Spelling, the Lost Art

Nov 22, 2011 by Sharon Dellorco

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Remembering when shortcuts, spell-checks and self-correction was not available for business/academia and the effectivity of an online spelling program.

As a writer, I am used to dotting my i’s and crossing my t’s; literally. I learned early on…really early on that spelling correctly has its advantages. I mean as early on and as far back as “the typewriter”. Most of you reading this article may have heard of such, and I can almost bet that a lot of you have not “typed” on one. Before the days of the “self-correcting IBM Selectric” (I’m hearing, huh…what is THAT? Never mind, but what an invention!), there were these typewriters. What it did upon the strike of the letter you wanted, was that a piece of metal with that particular letter literally hops out of the machine, and makes an impression of the letter, striking a piece of ribbon that had carbon on one side. When you were typing a letter (as in a document), and if you made a typo, or a spelling error, you had to retype the whole letter. Then, after the wonderful invention of Liquid Paper, you would dab on some white paint-like liquid over the letter error, wait for this to dry, then, try to match up exactly where the mistake happened, and restrike the letter onto the dried patch of paper. Very early on in my career, I worked for a man who would put the document up to a light, or a window and IF there were any patches of Liquid Paper, felt that this was unprofessional and had me retype the whole letter…over and over until I got it right. Without a typo, and without a patch of Liquid Paper; call it Letterwriting Bootcamp!

Spelling Correctly - What a Concept

I suppose my background has me well-trained in this concept called learn to spell. What worries me about the new generation, and by that I mean the very new, text message-oriented generation is that spelling is a lost art. Rarely do you see the word “through” written out; it is now “thru”. One doesn’t even see the word “see” anymore; it is “c”. That’s it. In the interest of time, not only do I understand why this is done, but I practice this method myself. The problem still exists that in the written word; books, newspapers, even e-books, e-news, and SCHOOL, one is still expected to spell - and spell correctly.

How DO You Learn How to Spell?

It is then that I started researching out different methods that children are learning how to spell properly. Is one spelling program or method better than the next? Honestly, I don’t think English is an easy language to spell; like learning how to read, one successful way of learning how to spell is repetitive memorization of words, and sight learning. There are lists of the most commonly used words in the English language; the first 100, 200 and so on. Older kids, younger kids have to learn this way. In my opinion, it is at this younger stage that it’s so important that these “commonly used” spelling words are ingrained. There are certainly phonetic approaches, but when those rules don’t apply, nothing beats just knowing how a word should be spelled. I stumbled across a program called ClickN SPELL by a company called, ClickN KIDS. It is an impressive program that teaches the 800 most commonly used words in the English language. The online program was written by a research professor with impressive accolades, and from what I’ve seen and heard, it works. I tried it myself (because I will try out what I write about), and found the program to be very user friendly, and entertaining enough for kids through 5th grade, as well as any adult with any variation of learning difficulties.

I was very happy to see that there is a spelling program that goes beyond “See Spot Run”, but in fact goes through teaching as many words as they do. I understand that this program is also used in schools, and is aligned with core curricula. I hope that a correctly spelled document always stays important, even if a document doesn’t have to be done over and over until there are no white blots on that piece of paper when it’s put against the light or a window.

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