this information, you may have a different view of thechild as a writer. Fen- example, as you read Angie's writing, did itoccur to you that she was controlling the spellings for morethan 80 percent of the words she wanted to use? Did you focuson all that Angie could do or was your initial assessment basedon collecting evidence regarding her needs? Did you focus onher strengths or her weaknesses? Notice the knowledge shedemonstrates in the piece. Notice the word choices (pharma-cists, nursing homes, hospitals, appreciaw) she makes to commu-nicate her insights and understandings. Notice her willingnessto explore the spellings of plural endings and possessives.

Let your role be to facilitate students' use of variousstrategies for spelling unfamiliar words. Record progress bynoting increases in written vocabulary (total number ofwords and number of different words) and in index of control(the percentage of words they can spell conventionally). Asyou work with young writers, always try to focus on whatthey can do!

Now consider the writing of six-year-old John who is in aninner-city K-1 classroom. With this new frame, think throughthe decisions John has made in his writing.

The Sarcise

The Clauns

are

JagalingAnd a Ball

Fell

6')

Assessment hrst Planning for a Uniting [urriculum that Deals Responsibly with Spelling 53

on theman that!tacks theTicits And

he could

the PrFesre!

And PrFesre

Fired him! thats a teeralb! thingthe End i Give up i cuit

Th csyk ISe-

vt

\ 001 tCLaurv,

(VC \J00)0A;Dii\l_

Fell

Ink)" t6-t-t

Tic;ts Aro1

rTesfe

mAy 9, !q95

, erfo..sre.t--;(co

tkr nl)

moll; 11, if\

; .1(

63 BEST COPY AVAILABLE

54 Spelling in Use

The list for analysis would look like this:

Conventional Spellings Constructed Spellings

The, the 44 are Sarcise (circus)

And // a / Ciauns (clowns)

Ball Fell Jagaling (juggling)

on man tacks (takes)

that he Ticits (tickets)

Fired him could (called)

thats thing Prfesre (professor)

End i / teeralb (terrible)

Give up cuit (quit)

A. 37 = # of total words

B. 27 = # of different words

C. 18 = # of different words spelled conventionally

D. 9 = # of different words with constructed spellings

18 divided by 27 = .6666 X 100% = 66.6%

Index of Control = 67%

In this piece it is clear that John sees himself as a writer, as onewho uses spelling to communicate his ideas and intentions. Itisn't obvious on first glance, however, that John is controllingthe spellings of two-thirds of the words he has chosen to use inhis writing. He has utilized his knowledge of letter-sound rela-tionships (phonics) to construct or invent spellings for thosepowerful words he knows belong in his writing. It is importantto notice that those words John constructs spellings for arewords that might never appear in a spelling program designed

6 4

Rssessrunt first Planning for a Uiriting Cumrillurn lhal heats fiespons,bly wilh Spelling 55

for first grade. Words such as juggling. tickets, professor terrible.and quit are important to the telling of John's story. Thesewords give the piece a richness and texture that would be ab-sent if John were limited to those words he would have studiedin a typical spelling program for first grade. John is encouragedto write what he knows and to use in his writing the same richlanguage he freely uses in his speech. This attitude frees him toexplore and take risks as he gains more and more control overthe conventions of written language.

Consider seven-year-old Courtney's writing in the samplebelow. As a second grader, she has slightly more controlover the conventional spellings. Her piece is focused andpersonal.

C

-2,cy. Mi :9runctpa

I. waa_& E. \a 1 tn

_ _

t17,1 qe

t1----;t OVOi V

(\111, \.1

A

\ 14(1";.2f h,fY,

I have one sad thing tosay. My grandpa died beforI was boen so I did'tget to see him I can't stopthiking about it I ownlysee picshrs of him inBlack and Whight. I wouldlike to see a picshr of himin color.

6 5 BEST COPY AVAILABLE

56 Spelling in Use

Conventional Spellings Constructed Spellings

I 44 have befor (before)

one sad boen (born)

thing to // did't (didn't)

say My thiking (thinking)

grandpa died ownly (only)

was so picshrs (pictures)

get see // Whight (white)

him I/ can't picshr (picture)

stop about

it of /

in / Black

and would

like a

color

A. 48 = # of total words

B. 35 = # of different words

C. 27 = # of different words spelled conventionally

D. 8 = # of different words with constructed spellings

27 divided by 35 =.771 x 100% = 77,1%

Index of Control = 77%

Courtney constructs spellings for fewer than one-fourth ofthe words she chooses to use. Once again, note that the con-structed spellings in this piece are for words that are neces-sary to communicate the very personal message the writerwould have imparted through her speech. Courtney, like

66

Pssessment hrst Plannmq for a &ling Eumpilum That Deals Responsibly with Spelling 57

Angie and John, has something powerful to say. Notice howher knowledge of letter-sound relationships is evident in herconstructions for pictures. She uses a known word, own,in her construction of "ownly" and visual memory in con-structions for before ("befor") and thinking ("thiking").Clearly, Courtney is aware of conventional spelling and isworking toward greater control. Even so, keep in mind thatwriters continue to use various strategies for spellingthroughout their writing lives.

The last sample in this section was written by seven-year-old Tyler, who is a third-year student in a K-1-2 continuousprogress classroom.

The Big hawsThar was a Big haws and a rath man and the rath man was aGete man and he wad mor mane. But the man dod not no thehaws ...as a magac haws. But own bay the haws sab

to the man you wal see in yowr brens three sparastha wal taL you wat wal hpan to you of you botshar but the man sab to the haws i wal notshar my mane but the haws wab not asr sowthe man wab not shar has mane sow the manRemanb Grete and the Three Sparas cam. The frt spaerat was

the sperat fo lif. Wan he woc up he was scarbThe sperat sab i an the sperat av lif The man stal was scard

The sperat tald the man to cam bawn and the man bab Thesgerat tald the man to fiLo ham and He bab thesgerat wat to has tim wan the man wasa LataL boy he was rat A math pag. The man

sab thas me yes sab the sperat you ar staeg in be cas

you wr not bueg you math wan you wr spost tosow you Ar staing in and boweg it Naw we mas Go

Naw and tha Laft wan he woc up thar was No oaEtar nnd he wat dac to slep but tan the nassperat cam and the man woc up agan the speratsab i am the sperat fo sanes folo me the man the sab ibot wat to The sperat fo sanes dasaperb and the sperat fo bor aperd.

But than the man woc up than the man shard His mane. the End.

67

;

58 Spelling in Use

frar (1/ Tbr:-

1.; Qy IL '01:11.1,

p

-t-

11.rec spzr''8

) r)'f .)'y .

(7....../411

'11

ifc,11=

/LW; -JCL b Tc. "rhe:

Wq. b o )1 G-

flp210.41. .

; . xr '1 - f 1.1,1

kv2 .v,4_

1-; i?ft, /ft "--

_ .

I a, 1-he, 512,-(0. t,t Cot.'

. _ .

.. c f'd'

I

hit

11,..

t11 ia; a t

BEST COPY AVAILABLE68

Assessment first Planning for a Diriting Curriculum that Deals Responsibly with Spelling 59

yoi tvi flOt L yor rkz-1 h V1/031 you V1/r. cog o st

f:)'DW g7-0, i hi 171 Pia _In or, 60

L\A'aw and Lfr_nj. .WQc (.5 Tithr vv.. Oat,

Tar an' Wo.7- da_c -1-() E)L1 but. 1101 -r

rlt QJ aTh 7--zi, fr, r \NG Lip 111) Lfik._ Sciks.41:

'1"al c 3a,cj ((0 rne to2 _man -r ye 5 ceo 1

i) 0- 7.- vvo- -t- e speeqt tl,g 'A &or ..Perd

U Thaii "t- ht) n)%nu.

(For easier reference, we have listed Tyler's constructedspellings in alp!nbetical order and have given the number ofrepetitions in parentheses for his most-repeated words.)

Conventional Spellings

The, the 4 4 4 444 P4 44 (35)Rig /

was 4 111 (8)a 4 (5)and 4 4 (10)man 41 4 11 (17)he, He 114 1 (6)

Rut, but 1.144 (5)

89

Constructed Spellings

agan (again)

an (am)

aperd (appeared)

ar (are) 1

asr (answer)

av (of)

bab (did) 1

bawn (down)

bay (day)

BEST COPY AVAILABLE

60 Spelling in Use

Conventional Spellings Constructed Spellings

not //// be cas (because)

to III (8) bor (door)

you H4./. 11 (7) bot (don't) Isee boweg (doing)

in II brens (dreams)

three, Three / bueg (doing)

cam (cairn)

my cam (came) Iup /// dac (back)

boy dasaperb (disappeared)math / dod (did)

me / fiLo (follow)

yes fo (of)

it folo (follow)

we frt (first)

Go Gete (greedy)

am Grete (greedy)

H is ham (him)

End has (his) I

haws (house) 1-144 I (6)

hpan (happen)

Laft (left)

LataL (little)

lif (life) I

magac (magic)

mane (money) III

Inas (must)

mor (more)

Assessment first Planning for a tiling Curriculum that Dees Aesponsibly with Spelling 61

Constructed Spellings

nas (next)

naw (now) I

no (know)

no oaE (no one)

of (if)

own (one)

pag (page)

rat (writing)

rath (rich) I

Remanb (remained)

sab (said) 44 I (6)sanes (science) Iscarb, scard (scared) Ishar (share) II

shard (shared)

slep (sleep)

sow (so) II

spaerat (spirit)sparas, Sparas (spirits) Isperat, sgerat (spirit) 44 I.1.1.1 1

spost (supposed)

staeng (staying)

staing (staying)

stal (still)

taL (telt)

tald (told) I

tan (then)

tar (there)

71

Constructed Spellings

tha (they) I

than (then) I

thar (there) Ithas (that's)

the (then)

tim (time)

wab (would) I

wal (will) III

wan (when) III

wat (want)

wat (went) I

wat (what)

woc (woke) III

wod (wanted)

wr (were) I

yor (your)

yowr (your)

62 Spelling in Use

A. 286 = # of total words

B. 109 = # of different words

C. 27 = # of different words spelled conventionally

D. 82 = # of different words with constructed spellings

27 divided y 109 = .2477 x 100% = 24.77%

Index of Control = 25%

The one significant difference with this piece is the dramaticincrease in volume. Clearly, Tyler has more to say. Angie wasreporting information she had gained about the nursing pro-fession. John told of his observations at-the circus. Courtneyused writing to express her sadness and longing to meet hergrandfather. Tyler draws upon his imagination, his experiencewith story, and his language to create his own tale. Althoughhe has the lowest index of control, he has the greatest writtenverbal fluencythat is, he uses the widest range of words anddoes not limit himself to words whose spellings he can con-trol. Tyler's writing reveals that he uses b for d and reverses p,which might be mistaken for q.lt is important to look forthese patterns which may be mistaken as error. Tyler's con-structions indicate a heavy reliance on letter-sound knowl-edge and a "spelling-as-it-sounds" strategy. It is this freedomto construct that enables Tyler to weave his story into a com-pleted fabric. The story reveals knowledge of familiar plotsand character development. The opportunity to work throughthis process can only enhance Tyler's overall development asa writer.

Decide

As teachers research what writers are doing, they use the infor-mation they are gathering to make curricular decisions about

7°

Rssessment first Planning for a Writing Curriculum That Beals Responsibly with Spelling 63

what will help writers most at any given time (see vignettes atthe end of this chapter for examples of teaching decisionsbased on observations of writers). These decisions are notbased solely on what children are doing. Teachers make deci-sions about how to help young writers with spelling and all theissues in their writing based on a vision of these children as fu-ture writers. These teachers understand how writers deal withspelling (which is often very different from the way schoolsand programs have dealt with spelling), and they work to keeptheir curriculum and instruction in line with this understand-ing. This understanding motivates wise teachers to focus ondeveloping strategic spellers.

To help your understanding of what having a vision forchildren as writers is all about, consider this story fromKatie's life as a writer. Just a few years ago, someone explainedto Katie a sensible way to remember whether a word ended in-ible or -able. When she heard it, Katie thought to herself,"Good. I'll never forget this and I'll never miss these endingsagain." Today, however, Katie can't tell you the "rule" for re-membering this difference. She's forgotten it because she justdidn't use it enough. What she hasn't forgotten, though, is thatshe has a problem with -ible and -able and, the truth is, this isthe more important knowledge for her to have as a writer. Sheknows she needs to check the spellings on words with theseendings if she uses them in a high-risk situation.

When we have a vision for children as writers, it must bebig enough to consider what kinds of writers they will be,rather than simply what content they need to know. Like all ofus, children will forget much of what they don't often use in dayto day thinking. What kinds of writers will they be when they'veforgotten'? Now, let's consider how L . iters deal with spelling.

How Miters Deal with Spelling

Writers know when they need a strategy other thanmemory to help them :Tell a word, and they know which

73

64 SeUlnq n Use

strategies are most useful to help them in these cases. Inthis way, writers control the conventIons of spellingrather than being controlled by those Nonventions.

Writers have a sense of their audience .\ld of how highthe stakes are (with that audience) for spelling conven-tionally in their writing. The degree to which writerstake measures to check their spelling is related to thestakes involved with various audiences.

Writers use any words they want to make the clearest ex-pressions in their writing. Writers do not avoid words be-cause they cannot spell them conventionally on their own.

Writers are also readers who have committed thespellings of many thousands of words to memory andnow "own" these conventional spellings as they write(Smith 1988).

When the audience stakes are high, writers rarely relysolely on their own checking of spelling. They use technol-ogy, such as spell-checks, and human resources, such asproofreaders, to help them check for spelling problems.

Writers do not know how to spell every word they needin their writing.

Teach

Finally, wise teachers help children with their spelling in use.These teachers share strategies with children, point out howone word is spelled differently from a similar word, and embedtalk about spellings as words are used throughout the day innteaningful contexts.

Mary Ann, a second-grade teacher, reminds her stu-dents of that tricky r in "February" every clay for a

74

Assessment hrst Nal111111q fOT a Writing Curriculum Nit hals Responsibly wilb Spelling 65

month (February, of course!) as she opens class with

the calendar.

Bill, a fifth-grade teacher, shares his own spelling strate-gies (such as i befcre e) by demonstrating his thinkingwhen he writes on the board in front of his students.

Carolyn writes each one of her second-grade students apersonal note during the week about how she seesthem learning. The notes are precious to the students,as they represent individual attention from the teacher.Embedded in each note are the conventional spellingsof a number of words that the students often use whenthey write back to their teacher.

This sort of spelling instruction isn't usually planned forit'santicipated. Teachers expect "teachable moments" aboutspelling to arise during the day and they take advantage ofthem in both individual and whole-class settings.

The content of this "embedded teaching" comes primarilyfrom what teachers know of spelling as writers themselves andis therefore focused on the strategies and information aboutspelling that writers really use as they write. This focus onfunctional uses keeps spelling in its proper place as a part ofwriting and allows even the youngest writers to spend theirtime playing with ideas, not with words. (See Chapter 4 formore examples and vignettes of teaching.)

Teachers who are leading the embedded instruction inspelling for their youngest writers keep reminding their stu-dents of the following set of strategies for generatingspelling:

First, think about how a word looks. We spell from visualmemory more than any other information system. Justas we remember the names of many thousands of ob-jects, people, and places, we remember that h-o-r-s-e ishorse because it looks like that to us and we recognize itimmediately, not because we sound it out or decode it.

66Spelling in Use

Help children to draw on this visual memory of wordsas much as possible. (Smith 1988).

Think about whether the word is a long word or a shortword. Often, children don't think about the proportionalrelationship of letters to word length. You don't want tospell Tyrannosaurus rex with only two letters or /eg withseven!

Is the word like any other words you know? If so, makeconnections in the spellings. Watch for these connec-tions when looking at pieces of writing because they areoften the child's theory base for many constructedspellings.

Is the word written nearby?We don't want to see chil-dren struggle to write Saturday when there's a calendarhanging just above them! Teachers do have to keep aneye on how environmental print is being used, though.If children are overrelying on itnot wanting to writeany words unless they can find the correct spelling forthem somewherethey will not be growing in their abil-ity to generate the spellings they need.

Think about what sounds you hear in the word. Empha-size this point last. It has often been said that the worstspellers are the "wuns ho spel fonetikaly." We need toteach children to "sound out" words, stretching themlike rubber bands and listening to the different soundparts. We must also remember, however, that this isoften the least efficient way to generate a conventionalspelling.

The success of these or any spelling strategies lies in chil-dren using them wisely, drawing on the first one most and theothers only when extra help is needed. Through observation,questioning, and analysis of writing samples, teachers can geta sense of how children are using various strategies to spell asthey write.

r-f

assessment first Planning for a Writing Curriculum Thal Beals Besponsibly with Spelling 67

Ilignettes: lie loin, Paola, and Christina

Kelvin

Kelvin's kindergarten teacher usually had good success withfiguring out the sensible ways her beginning writers werespelling, but Kelvin was an anomaly for her. There seemed tobe little or no visual or phonetic correspondence between thewords Kelvin would write and the words he would read as hiswriting. Kelvin's illustrations were quite detailed and often in-cluded conventional environmental print, showing that Kelvinused his visual memory extensively in his artwork, unlike hiswords. Kelvin was also making very good progress in reading,again relying on both visual memory and letter-sound corre-spondences to help him figure out text. When the teacher

7. -I n

I- I r---- -1 _

Kelvin's story about his trip to the Gap.

77

68 Speliing in Use

asked Kelvin how he thought of how to write the words, Kelvinrepeatedly said, "I just think of them." Kelvin read the piecepictured on page 67 to his teacher as, "My mom took me toGap and bought me a new green shirt."

Kelvin's teacher decided to observe him as he wrote onemorning to see if there were any clues to this anomaly in his ac-tions as a writer. As she watched, she noticed that Kelvin firstdrew his picture, paying close attention to many small detailsin backgrounds and figures. When the picture was finished,Kelvin began to write. His teacher noticed him looking aroundthe room after placing each letter in the text. She began to fol-low the line of his vision and noticed that Kelvin looked at thesign that said library arid then wrote an I. Next, he looked at theword Aprilon a calendar and wrote the letter a. This pattern

' A ci y-Aj

e- M YMAA4AOC)

Trit0 cah

Kelvin's story about his trip to the beach.

gssessment first Planning for a Writing Curriculum That Deals Besponsiblg with Spelling 69

continued as the teacher watched Kelvin find words in theroom, take a letter (usually the beginning one) from each oneand add it to his paper!

Wisely, Kelvin's teacher taught into his process, confirminthat it was helpful to use environmental print but showing hima better way to do this. She also showed him the other strate-gies, especially emphasizing thinking about how a word looksbecause she knew Kelvin had very strong visual memory(she'd seen this in his illustrations). Literally overnight, Kelvin,his teacher, and his classmates could start to read his writingbecause he had learned to draw on new strategies as a writer.

Kelvin wrote the piece pictured on page 68, "Me my momand my dad and brother went to the beach," just three daysafter this powerful conference with his teacher. Notice the typ-ical pattern of strong approximations of spelling early in thepiece and then a falling away from this strength toward theend, as Kelvin gets tired. The new work of deeply theoreticalgenerated spelling is hard and tiring, and we often see thisfalling away near the end of young writers' early pieces.

Paola

Rising to the expectations of her kindergarten teacher, Paolasaw herself as a writer and went happily to the writing work-shop each day. She wrote about things that were happening inher life and, though shy, she would share her writing with thechildren sitting close to her. In the piece on page 70, she writesabout her family at Christmas, reading it as, "We got a lot ofpresents for Christmas for fun." At this point in the year, Paolawas writing letters that she knew, but not yet making many let-ter-sound connections.

In early spring, Paola's teacber decided to help her youngwriters by having each of them make dictionary boxes oftheir favorite words to use in their writing. Soon after, Paola'swriting took a major turn. She was still writing about thesame topics in her life, but she had lost faith in her ability to

7J

70 Spelling in Ilse

6 A--\-sevE f-i!

-II 1? The

Paola's story about Christmas with her family.

write the words she needed. and she began to rely exclu-sively on her box of words, losing all meaningful (syntax. se-mantics, pragmatics) word-to-message relationships. In thenext piece pictured, notice that if you simply looked at thenumber of conventionally spelled words, fourteen out of fif-teen are correctly spelled. Of course, together they don'tmean anything! Paola read the piece on page 71 to herteacher as, "My sister and I went to the park to play."

Paola's teacher realized that the box of c..)rrect spellingshad heightened Paola's awareness of convention to a pointwiiere she had lost faith in her own abilities as a writer. Theteacher began to notice that other children, though they didnot go to the extremes that Paola did, were mostly writingabout whatever topics could be handled with the words intheir boxes. After an honest conversation with her studentsabout how she felt the word boxes were hurting them more

80

AssessmeM first Planning for a Wing Curriculum That Oeals Responsibly with Spelling 71

--

(A) tiO h71- "H:"

-00. , poL_

A piece written while Paola was relying on her dictionary box.

than helping them as writers, Paola's teacher ceremoniouslyallowed the children who wanted to get rid of the boxes to doso and go back to making sense of spelling without them. Afteran individual conference with her teacher, Paola dramaticallyreturned to the sensible strategies she had used before theword box. Notice that in her next piece, written just a weeklater than the "Cat, zoo ..." piece, Paola has used severalspelling strategies as she writ es, "When I went outside I sawflowers." With experience, Paola has grown so much as areader and writer since Christmas!

8 1

12 Spelling in Use

Paola describing flowers she'd seen.

Christina

Though the writing of Christina, a first grader, showed an ob-vious attention to how words sound, her teacher was con-cerned that this young writer might be relying too heavily onthis one spelling strategy because she was not seeing thegrowth toward conventional spelling that she expected in awriter as fluent as Christina. By observing Christina writingthe following piece, her teacher noticed that Christina wrotevery quickly and that her mouth moved constantly, shapingthe sounds as she went. It was apparent that Christina's pen-cil could not keep up with her "sounding out," because manywords had significantly fewer letters than convention woulddictate. Christina was relying exclusively on one strategy as

8 2

Rssessrnenr first Planning for a Writing Curriculum lhat Beals Responsibly with Spelling 13

she wrote"sounding out." Christina read the first of her pic-tured pieces as, "When it's the last day of school I'm going toFlorida. I get to see my family. It's going to take a long time."We suspect, however, that when she first generated the text,the last words were two days rather than a long time. She re-membered what they meanttwo days is a long timebutfound reading them as she'd written them to be difficult.

15 11 5 do, t,n1. H0,1: 10i /le i H:1(1LIY3 Jai')

N

I 1

!.

(

Christina's story about a summer trip to Florida.

Christina's teacher sat beside her, confirmed her thinkingabout the sounds of words as a good strategy, patiently againshowed Christina how to use the other spelling strategies (vi-sual cues, word length, etc.), and suggested she make spacesbetween her words when she wrote. Her next pictured pieceshows dramatic growth as Christina goes to her writing with amore sophisticated repertoire of strategies at her disposal.You will notice again the falling away from strong approxima-tion (as in the writings of Paola and Kelvin) as Christina gets

74 Spelling in Use

C..70,43c-4.- 9'_

. _ . . .

r9;g_oi n 1-31s.eefilkose a minFiry_ I.g.

tAak:121.01.1461E 1`7.0.Y.!--_7:& .1

/C1

Christina's story about an upcoming trip to the zoo.

tired near the end. Christina read this piece as, "I am goinv, tothe zoo with my class. And I am going to see the animals. I amgoing to eat my lunch. My mom is going with n Then I'mgoing home. I'll fall asleep. Then I'll wake up agwn."

8 4

MMus amt 'Routines:Classioom Possibilities

One of the primary concerns shared by many teachers in tran-sition from a spelling textbook to a study of spelling in use isthe use of time. The structures and routines of the textbook

are so clear-cut, decisions are made, and options are delineated.Moving to a more balanced literacy program, where writing isthe focus and spelling is studied in use, can be intimidating tosome teachers. As you are developing the professional knowl-edge base necessary for teaching into what the children are try-ing to do in their writing and language use, you may find ithelpful to see what others have done in their own transition.

Many teachers are familiar with the typical class period forthe textbook approach to spelling. In this piece we will suggesta set of predictable structures that you may find useful as youmove away from the textbook and begin to deal with spellingin use. We recommend that children be given at least one houra day to work as writers. In this hour, a number of predictablethings might happen, but the mainstays of the writing work-shop are whole-group meetings, writing, and who/e- or small-group share sessions.

76 Spelling in Use

Whole-Group Meeting (5 to 10 minutes)

The teacher directs a mini-lesson, students are gathered andlistening, teacher is teaching. Mini-lessons focus on many dif-ferent aspects of writing, of which spelling may be a small butsignificant part. Possibilities include the following scenarios:

The teacher writes in front of the students and thinksaloud as she generates spellings, giving access to herthinking about spelling.

The teacher leads an inquiry into spelling patternsand/or anomalies such as ed endings, doubling finalconsonants, vowel pairs, and homophones. Over sev-eral days (typically), students look for these patternsas they write and read and experience the print in theirenvironment. The patterns are collected and catego-rized, and students generate theories about thespelling patterns.

The teacher shows students how to use a spelling strat-egy such as "have a go," where a writer tries spelling adifficult word two or three different ways and selectsthe one that looks most right. Other strategies are de-scribed throughout this book.

Wilting 130 to 40 minutes)

Children are writing (reading and talking as needed to supporttheir writing) while the teacher confers with individuals andsmall groups, teaching them the strategies and skills theyneed for the work at hand. Possibilities include the followingscenarios:

86

structures and Routines Classroom Possibibties 77

Children are writing in many different genres, such aspoetry, fantasy, memoir, and informational writing. Theyare also writing in personal journals, notebooks, andlearning logs. The teacher emphasizes different stakesfor conventional spellings based on audience and stagesof drafts, yet encourages writers to be attentive to theirgrowing understanding of the conventions of writing.

The teacher confers individually and with small groupsof children about their writing. She uses these confer-ences to teach directly into the children's writing. Thisteaching may include spelling strategies or patternsthat a child needs while in the process of writing.

Whole-Group OT Small-Group Share Session (5 to 10 minutes)

Selected students are teaching from their strategies. The se-lected students teach, the teacher listens, other children listenand question.

Possibilities include the following scenarios:

The teacher encourages children to make note ofspellings that interest them when they read, write, andexplore the print in their environments. When the classcomes together for a share session, children may offerthe spelling anomalies they found for others to con-sider. This helps children realize the fact that our lan-guage is meaning based and alphabetic, but notnecessarily phonetic (Smith 1985; Goodman 1993; Mills.O'Keefe, and Stephens 1992).

As the teacher confers with the students, she looks forindividuals who can share their strategies with the classlater.

87

78 Spelling in Use

Mini-lessons

Most of the direct instruction in spelling occurs in the mini-lessons. These may be for the whole group when the teacherdecides that a strategy is one that will be of benefit to theentire writing community. More often, however, mini-lessonswill be directed to small groups and individuals as theteacher confers with children about their writing. In mostcases the mini-lessons focus on strategies such as thoseidentified by Sandra Wilde and Christine Bouffler, and de-scribed in Chapter 1. A mini-lesson might address such spe-cific skills as when and how to use contractions, how tomake plurals, how and when to add ed, strategies for remem-bering how to spell words such as separate, and dessert, andother words which children repeatedly tend to find difficult.For accountability purposes teachers make a note of all thelessons they teach, whether they be with gi oups or individu-als. Mini-lessons can focus on strategies. spelling patterns andrules, and even ginunicks that help writers generatespellings. Some examples of each type of mini-lessons fol-low; also see Kni Kan Red This (Wilde 1992) for other usefulstrategies, patterns, and rules.

Strategy. Beverly, a fifth-grade teacher, speaks to a smallgroup of her students. "I've noticed," she says, "that when youguys are writing your drafts, you spend a lot of time looking upwords you don't know how to spell. Let me make a suggestion.When I'm writing and I'm unsure of a spelling, I often write iton a Post-it note two or three different ways and go with theone that looks most right to me. This saves me time while I'mdrafting, and 1 always know I can go hack again later if I'm stillunsure. So, will you guys try this out for a few days and let meknow how it's working for you? If you like it, we can share itwith the rest of the classmaybe on Friday."

88

Structur2s and Houtines Classroom Possibilities fl

Other examples:

If you are having trouble with a spelling, try to remem-ber what the word looks like.

Before you finish a writing project, have someone elsehelp you check your spellings.

Patterns and Rules. Kevin, a second-grade teacher, gathershis whole class around him. "I need to show all of you how todo something in your spelling. Many of you use words that endin ing like having and taking and giving." Kevin writes thesewords on the board. He asks his students, "What were thesewords before we added the ing to them'?" Quickly, several stu-dents answer with the correct root words. "Did you notice,"Kevin asks, "that the final e is dropped off each one before weadd the ing?" This is something you can usually count on inyour writingthat you need to drop the final e on a wordwhen you add ing. Will you help each other to remember thatas you're writing? I'll leave these examples posted on ourchart for a while just -to help you."

Other examples:

plural endings

adding prefixes and suffixes

possessive forms

contractions

Gimmick. Mary Aim, a third-grade teaclior, is discussing adraft of a letter that three of her students have written to theprincipal. She notices the word separate spelled as "seperate"in their draft. She exclaims, "Oh, separate! I used to misspellthis wo:d all tlw time until someone told me to rememberthat there was 'a rat' in the middle of that word, and I've never

89

80 Spelling in Use

forgotten that it's arate instead of erate." Maybe that will helpyou. Will one of you tell the class about this quickly when wemeet for our share session later?"

Other examples:

A double helping of dessert gives you two s's in this word.

The principa/ is your pal.

11111 Spelling Instruction in Spelling Inquinj

In a more traditional approach to spelling instruction, thestructures and routines are dictated by an arbitrary scope andsequence determined by distant and unseen "experts." Curric-ular and instructional decisions are never left to the teacher,the one person who has the most intimate knowledge of thereaders and writers in the classroom. When spelling instruc-tion is a matter of moving the children through the spellingbook, teachers do not have to make any decisions about whatto teach and when to teach it. However, when writing is thefocus and spelling instruction is an eml...dded part of thatfocus, teachers must rely on their own knowledge of spellingin use. That knowledge comes from their own experiences aswriters and kidwatchers, as well as from professional re-sources, and it is refined through reflective practice.

Other than direct teaching, a balanced literacy program re-quires a supportive classroom environment. Such an environ-ment would be rich with print. This could include menus,schedules, color words, numbers, directions, mailboxes, thealphabet, a calendar, instructions, a class list, sign-up sheets,books (organized by author, genre, title, topic), maps, addressbook, a return aidress for the classroom, and any other printthat would support the work of young readers and writers. Inaddition to environmental print, writers will need resources

00

Structures and flumes Classroom Possibilities 81

such as dictionaries, spell-checks, and computers to supporttheir spelling growth. Naturally, decisions about what to in-clude in the environment would be made on the basis of theage and development of the children. Learning to use thesources in the room is a valuable strategy to any young writer.

Many teachers who work with spelling in use daily in theirwriting workshops also make time during the week to lead aspelling inquiry in their classrooms. This time is in addition to,not in place of, the predictable writing workshop. These teach-ers want to encourage their young writers to be curious aboutwords and to have a respect for the language they will use to filltheir lives with powerful writing. Three of these spelling inquirystructures are described below. What is important about eachof these structures in classrooms is that the focus remains onthe children as writers. The spelling curriculum that is "cov-ered" in these structures is generated from the work childrendo and the questions they have as writers and readers.

Spelling Inquiry 111: R Third-Grade Classroom

A block of time on Thursday mornings in a third-grade class-room in New York City is reserved for spelling study. Thisfocus time on spelling is a predictable structure in this class-room, and the students prepare for it all week long. Theirpreparation, however, is not in the form of spelling exercisesor drills on lists of words. These third graders prepare by liv-ing their lives as writers with a curiosity about ai.ti a respectfor words. When the focus time on spelling begins, the writersgather, with their notebooks or small scraps of paper in hand.

During the week the teacher asks his students to livewith two questions in their writing lives in preparation forspelling study time. One question is, "What words have youwritten this week that were hard for you or made you won-der about their spellings?" The other question is, "Whatwords have you read this week whose spellings inade youcurious?" The students are to collect such words during the

91

82 Spelling in Use

week (no set number of them) and bring them to the Thurs-day morning spelling study time.

Using the words his students bring in. the teacher leadsthe group into inquiry about spelling patterns, meaning-basedrelationships in spelling, and spelling anomalies. Because hehas created this open-ended structure for the study ofspelling in his classroom, the teacher must be ready to "teachinto" what his young writers bring. He brings a great deal ofknowledge about spelling to his student in these sessions. Forexample, when one student is curious about ph spelling the[sound in many words, the teacher explains that phon meanssound and that's why many words use that letter combina-tionbecause of what they mean, not how they sound. Thestudents think of all the words they can that have the ph com-bination as they use the teacher's information to test out thismeaning relationship. They find exceptions, of course, butthey are used to exceptions in this .kind of inquiry. In a !ditionto explaining to the students many things about spelling asthey bring words to study, the teacher also frequently ex-plains his Own thought process to them when faced with aspelling anomaly.

Over the course of the year, the teacher and his studentsoften get "on about" something in their spelling inquiry andstay with it over timeas they did with the pattern ough. Forseveral days, the students collected words with this patternand charted them by sound as they worked to develop a the-ory about this unusual pattern. The teacher also makes booksabout spelling available to his students (including teacher's re-source books, such as Sandra Wikle's You Kan Red This), andthe students often look to these resources when they are inter-ested in particular patterns or meaning relationships.

What Is Significant about This Structure?

There is no set curricukim for which words to focus onor what to study about spelling.

9 2

,-

Structures and Routines Classroom Possibilities 83

Children learn a great deal of content knowledge aboutspelling, but this content (curriculum) is clearly gener-ated by the work students do as writers.

The emphasis in this spelling program is on children'shabits of mindbeing curious about words. The em-phasis is not on specific pieces of information aboutspelling or specific words.

The spelling study time is predictable so that studentscan expect it and live toward it in their thinking. Thestudents have a great deal of responsibility in makingthis inquiry relevant and interesting.

The inquiry approach to spelling helps the student un-derstand the complexity of spelling. Students may bemore willing to take risks because the emphasis is noton holding correct spellings for mastery tests.

The theory building and searching out of patterns in theinquiry approach helps children to he more aware ofpatterns and apply this to their spelling in use.

Outline of This PrerlictaMe Structure

There is predictable weekly time for spelling inquiry inthe classroom. This block of time would usually beabout thirty minutes in length and should be in additionto the writing workshop time, not in place of it. Whenthe class is really excited about something in spellinginquiry, there may be short follow-up gatherings duringthe week as students find new examples of patterns orhave new insights.

During the week, teachers ask students to make a note ofwords whose spellings are difficult or interesting to them.Students find these words as they engage in their ownwriting and reading. Teachers may want to require that

93

84 Spelling in Use

these noted words be turned in each week, but this is notnecessary. The teacher can certainly ask about notedwords from time to time in conferences with individualstudents and might even ask upper-grade students to re-port on their own individual spelling inquiries.

We recommend that teachers not set a certain quantityof words for students to find for inquiry each week. Ifthe focus is on genuine inquiry, the words will presenthemselvessometimes several in a week for a student,

sometimes none at all.

When the wilole class comes together to study spelling,the teacher may need a structure for determining whocontributes the words for study, although this is notnecessary. If a structure is needed, the teacher might di-vide the class into groups who meet briefly to discussthe words they have collected; the teacher then mayask one of these groups to bring the words or word pat-terns for that week's study.

We recommend that there be no spelling tests of anykind in this structure. Since the point of this approachto the study of spelling is to teach children to be curi-ous about words as they grow in their knowledge ofwords, there is no need for them to demonstrate mas-tery of specific words on tests.

Spelling Inguily #2: 11 Kindeigarten Classioom

During the class meeting On Monday morning in a kinder-garten classroom, the teacher carefully uncovers a picturethat has been taped to or drawn on the top of a large piece ofchart paper. This morning, the picture is of an elephant. Theteacher pronounces the word "elephant." The children look atit carefully and immediately begin to think about it. Theseyoung writers know that sometime during the day they will

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Structures and Routines Classroom Possibilities 85

come to this chart either alone or with a friend and generate aspelling for this word, elephant.

Throughout the day the chart fills with various attemptsat this spelling, each one signed by the writer who "had ago." The first writers to try a spelling take the biggest risk,as they create a forum for discussion for those who follow.The teacher loves to listen in on the talk during the day thatsurrounds the attempts to spell the word. By listening in,she is able to learn a great deal about what strategies herstudents are using to generate spellings, and she notes theinsight she gains as a reminder for future mini-lessons or in-dividual conferences.

Near the end of the day, the class comes together againaround the chart with the elephant at the top, but this time thechildren gather as researchers, as their teacher has taughtthem to be. She has them look for patterns in the various at-tempts, such as every try having an I and an f somewhere inthe word. They discuss the patterns they see, and some chil-dren talk through how they generated their spellings. Theteacher listens carefully and teaches into any strategies thatshould be confirmed, even though sometimes the smartstrategies do not render the conventional spelling.

Such was the case with this word, elephant, as children de-scribed hearing an f and so they wrote f in the word. Theteacher confirms that matching the sounds you hear to the let-ters you know is a smart thing to do, especially for very youngwriters. One child put two Ps in his attempt because, he said,"I was thinking that a lot of words have two i's together in themiddle and it looked like this one should have two." Again, theteacher confirms that thinking about how parts if this wordmight be like parts of other words you've seen k a smart strat-egy. "But," she says with a smile on her face, "ek 'hunt is atricky one," and she goes on to show the children the conven-tional spelling and talk to them about the various parts of thewords, teaching content about ktter patterns as sh2 does. Be-cause of all the early confirmations and the general tone of theinquiry that the teacher creates, the children do not seem at

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all defeated when their teacher shows them the conventionalspelling. Instead, they seem very curious and think of them-selves as quite smart for getting as close as they did. Theyoften have a good laugh about Lie words that trick them withsilent letters or unexpected patterns.

What's Significant About This Structure?

This structure was chosen for this kindergarten class-room for several reasons, but one of them is the mostcritical in the teacher's mind. This structure creates aclimate of trying in the classroom. These children knowwhat to do when they come to a word that's hard forthem because they do it routinely as a class structure.They also know that even nonconventional spellingscan be very smart choices when they are theory based(an expression the teacher uses with her students). Sothe words and the patterns they present are less impor-tant to the teacher than the fact that her students learnto try and feel comfortable with attempting to spellwords that are new or difficult for them. The focus is onthe children as writers.

The teacher must be a careful listener throughout theday and during the children's gathering as re earchersaround the chart. She is listening for the smart ways herstudents are thinking so she can confirm these, andshe's also listening for what it seems they don't yetknow so she can teach them. We call this "teachinginto" a generatA-d curriculum.

The teacher encourages her students to attempt thespelling with a friend because she trusts that the talkthat is geiwrated in their interactions will be v,--y in-structional. She wants students to learn from eachother so she makes it a part of the structure.

The teacher wants her young writers to understandwhat it means to approximate !Telling and why they

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need to be willing to use approximation as writers. Thisstructure helps her children to understand approxima-tion, as it draws their attention to the intelligence shownin their attempts but still acknowledges the fact thatthey are approximating (by showing them the conven-tional spelling). The teacher uses the word conventionroutinely with her kindergarten students because shewants t'.em to understand what it means and how theywill grow toward it in her classroom. This wise teacherdoesn't hide her instructional theory base from her stu-dents, but shares it with them.

Outline of This PredictaMe Structure

The teacher reveals a pictured word somewhere in theroom and pronounces it.

There can be many reasons for choosing a picturedword: A student may suggest one, the teacher may see aneed to look at a certain pattern in the children's writ-ing, or the curriculum from another part of the day maysuggest a word. Remember that the primary goal of thestructure is to teach the strategies of approximation foryoung writers, so the words can come from anywhere.

Children come up alone or in pairs during the day andapproximate a spelling for the word. Their only resourcefor this approximation is their brains. Some teachers usethis structure all in one sitting, passing out note cards topairs for their written approximations, and then collect-ing the cards and studying them as a group.

The teacher first listens as children talk about how theygenerated their spellings, and she confirms any smartstrategies she hears them explaining.

The teacher reveals the conventional spelling and ex-plains it in terms of letter-sourd relationships, letterpatterns, meaning base, and similarities to other words.

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The teacher encourages the children to ask questionsas they examine the conventional spellings.

Sometimes children will generate the conventionalspellings in their attempts. Though this is worth a cele-bration, the teacher must lead the way in showing thatthe conventional spelling was not the only smart onegenerated.

The teacher should keep records of the words the classhas attempted to spell and retrace patterns from time totime in new words to show the children how to transfertheir growing knowledge bases to new approximations.

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he teaching of spelling in use looks very different from whatmany people are used to seeing in classroom spelling in-struction. For many parents, walking down the halls of an el-

ementary school where children's real attempts at writing arecelebrated and displayed can be a disconcerting experience atbest. "Aren't they teaching them anything?" is the question thatcomes to mind for many. Because they lack the knowledge baseto understand what they are seeing, these parents would likelybe much happier if they saw row after row of conventional,neatly copied "stories" on display. For this reason, teacherswho choose a spelling in use curricular and instructional ap-proach will have to communicate regularly with parents to helpthem understand how their children are being helped to be-come better writers (and spellers!). From the beginning of theteacher/parent relationship, it is important to stress the beliefthat you are not preparing children to someday be writers, youare allowing them to be writers now. This means that they willwrite like the children they are, six-year-olds making daily dis-coveries about a fascinating, complex language that gives thempower and voice. In this chapter we provide practical hell) incommunicating with parents about the teaching of spelling inuse. The chapter covers four areasworkshops for parents,

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conferences with parents, individual letters to parents, andclassroom newsletters. The chapter ends with a summary ofthe information we often share with parents in newsletter for-mats. As you read this chapter we encourage you to thinkabout ways to extend your classroom and make it an invitingplace for parents to learn alongside their children.

The Parent Workshop

One effectiveway to communicate with parents is to present aworkshop on spelling. Your workshop can demonstrate to par-ents how children develop as writers and how spelling knowl-edge emerges and is constructed through experience andinstruction.

Goats

However you decide to conduct your workshop for parents,you may find it helpful to consider the following goals in theplanning phase:

to examine the developmental nature of spelling as partof the child's overall literacy development

to introduce strategies that facilitate development inspelling

to introduce a system of record keeping that documentsspelling growth and change

to introduce the concept that instruction in spellingdoes not mean slavishly following a spelling textbook

to help parents understand that you see children's con-ventional approximations as opportunities for you to

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teach, not reasons to penalize children for what they donot yet understand

Examining the developmental nature of spelling as a part ofthe child's overall literacy development. You might usesamples of children's writing such as those presented in Chap-ter 1 to demonstrate how the instructional practice in theclassroom influences writing. You might also show how afocus on spelling in use can lead to more fluent writing. Thesesamples, or ones from your own students, can be used to helpparents understand how the skills they value (letter formation,spacing, punctuation, sentence structure) are not ignoredwhen emphasis is given to expressing the writer's knowledge,feelings, and questions.

You could present Cambourne's conditions for learning (asoutlined in Chapter 1) and show how the classroom environ-ment you and the children have established maximizes thoseconditions. Use examples from the daily routine (as presentedin Chapter 4) to demonstrate how these conditions are created,and show their connections to the writing samples you share.

Introducing strategies that facilitate spelling development.You could present the spelling strategies by Sandra Wilde de-scribed earlier and demonstrate to parents how all writers(even adults) employ various strategies to generate spelling.You might have parents brainstorm all the things they usuallydo when they are writing and are uncertain about how to spella particular word. We find that the strategies adults use mostoften will easily fall within the five strategies Wilde has identi-fied. It is often enlightening for parents to realize that learningone strategy that can be used in many contexts is more effi-cient than memorizing the single spellings of countless wordschildren may or may not use in their writing. You could do thesame with the ten strategies Bouffler outlined (see Chapter 1).This may help parents understand the strategies we are work-ing toward with our students. However, it is important to em-phasize that our youngest writers will only approximate the

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use of these strategies, as they have ownership over far fewerwords than a more mature writer.

Introducing a system of record keeping that documentsspelling growth and change. You may find it useful to use theinformation in Chapter 3 to show how you will make instruc-tional decisions and document growth and development. Sam-ples from a child's writing folder that demonstrate the wisethings the child has done, over time, to generate the spellingsneeded to communicate his or her intentions can help parentssee the power of having a repertoire of spelling strategies.Being able to inform parents about a child's developing controlover strategies (using the notion of an index of control) canhelp parents understand that spelling tests are not the only de-vices to determine whether their children are learning to spell.In fact, parents may come to understand that spelling tests arevery poor measures of a child's spelling in use.

Introducing the notion that instruction in spelling does notmean slavishly following a spelling textbook. You may find ithelpful to share your vision for instruction in spelling as a part ofthe overall writing/literacy curriculum. You could present forparents some examples of the predictable structures and rou-tines that will be present in the classroom you share with theirchildren (as described in Chapter 4). Demonstrate what willoccur in a mini-lesson and explain how you decide what to teachand to whom. Review the classroom stories found in Chapter 4,and use examples from your own class to show how you haveestablished expectations for your students. This can help par-ents to understand that instruction in spelling occurs both di-rectly and indirectly in a holistic writing curriculum. Parents cancome to appreciate inquiry, mini-lessons, group share sessions,and various other strategies as valuable instruction.

Helping parents understand that children's approximationsare teaching opportunities, not reasons to penalize childrenfor what they do not yet understand. Most parents have ahistory of schooling which taught them that all errors in

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learning were to be penalized with poor grades, rewrittenwork, or extra "practice." You will have to help parents to seethat you use children's approximations ("errors") as curricu-lar information from which you make plans about how toteach a child. The moves children make with language give uswindows into what they understand and what they need toknow. We need children to show us what they need to know,so we must reduce the stakes for taking risks in their learning.

Patent Illotkshop Ideas

The following are workshop ideas that we have used withgroups of parents to generate conversations about spellingthat lead to an understanding of the insights outlined above.

Find a word in the dictionary that you do not expectmost parents to knowa word like branchiopodan. Pro-nounce the word several times and give the definition.Then ask parents to generate a spelling for the word.Compare the different possibilities and have parentstalk about how they generated these possibilities. Theconversation about this activity should help parents tosee that generating spellings for words we don't knowcauses us to draw on knowledge of letter-sound rela-tionships, knowledge of meaning units, and knowledgeof letter patternsall of which come from what weknow about other words. Use this conversation to ex-plain how you work on building up these knowledgebases in your spclling program rather than on focusingon individual words. Emphasize the importance of read-ing in building up a visual history with words.

Explain to parents that the average literate adult cangenerate correct spellings for between forty and fiftythousand words (Smith 1988). Point out that many ofthese words are ones that have never actually beenused in writing by the adult, yet the conventional

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spellings can be generated. Have parents discuss howthis much knowledge about spelling could have hap-pened, and use this conversation to help them under-stand that adults did not learn these words one at atime. Help them to see that adults have learned to spellfrom reading and writing (Smith 1988) and that theydraw on a vast visual history of having seen wordsspelled for them as they read. This will help you sup-port the fact that you are teaching children to spellwhenever they are engaged in reading and writing.

Have parents think about their vision for their child as awritersay, ten years from now. How do they hopetheir child will be as a writer in the future? Included inthis, of course, is how this child will deal with spelling.This conversation should help parents to see that theultimate goal is that the child be conscientious abouttaking his or her writing into the world, not holding thecorrect spelling for every single word the child will everencounter. Be very clear with parents about your visionfor their child as a writer, and show them specificallyhow you are helping that vision become a reality. Deal-ing with conventional spelling is part of a much biggervision, and parents should know this.

Have parents of upper-grade students think about howtheir own writing processes change, depending on theirintended audience. Have them imagine the differentprocesses involved in writing a letter to a relative, amemo to a boss, and an application for a job. Help themto understand that the writing processand, in particu-lar how writers deal with something like spellingis notthe same for every audience. Explain to parents that youtalk to your students a lot about making the writingprocess fit the stakes of the audience. For high-stakes au-diences, you have students take fewer risks and double-check their conventional spelling and usage with theirpeers. For low-stakes audiences, they can take more risks

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and worry far less about "looking dumb" because of theirconventional spelling and usage. In your classroom,show parents how you have children engage in a range ofwriting for different high- and low-stakes audiences.

To help parents understand the role of reading and visualmemory in remembering spellings (Smith 1988), youmight draw a picture of a horse on the board and ask par-ents what this "says." They'll say, "horse," of course.Then quickly write the word horse and ask them what itsays. They'll say, "horse," of course! They won't "soundout" to get this word, they won't imagine other similarwords, they won't even think about meaningful units ofthe wordthey'll simply know it looks like horse in thesame way the picture looked like a horse. In many ways,the alphabet allows us to "draw pictures" of words withletters. As readers and writers, remembering what the"letter pictures" of words look like helps us to read andspell them, as Smith so eloquently helps us to under-stand. This will help parents understand the critical roleof extensive reading in learning to spell: children learn torecognize the words they read repeatedly (lust as theyrecognize objects in their environments), and they recre-ate these recognized wor ds as they write.

Helping Children at Home with Spelling

The following ideas could be shared with parents to encour-age them to work at home with their children if they are espe-cially concerned about spelling growth.

Parents of young children can place plastic magneticletters on the refrigerator and encourage their childrento make words, as well as make words themselves. "II.ove You" is an easy message to leave. Kids can use theletters to tell what they would like to have for dinner!

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Encourage parents to have written conversations withtheir child. After parents see the conditions that helpchildren to learn through demonstration, they shouldunderstand the value of the written conversation. Youmay suggest that parents keep a journal for these con-versations so that their child's growth can be tracedover time, creating a beautiful family artifact. Be surethat before these written conversations are under way,the parents understand and value their child's con-structed spellings.

Suggest that parents have a regular message board intheir homes where all members of the family (even theyoungest writers) leave and receive messages. Again,be sure before you suggest this that you have helpedparents value learning through demonstration and theirchild's constructed spellings.

Encourage parents to give "literary gifts" to theirchildbooks, pens, a variety of paper, stationery, littlepoems for little pockets, blank books, etc. A great birth-day gift for a young writer is a box full of paper, stickers,and things to write witha writer's box!

Encourage parents to have their child write for manydifferent purposes and audiences. Children shouldwrite notes to remind parents of things they want,thank-you letters to friends and relatives, stories andcards as presents for others, and even letters of com-plaint to officials when they are upset about things theysee as unfair.

Suggest that parents engage their child in an inquiryabout a word pattern that makes them curious. For exam-ple, the family might start a chart on the refrigerator of allthe words they can think of that have the long e sound inthem and then study all the different ways this sound canbe spelled.

Communicating with Parents 9?

Encourage parents to demonstrate a curiosity anoutwords as they travel with their child down the inter-state, or to the grocery store, the mall, or a restaurant,or just when they read aloud with their child. When par-ents comment on an interesting word or a spellinganomaly, they not only draw attention to the word orletter pattern but also demonstrate that readers andwriters are curious about words.

Emphasize to parents that reading is the best teacher ofwriting and spelling (Smith 1988). Parents should besure that their children have access to many books andshould encourage their children to read often.

Conferences with Parents

Another powerful line of communication with parents aboutyour curriculum and instruction is the parent conference. Toooften, teachers and parents only schedule conferences to-gether when there is some problem. However, in classroomswhere spelling and other content is taught in use in children'swriting, conferences are one of the best ways to help parentsknow how curriculum and instruction are being generated bytheir child's work and how their child is growing as a writer.The conference allows the teacher to explain in detail bothhow he or she is working individually with the child and howhe or she is teaching the whole class. The conference also letsparents ask questions that will help them understand and feelcomfortable with the instruction that may look very differentfrom what they expect to happen in school. Parents should beissued an ongoing, open invitation to confer v.,ith the teacherabout their child's work.

The following are some suggestions we have found usefulin dealing with parents when one of our primary concerns was

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to help parents understand how we teach spelling and othercontent in use in children's writing.

Before the conference begins, review samples of thechild's work and have these ready for the parents tosee. Using Post-it" notes or some other flagging sys-tem, mark places in the child's work that are signifi-cant indicators of growth in writing. For example, youmight mark a piece that has several examples of silentletters represented in spellings to show movement to-ward visual memory and ownership of spellings. Manyparents will not know what signs to look for to seegrowth.

Show parents any in-process notes you have takenabout the child's writing. Explain how you study thechild's work and use that information to make curricu-lar decisions. Report on the conferences you have hadwith the child that were a reFiilt of your study of thatchild's writing. Understanding that you are familiar witheach student's work will help parents value your in-struction because it is so like what parents do as theyhelp children learn and grow at home.

Have records of the content you have taught in .nini-lessons to the whole class ready for parents to see. Themini-lesson is most like what parents expect to be hap-pening in the classroom, and it can be a bridge they canmeet you on as they come to understand your teachingof spelling in use. Be sure to explain how you decidewhich mini-lessons to teach to the whole class.

If you are giving grades for spelling, the parent confer-ence is the place where you should explain to parentsexactly how this is done. If you are not giving gradesfor spelling but are giving grades for writing, explainhow spelling figures into t hat grade. lf, as we hope,you do not have to deal with grades at all and you

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instead describe children's development as writerswhen you report to parents, explain how you track achild's growth over time. You will want to mentionboth records of conferences with the child and sam-ples of work with analyses like those mentioned inChapter 3.

Open up the conference generally and frequently forparents' questions. You should also ask parents leadingquestions about their children that communicate yourvision for the classroom and that teach parents tothink about their child's writing in new ways. For exam-ple, after parents have looked through their child'ssamples, you might ask them which piece of writingthey think represents the greatest risk taking by theirchild. You might ask parents to tell you about th.::irchild's interest in writing and words at home. Youmight simply ask parents what they can tell you abouttheir child as a learner that will heip you teach theirchild better. By getting parents to talk about theirchild's learning, you h Ap them to see that you careabout that child as an individual. This is a powerfulthing for parents to understand.

Be sure to end the conference by telling parents whereyou next plan to focus your attention, with regard totheir child's development as a writer. Show them howyou made this focused decision and how it came from acombination of a vision you have for their child as awriter and an understanding of where that child is atthis time in his or her growth.

The bottom line when conferring with parents is tocommunicate that you are doing your best to teachheir child, not just as one of a group of thirty children,

but as a writer in his or her Own right. Help parents tosee that it is difficult, complicated work, but that youare willing to do it.

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Letters to Parents

As suggested above, we recommend that teachers find many.fo-rums for communicating with parents, such as workshops,newsletters, and conferences about a child's work. We makeone further recommendationthat letters to parents be individ-ualized for each child in the classroom. General informationabout curriculum and instruction can be shared in a standardnewsletter format, but the more specific report of a child'sgrowth toward spelling in use should be done on a child-by-child basis. Growth in a child's writing over time is not a uniquephenomenon, but it is an individual one; at any given moment inthe classroom, each child will be experiencing that individualgrowth as a writer. If we choose to refocus our writing curricu-lum so that we deal with spelling in use, we must find a way tolet parents know how each child is using spelling in his or herwriting and how this is a part of the child's overall growth as awriter. As parents and teachers, we are convinced that there isno more powerful communication between home and schoolthan a personalized note about one child's development.

In the busyness of our teaching lives, however, we must re-member to keep our teaching manageable, and so we offer somesuggestions to help with the management of individualized par-ent letters. Following these suggestions are a few sample lettersto parents that might accompany children's writing samples.

Keep the letters short and to the point. The fact that theletter to parents is about only their child is what willmake it powerful, not its length.

Inform parents in a newsletter or a school meeting thatthey can expect these letters about their child's growth.This will keep parents from seeing the letters as an indi-cation that something is wrong (the old reason that in-dividual letters were sent home).

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Pace yourself. Plan to write only four or five letters toparents a week. Again, the individualized letter is pow-erful because it's individualized, and the quality of thatnegates the need for quantity. You might set a goal of,say, five individualized letters to each child's parentsduring the school year.

If at all possible, use a word processor to write individu-alized letters. You can save them, spell-check them,and, in general, write the letters much more quickly ona word processor. Also, if you find a particularly goodway of saying something about an aspect of growth inone child that is true for another, you can clip and pasteon a word processor and save some time.

Always refer to your own classroom notes before youwrite these letters. This will improve the quality of yourletters by making them more specific. Quoting your ownnotes in the letter is very powerful.

Check to see what you said to parents in the last indi-vidualized letter before writing a new one. Try to buildon your insights from letter to letter. For example, if yousay in one letter that you hope to see a student takemore risks using words whose spellings she is unsureof, give an update on that point in the next letter so thatparents will know you have been working on and watch-ing for this growth in their child's writing.

Be specific about one or two areas of growth you haveseen in the child's writing; spelling in use will obviouslybe a part of this. Cite examples so parents will know onwhat evidence you are judging this growth. You mightphotocopy a piece or two of the child's writing thatdemonstrate the growth, or quote the child directly ifthe growth was noticed in the child's actions ratherthan in his or her writing.

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Be specific about one or two areas where you want tohelp the child grow next as a writer. If possible, suggesthow the parent can help the child grow as a writer inthese areas.

Keep the tone professional but approachable. Stayaway from jargon.

Invite parents to write back to you about what they seeat home in their child's growth as a writer.

Sample Patent Letters

(to the parents of Christina, discussed in Chapter 3)

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Gomez,

Greetings! I am writing to update you on Christina's recentgrowth as a writer. Last Monday I sat and watched Christina write,and I noticed that she used primarily one strategy for getting herwords down on paper"sounding out." I confirmed this strategy forher. She wrote very fast by sounding out, showing that she has confi-dence in her knowledge of letters and sounds. To help her grow, Italked with Christina about using other strategies to get her wordsdown on paper. I told her to think about what words look like fromher reading (because some sounds you can't hear) and to think aboutwhether the word was a long word or a short word. I also remindedher to make spaces between her words. Well, as you can see from thetwo examples, these new strategies already are taking hold inChristina's writing. Bravo! My next goal with Christina is to get her touse more variety in her writingwriting poems, letters, stories, etc.You might encourage her to do some of these at home. I'm excitedabout her growth.

Sincerely,

Mrs. Vargas

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(to the mother of Kelvin, discussed in Chapter 3)

Dear Mrs. Almonte,

Hello from our busy classroom! Kelvin continues to love writingworkshop (I saw him hug a piece of paper the other day), and I amvery excited about his growthwe've had a breakthrough. For weeksI've been trying to understand what strategies he was using to get hiswords down for his writing. The other day I sat by him and justwatched him write. I realized he was looking around the room andjust writing down letters he saw (oh my!). His "words" had nothing todo with what he was thinking about his writing. I talked to Kelvinabout this and helped him use the strategies I'd been teaching to thewhole class (picturing what words look like, "sounding out," makinglong words long and short words short) that day. Since then, Kelvinliterally has become a new writer (as you can see from these sam-ples). He can read what's there and so can his classmates and I. Fornow I believe it is best for Kelvin to keep using these strategies andgrow with them a while. But soon I want to work with him on stayingwith a story over time. He tends to start a new piece every day, evenwhen there is a lot more to the ones he leaves behind. Anyway, I'mexcited about this breakthroughask Kelvin to tell you about it.

Sincerely,

Ms. Watson

hwsletter for Parents

Some teachers find it very effective to maintain Ongoing linesof communication with parents through a regular newsletter.Your newsletter could consist of many typical items, report-ing events and happenings in the classroom and school. How-ever, you and your students also could use the newsletter as a

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vehicle for communicating how the writing curriculumencompasses instruction in spelling. In every issue you or astudent could highlight a new spelling strategy, explaininghow it is used and showing examples of how it has helped instudents' writing during that news period. Using the "patternsand rules" focus used by Kevin (as described in Chapter 4),you might have a :hild share the word(s) under study for theweek, as well as the patterns and insights gained through thatstudy. You could also provide some writing samples todemonstrate how children in the classroom are making use ofthose new insights.

Your newsletter might also be a place to address concernsexpressed by parents or those concerns you anticipate. Youcould utilize your own professional knowledge base and elabo-rate with information you have read in professional materials,such as books and journal articles (see bibliography). Outlinedbelow is information we frequently share with parents to helpthem understand the knowledge base that informs our instruc-tion, particularly in relation to the teaching of spelling in use.We have tried to preserve the tone of how this information isbest shared with parents, and we encourage you to use as muchof it as you see fit for newsletter type correspondence with par-ents. This particular piece would be useful when addressingparents' questions and concerns about constructed spelling.

Infonnation About the Developmental Hature of Spelling

As my son learned to walk, we celebrated his first steps. Whenhe toddled only a step or two before falling, we focused on thetwo steps. We gave him praise for his attempts, for his suc-cessful two steps. We encouraged him to stand up and tryagain. In short, he found himself in a supportive environmentwhere the people he trusted most saw his attempts asprogress toward independence.

As he learned to talk, we listened intently to his utterances.We focused on what he had to say, the message he wanted tosend. When he said "kitty gone," we acknowledged his attempt

Communicating with Parents 105

to produce language arid validated his successful communica-tion. We responded, "Yes, the kitty is gone. The kitty went inthe yard, but she'll come back." This sort of elaboration accom-plishes several things at once:

It repeats and validates the child's message.

It models a standard form of language while communi-cating the same intent.

It demonstrates that we value the child and what he orshe has to say.

It serves as a scaffold upon which the child can buildand extend his or her own understanding of how lan-guage works.

As a child begins to write, the adults in his or her life needto be equally supportive and accepting of the child's early at-tempts with written language. Several aspects of a child's de-velopment merit mention:

Handwriting may be "sprawling," lacking control overadultlike formation as a child slowly develops a morelegible form.

Early writing may be tied to drawings and occur as one-word labels or short phrases that communicate only abasic message about the drawing.

Awareness of the sounds of letters will increase as achild attempts to invent or construct spellings to com-municate thoughts.

As a child writes, constructed spelling will progress to-ward an adult standard, much as the child's speech pro-gressed from strings of sounds ("da-da") to completesentences and elaborated speech.

As with speech. the more demonstrations adults pro-vide in natural contexts to show how written languageworks, the more a child will continue to explore and

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approximate those behaviors that will satisfy his orher need to communicate.

As children reach school age and begin writing for audi-ences beyond the home, it is their constructed spellings thattend to concern adults most. Many adults focus on the factthat children's constructed spellings arc not correct whencompared to standard dictionary spellings. Adults often per-ceive these constructed spellings (also called inventedspellings or temporary spellings) as errors or mistakes thatneed to be corrected immediately before bad habits arelearned. To the contrary, constructed spellings actually pro-vide insight into children's understanding of lettet-to-soundcorrespondences and spelling patterns. It is also through con-structing spellings that children develop an awareness of theneed for and benefits of standard spelling.

Remember that your goal in communicating with parents isto invite them to celebrate their child's learning with you. Yourrole is to hell) parents see the intelligence in the approximationschildren make as they take the necessary risks to gain experi-ence with conventional spelling. Every language move a childmakes comes from some evolving theory the child is using tomake sense. Help parents suspend their adult logic (Laminack1991) and see this theoretical brilliance in their children.

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uestion afid Possibihties

Questions. We love questions. They keep us growing, keep usthinking. When we share our thinking with students and col-leagues, spelling is one topic that never fails to generate

many questions. Through many conversations about spellingquestions, we have come to the conclusion that there are veryfew single answers or "quick-fix" solutions to most of the issuesthat perplex us. Instead of answers to questions, we need waysto make good decisions in our teaching with regard to spelling.Sometimes the "answers" that inform our decisions will be dif-ferent. What we need are ways to think about our questionspoints that help us consider our own beliefs and that structureour looking to children for the answers they may hold.

Below are six questions that have come up in one form oranother in many of our conversations about the teaching ofwriting. In response, we offer points to consider that we be-lieve will help you in your own classroom decision making.

Question One: When do you stop letting children use con-structed spelling? Points to consider:

First, let's look closely at the question. The word lettingseems to convey the idea of "granting permission" to

108 Spelling in Use

children to use constructed spelling. This is not anissue of permission, however; it is an issue of under-standing. We don't let children construct spellings, as ifthey had some other options to say what they need tosay; we understand that they must construct spellings ifthey are to do the work of writers.

All writers construct spellings throughout their lives forwords that are unfamiliar. The more experience writershave, the more strategies they develop and the fewerconstructions are needed. This is always true. Con-structing spellings is not a stage a writer outgrows, withconventional spelling being the end goal. It is somethingwriters learn to handle throughout their lives.

We always encourage children to write for audiencesusing all the powerful things they know about writingincluding strategies for spelling, and we have high ex-pectations for our students. If we feel a student is notusing all her knowledge about writing, for example, weintervene and try to teach her past this. At the sametime, we also understand that all writers will need toseek spelling assistance when writing for certain audi-ences. There is no time when this need is not presentnot in our entire writing lives.

Question Two: What about word lists? Points to consider:

Let's think about the general assumption behind wordlists: that we learn to spell one word at a timethatthere is a moment when we don't know how to spell aword, and then a later moment when we do. We do notbelieve that the conventional spellings we hold come tous in moments of time. We believe they come in layersof experiences with reading and writing. The "momentin time" learning may happen with a very few wordsthat we ownwords such as Mississippi, where the gim-

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Questions and Possibilities 109

mick of the spelling was fixed in our minds the first timewe heard itbut this is a rare occasion.

Spelling instruction can focus on spelling patterns andstrategies, growing out of the context of the writer'swork and questions.

Some writers do, in fact, use a sort of listing strategy tohelp them remember tricky words that they use often.Our friend Barbara keeps a little note on her computerto help her remember the difference between thespelling of chose and choose. Our friend Jane keeps a re-minder on her desk to help her with familiar andsimilar. "Those i's and a's can be so confusing!" shesays. The significant point to remember here is that thisis a very selective "list" initiated by the writer as a strat-egy for spelling troublesome words.

Question Three: Should I have my students keep personaldictionaries of words they need help remembering? Points toconsider:

One important thing to think about here is, "Whose pur-pose will this serve?" As teachers, we must ask our-selves if we want children to keep personal dictionariesbecause it's a good strategy for a writer, or because wehope to see fewer constructive spellings in children'swriting.

Another thing to consider is how we envision childrenusing personal dictionaries. We need to articulate a vi-sion )f use for any structure that we put in place for allstudents in our classrooms. Once children begin to usea structure we've put in place, we must continuously re-flect on its use to see if it matches what we envisioned.

For writers to use dictionaries for spelling help in anyproductive way, they must Own the spellings of most

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110 Spelling in Use

words they need in their writing. A writer can't stopagain and again to look up words. Many adult writersnever interrupt their writing for this, choosing to dealwith spelling issues after all their writing is complete.For us to expect young writers to look up words theydon't know, in the same way adults would use this strat-egy, is unrealistic. There are just too many words forwhich young writers don't own the spellings. There isno way they could employ this strategy without it inter-fering with their meaning making.

When teachers encourage children to use dictionariesfor spelling help, they often see these children begin tolimit themselves to using words that are in their dictio-naries. Remember the example of Paola in Chapter 3.

Question Four: When children are writing and don't knowhow to spell a word, should I spell it for them if they ask?Points to consider:

First, ask yourself, "Why is the child asking for a spelling?"The answer to this question always lies with the child. Ifeight-year-old Robert routinely and confidently con-structs spellings for words he needs in his writing, his oc-casional asking for a spelling is a good strategyone thatmany writers use. Robert has probably asked for thespelling because the word perplexes him in a way thatmost unfamiliar words do not. On the other hand, if Saraseems afraid to construct spellings for most unfamiliarwords, she likely asks for spellings because she is reluc-tant to take risks or because she has a limited repert direof strategies. She needs more work with strategies forconstructing spellings for unfamiliar words.

We must consider the possibility that when we rou-tinely offer spellings to children we may be creatingcodependent relationships. Although feeling needed asteachers can be satisfying, it does little to make our stu-dents the independent writers we want them to be.

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Questions and Possdnbtles 111

Question Five: Why do children spell words conventionallyca a spelling test, and then misspell them in their writing?Points to consider:

On spelling tests, the point of children's work is to getcorrect spellings for specific words. The focus of theirattention is clearly on generating conventionalspellings. In writing, the point of children's work is onmaking meaning, so the focus of their attention is un-derstandably diverted away from spelling.

A spelling test is essentially an act of simple memoryand recall. Writing, on the other hand, is a much morecomplex act of continuous generationgeneration ofideas, sentence structures, text features, and, of course,spellings.

Related to this question is the difference between veryyoung writers spending their writing time copying textversus spending time generating text. You may have ob-served what many wise teachers have: when encounter-ing unknown sp,..11ings, the "generators" come up withmuch better spellings than the "copiers" because they'vehad so much more experience at what a writer must dowhen unknown spellings are encountered. Copying in noway replicates or gives children experience generatingtext. Preparation for spelling tests, likewise, gives writersno experience in generating text as needed.

Question Six: Should I give grades in spelling? Points toconskler:

The things we give grades for should reflect what is val-ued most in the classroom.

On the other hand, a grade by itself, on anything, is an ex-tremely narrow evaluative view of a child's learningand/or performance. The grade itself doesn't help thechild's learning or the teacher's teaching. There just isn't

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112 Spelltng in Use

enough information in a grade, and it represents merely asmall part of the child's total literacy development.

Sandra Wilde has noted that we feel compelled to givegrades in spelling because it is a feature of writing thatis very visible, even though it is not in any way the mostimportant feature. She has said that giving separategrades in spelling and writing is like giving separategrades foi multiplication and mathematics.

If you as a teacher want a way to look evaluatively atchildren's spelling use, refer to Chapter 3 and lookclosely at the index of control. This index can give you aqualitative and quantitative picture of children's con-ventional spelling use. Although we realize that thenumbers generated from the index could be convertedto grades for spelling, we feel strongly that this shouldnot happen. If children know that they are being gradedfor conventional spellings, they will begin to focus onthis at the expense of meaning making, and it is likelythat they will take fewer risks as writers.

Question Seven: What about spelling books? Should I use theexercises as extra resources for my writers? Points to consider:

The exercises in spelling books are made-up workwhere there is no work to be done. This is why the exer-cises often seem so senseless and, when they are as-signed as homework, require whole families to figureout what's to be done. There just isn't any work to bedone on "practicing" with spelling. There are not anylayers to understanding spellings. You don't deepenyour knowledge of how to spell a word, so any attemptsto make the study of individual words into meaningfulstudy are purposeless.

122

"

We learn through reflection. E. M. Forster has been quotedas saying, "I never know what I think until I see what Isay." In a very real sense, the writing of this book has

helped us to see what we say and know better what we think.Our own words have become a text for our reflection, and wehave learned from them. Over and over we have noticed cer-tain themes behind our words, sometimes appearing veryclearly in a story or an insight, other times living underneaththe ideasharder to see, but just as important to our thinking.

Now that we see what we say behind our words and under-neath our ideas, we have discovered that we think:

All writers are spellers, but not all spellers are writers.

Writers need tools (spelling, genre structures, punctua-tion, etc.) to write with power. The tools by them-selves, though, are not important. Powerful writing isimportant.

For spelling instruction to make sense, it needs to hap-pen alongside the real work of writers. This is the onlyway teachers can know what a child can do and whatthat child needs to know.

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114Spglinq in Ilse

The best teaching about language happens when chil-dren are invited, through predictable structures, to becurious researchers of how language works.

Teachers must know curriculum well enough (apartfrom manuals and textbooks) to meet students "head-on" in their work. Distant authors of manuals can neverknow the students we teach and so cannot do this"head-on" teaching.

We have come to believe that constructed spelling is themost appropriate term for the spellings that writersgenerate because this term reflects the constructive na-ture of learning.

We learn through questions. As we reread this text, asmuch as we are confirmed to see what we think, we are leftwith lingering questions. The more we know, as they say, themore we see we need to know. We have made peace with thisin our teaching, embracing anomalies because we trust themto keep us learning. We love what Parker Palmer (1990) hassaid: "Truth is an eternal conversation about things that mat-ter, conducted with passion and discipline." Our questionskeep us in the eternal conversation:

What kinds of classroom questions and research do weneed to help further our understandings about howwriters come to control language use?

To what extent will technology (spell-check, Internet,e-mail) impact this conversation about spelling and itsrole in a writer's life?

To what extent will politics continue to impact this con-versation, and, with regard to the empowerment of ageneration of writers, how political must we be in de-fending our stanco

What are the best ways to reeducate a professionalwork force of teachers schooled from a more tradi-

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Conclusion 115

tional paradigm of language learning, and do we havethe right to assume that this reeducation should takeplace?

What kinds of implicit knowledge do writers hold thathelp them own the spellings of many words? Can wemake this kind of knowledge more explicit?

What kind of writers would we have if children wereconsistently exposed throughout their school years toinstruction in writing that valued spelling in use, in-stead of accumulating years of mixed messages in hit-and-miss instruction? In other words, what's possible?What new insights could be gained from studyingthese writers?

We learn through stories. Our lives in classrooms arefilled with a hundred small narratives a day, each with its ownbeginning, middle, and endor sometimes, "to be continued."This book has been filled with the lessons we have learnedfrom being students of our teaching stories, so it is only fittingthat we should end with one more storya personal story,one more window into our current understanding about the roleof spelling instruction in our teaching of writing.

It is spring. Katie is on a committee at the university to se-lect an outstanding faculty member for excellence in teaching,and she is reading through a stack of nomination forms fromstudents. On one of these forms the first line reads, "Dr. Roseis very eger [sic] to help her students." Katie is floored by this,and a few moments later when she realizes she is floored bythe misspelling, she is again floored at her own reaction to it.Isn't she the "writing woman" who repeatedly tries to help herstudents understand how much more important the messageis than the way it's spelled? How could she be offended at acollege student's misspelling of a word in the first line of anomination form?

Together, we thought through this story, looking for somenew understanding we were certain lay in its denouement. Es-sentially, we realized that the understanding to this story lay

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116 Spelling in Ilse

in the answer to one question. If this college student had beena student in our, say, fourth-grade classroom, would we haveput in a better day teaching if we had made her write eagerfifty more times until she "got it," or if we had spent our energyon turning her into the kind of writer who knew to get someoneto proofread her writing for certain, high-stakes audiences(such as a nomination committee)?

Our answer to this question was, of course, we would havespent more time teaching toward the kind of writer we hopedshe would become, not more time focused on a certain word.Clearly, it was unacceptable for a college student to "go publicwith" (publish) a piece of writing to a distant audience (thenomination committee) with a misspelling in it. We know it isnot important that the college student (or any writer) holdonto the spelling of all the words she might ever want to use.What is important is that she assess her audience and knowhow to prepare her writing accordinglyincluding checkingspelling when her writing will lose power if there are mis-spellings in it.

-1 the end, what we have to understand about writing cur-riculum, particularly with regard to spelling, is that we cannever anticipate all the specific things our writers will need toknow at specific times in their lives. It would be presumptuousof us to think we could. We must nurture, instead, a "curricu-lum of being" (Wood 1995) that initiates writers into a way ofbeing as writerswriters who care deeply about what theyhave to say and can get those messages prepared with powerto go out and rock the world. Young writers need all the cur-riculum help we can give them to write with power, but we asteachers must remember that the "stuff" of the curriculumlike the conventional spelling of eageris never the point. Thechild and the life he or she now lives and will someday live asa writer is the point.

Does this sound like just semantics? We believe that under-standing and taking this curricular stance of being is a wholeparadigln away from a stance where the stuff of curriculum,

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Conclusion111

particularly the isolated focus on spelling words, seems to bethe whole point of instruction. We hope Spelling in Use will

help open conversations and encourage new thinking aboutlooking at children as writers who have many tools at theirdisposal, including spelling, to write with power in the world.One child's life as a writer is the point.

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Bouffler, Christine. 1984. Spelling as a language process.In Reading, writing, and spelling (Proceedings of the fifthMacarthur reading/language symposium, Sydney, ed. L.Unsworth). Quoted in Brian Cambourne and Jan Turbill,Coping with chaos (Portsmouth, New Hampshire: Heine-mann, 1991), 24-25.

Calkins, Lucy McCormick. 1994. The art of teaching writing: newedition. Portsmouth, New Hampshire: Heinemann.

Cambourne, Brian. 1988. The whole story: Natural learning andthe acquisition of literacy in the classroom. New York:Scholastic.

Cambourne, Brian, and Jan Turbill. 1991. Coping with chaos.Portsmouth, New Hampshire: Heinemann.

Cochrane, Orin, Donna Cochrane, Sharm Scalena. and EthelBuchanan. 1984. Reading, writing, and caring. Katonah, NewYork: Richard C. Owen Publishers.

Dakos, Kalli. 1993. Don't read this book, whatever you do! NewYork: Macmillan Publishing Company.

Fletcher, Ralph. 1993. What a writer needs. Portsmouth, NewHampshire: Heinemann.

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120Spelling in Use

Goodman, Ken. 1986. What's whole in whole language.Portsmouth, New Hampshire: Heinemann.

Graves, Donald. 1983. Writing: Teachers and children at work.Portsmouth, New Hampshire: Heinemann.

Halliday, Michael A. K. 1973. Explorations in the functions oflanguage. London: Edward Arnold.

Laminack, Lester. 1991. Learning with Zachary. Richmond Hill,Ontario: Scholastic-TAB.

North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. 1989. Grades1 and 2 Assessment Communication Skills. Raleigh.

Palmer. Parker. 1990. Good teaching: A matter of living themystery. Change Jan/Feb:12.

Smith, Frank. 1978. Reading without nonsense. New York:Teachers College Press.

. 1988. Joining the literacy club: Further essays into educa-tion. Portsmouth, New Hampshire: Heinemann.

Wilde, Sandra. 1989. Looking at invented spelling: A kid-watcher's guide to spelling, part 1. In The whole languageevaluation book, ed. Kenneth Goodman, Yetta Goodman,and Wendy Hood, 213-26. Portsmouth, New Hampshire:Heinemann.

. 1989. Understanding spelling strategies: Akidwatcher's guide to spelling, part 2. In The wholelanguage evaluation book, ed. Kenneth Goodman, YettaGoodman, and Wendy Hood, 227-36. Portsmouth, NewHampshire: Heinernann.

. 1992 You kan red this! Spelling arid punctuation forwhole language classrooms, K-6. Portsmouth, New Hamp-shire: Heinemann.

Wood, Katie. 1995. "Developing a curriculum of being."Keynote address given at the Summer institute of TheWriting Project, Teachers College, Columbia University,New York.

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It was a surprise for me to learn that Katie Wood and LesterLaminack had written a book on spelling! I know them bothas writing people. I picture Katie, standing at the podium of

the Teachers College Writing Project Institute, with throngs ofadmiring teachers all around her. She is talking about the craftof writing, regaling us with stories of children who write withgrace and wingspan and intention. I can feel again the fullnessof the silence when she closes Cynthia Rylant's Missing May,and we'll sit in quiet reverence, letting the wake of this storywash over us. "A book on spelling?" I asked.

But then I saw the book, and I understand. The power ofthis small gem of a book is that it is a book about spelling writ-ten by two people who love reading and writing, story andmemoir, song and poetry. It's a book about sp2lling by twopeople who know that spelling is for writing, that spelling ismeant as a tool for reaching wide audiences, that it's meant tohave a placebut only a placein the wholeness of our cur-riculum. How precious it is to have a book that efficiently gath-ers together the field's wisdom on spelling, highlighting someparticularly useful insights. How useful it is to have a bookthat suggests a handful of effective, small, easily-managedstrategies for supporting our children as spellers.

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122 Spelling in he

But the book's biggest contribution is that Katie andLester build on that base of knowledge, and share with ustheir own insights about spelling. These insights grow frompeople who understand wellwho helped to inventthecentral tenets used by those who teach and write about thewriting workshop.

I know of few professionals who know more about confer-ring with students around rough draft writing; now Katie andLester take that wisdom and incorporate it into strategies forthe teaching of spelling. I know of few professionals who arewiser about ways to support teachers as they grow. Now Katieand Lester take that wisdom, too, and incorporate it into theirthinking about the development in the area of spelling.

Lucy Calkins

131

Aesthetic language, 18Analogy, spelling by, 14Approximation

as learning style, 17in oral language, 11reflective eyes of, 8.9value of, in spelling

instruction, 1,90-91,92-93

Articulation, and spelling, 14Assessment

distinction betweenevaluation and, 41-42

in planning curriculum, 3,41-73

Audience for writing, 64,94-95,108

Authority, spelling by referenceto, 15

B

Basal readers, influence onspelling, 9,10

132

Children, changes in learningpatterns of, 1-2

Conferencesone-to-one, 43with parents, 97-99with students, 77

Constructed spellings, 106,107-108

Context in teaching spelling,64-65

11

Decide, as part of research,decide, and teach frame,62-64

Demonstration learning style,16,17

Emergent literacy, 10Engagement learning style,

16

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124Spelling in Use

Environmental print in spellinginstruction, 66,67-69,76,80-81

Evaluation, distinction betweenassessment and, 41-42

Expectation learning style, 17

Functional uses of language,17-19

Functional writing. 11-12

Generation, monitoring, andrevision strategy, 13

Gimmicks, 79-80Grades in spelling instruction,

98-99,111-112Graphic patterning in spelling,

14.76

Heuristic language, 18Home assistance, role of

parents in providing, 95-97Human resource strategy, 13,64

Immersion learning style,16,17

Informative language, 18Instrumental language, 18Interactional language, 18,43Invented spellings. See

Constructed spelling

133

Kindergarten classroom,spelling inquiry in, 84-88

Languageaesthetic, 18functional uses of, 17-19heuristic, 18informative, 18instrumental, 18interactional, 18personal, 18regulatory, 18spelling as extension of

development, 10-17Learning strategies, 16-17,91

through questioning, 114-115through reflection. 113-114through stories, 115-117

Letters to parents in spellinginstruction, 100-103

Linguistic content, spelling by,14-15

Literacy, emergent, 10Literacy program, developing

balanced, 80-81,90,91

Mentoring, 10,19Mini-lessons, 78-80

Newsletters wit h parents,103-106

Index 115

One-to-one conferences, 43Oral language, developing skills

in, 10-11,15Ownership strategy, 13

Parents and spelling instruction,3,89-106

conferences, 97-99home assistance, 95-97letters, 100-103newsletters, 103-106workshops, 90-95

Personal dictionaries in spellinginstruction, 109-110

Personal language, 18Phonetic spelling, 13-14,

67-69,82Phonological units and

spelling, 14Placeholder spelling, 13,42Proofreaders, 64Purposeful writing, 15-16

El

Questioning as learningstrategy, 114-115

Readingas influence on writing. 10,12role of, in spelling, 9,15

Recordkeeping, 90,92Reflective learning, 8,9,113-114

134

Regulatory language, 18Research, as part of research,

decide, and teach frame,44-62

Research, decide, and teachframe, 3,16,41-73

decide, 62-64research, 44-62teach, 64-65

Resources in spellinginstruction, 80-81

Response learning style, 17Responsibility learning style, 17

Semantic units, and spelling, 14Small-group instruction, 43,77Sounding out as spelling

strategy, 14,43,66,72-73Spell-checkers, 64,81Spelling

context in teaching, 64-65developing writing

curriculum to dealresponsibly with, 41-73

developmental nature of,104-106

evaluation of, on basis ofnatural writing, 12-13

as extension of languagedevelopment, 10-17

as facet of writing, 2.15-16methods of learning, 12principles in observing, 12-13proportional relationships

in, 66reflections on meaning of, 5role of, in reading, 15

3°.

126 Spelling in Use

Spelling (cont'd)role of teacher in evaluating, 13teacher transitions in

teaching of, 21-38writer's methods of dealing

with, 63-64Spelling anomalies, sharing, 76,

77,82Spelling drills, 5Spelling errors, initial reactions

to, 6-10Spelling exercises, 5,112Spelling inquiry

in Kindergarten classroom,84-88

in third-grade classroom,81-84

Spelling instructionenvironmental print in, 66,

67-69,76,80-81grades in. 98-99,111-112personal dictionaries in,

109-110resources in, 80-81role of parents in, 3,89-106transition in, 2-3,5-19in whole language

classrooms, 1,2.75-88Spelling lists, 108-109Spelling strategies. 78-79

analogy in, 14articulation in. 14generation, monitoring, and

revision in, 13,43graphic patterning in, 14,76human resources in, 13,64linguistic content in, 14-15opting for alternative word

in, 15

ownership in, 13phonetic, 13-14,67-69,82placeholder, 13,42reference to authority in, 15semantics in, 14sounding out as. 14,43,66.

72-73textual resources in, 13use of, in writ :ng, 13-15,

91-92visual memory in, 14,64,

67-69,79.95Speiling tests, 5,111Spelling textbooks, 90,92Stories, learning through,

115-117

Teach, as part of research,decide, and teach frame,64-65

Teachers, turning points inprofessional developmentof, 5-19

Temporary spelling. SeeConstructed spelling

Textual resource strategy, 13Third-grade classroom. spelling

inquiry in, 81-84

Use learning style, 17

Li

Visual memory. and spelling, 14,64.67-69,79,95

135

Index 127

Whole-group instruction, 76,77Whole language classroom,

spelling instruction in, 1,2,43,75-88

Word boxes in writinginstruction, 69-71

Workshops for parents inteaching of spelling, 90-95

Writer-centered curriculum,planning for, 42

Writingaudience for, 64,94-95,108children's use of, 17evaluation of spelling on basis

of natural, 12-13functional, 11-12personal applications of, 77

136

purposeful, 15-16reading as influence on.

10,12spelling as facet of, 2,15-16spelling strategies used in,

13-15,63-64Writing curriculum, 76-77

assessment first planning in,3,41-73

dealing responsibly withspelling in. 41-73

effect of changing views ofspelling in, 3

making changes in, 1structuring into stages. 11teacher transitions in

teaching of spelling in,21-38

word boxes in, 69-71

Lester Laminack is chair of the Department of Elementaryand Middle Grades Education at Western Carolina Univer-sity, Cullowhee, North Carolina. He teaches graduate andundergraduate literacy classes, is a past member of theWhole Language Umbrella Board of Directors, is a currentmember of the board of the Center for Expansion ofLanguage and Thinking, and is actively involved in stateand national literacy organizations. He is an author, ateacher, and most of all a learner.

Katie Wood is an assistant professor in the Departmentof Elementary and Middle Grades Education at WesternCarolina University, where she teaches graduate and under-graduate courses in language arts and children's literature.She is also a consultant in the New York Public Schools withthe Writing Project. Teachers College, Columbia University.

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137 129

_

Spelling in Use is written to

help teachers and parents understand how

learning to spell is a part of the broader fabric of learning

to write. While spelling instruction happens every day in whole

language classrooms, this learning looks so different from traditional

spelling lessons that many adults have difficulty understanding how children are

actually learning to spell in such environments Laminack and Wood describe, in

accessible and lively prose, both the theoretical and the practical details of these

classrooms, where learning to spell happens in the context of purposeful writing

Teachers. who are themselves moving into whole language practices, or considering doing so,

will find support in the teachers' stories presFmted in Spelling in Use, where three classroom

teachers candidly describe their own experiences A rich collection of student writing is

presented and analyzed in detail, making the book exceptionally valuable for inservice

discussions or workshops on spelling and writing instruction Later chapters are designed

to help teachers include parents in the conversation, covering workshops with parents,

conferences, individual letters, and classroom newsletters, and offering responses

to frequently asked questions from parents and administrators Informative

and practical, this book is written with classroom teachers in mind,

and it offers engaging help to all language arts instructors

wanting to develop a richer understanding of

how children learn to spell

NeirENational Council of Teachers of English1111 W Kenyon Road, Urbana, Illinois 61801-1096

BEST COPY AVAILABLE 1384

1.11111PF'

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