Are Phonic Spelling Program Likely to be Effective? Cedric Croft
There are three important features of written English which provide a context for considering the effectiveness of phonic spelling programmes. 1. English Spelling English is not a regular phonetic language. In simple terms this means there is little one- to- one correspondence between many graphemes (letters) and many phonemes (sounds). The classic study of relationships between graphemes and morphemes published in 1966, demonstrated that written English is rule- governed in about fifty per cent of cases, meaning that spelling follows predictable grapheme/morpheme patterns about half the time. But how will a phonic approach help students write and spell the many thousands of words that do not follow predictable spelling patterns? (i) Regular and Irregular Words Regular words generally follow quite predictable letter and sound patterns. Examples of regular words are ‘had’, ‘can’, ‘abandon’, ‘banana’. Irregular words do not follow these predictable patterns. Examples of irregular words are ‘ache’, ‘believe’, ‘lounge’, ‘naughty’. There is ample research evidence to show that irregular words are more difficult to spell than regular words. Accordingly, knowledge of phonics is of little help when learning to spell irregular words, but many of the most frequent words for beginning writers as represented by the Spell-Write Essential Lists for example, are irregular e.g. (‘was’, ‘when’, ‘because’, ‘could’,) or unsuited to being sounded out e.g. (‘the’,’ said’, ‘they’, ‘are’,). In the initial stage of learning to write and spell, words such as these are best introduced as ‘whole words’ within a context of writing, not as a series of discrete sounds taught in isolation from writing. (ii) Phonic Inconsistencies and Confusions In addition to irregular words there are numerous other phonic inconsistencies and confusions for beginners in English spelling. For example there are homophones which are pronounced identically but spelt differently, e.g. ‘meat/meet’, ‘grate/great’, ‘allowed/aloud’; words with identical letters or combinations of letters but pronounced differently, e.g. ‘said /raid’, ‘cough/though’, ‘bread/lead’; readily confused pairs of words many of which are irregular as well, e.g. (were/where, through/though, thing/think). These inconsistencies and confusions are unlikely to be used and spelt conventionally using phonic strategies alone. (iii) Vowel Sounds Standard English has 44 sounds or phonemes with five short vowels, and six long vowels, (including ‘y’ as a semi- vowel). Vowels represent about one – quarter of all phonemes. However, research from 1995 for example, showed that using the wrong vowel e.g. ‘burd’ for ‘bird’, accounted for one-third or more of written spelling errors. This research also identified homophones and words with double letters as the other major spelling errors.
A phonic programme will not do much to counteract these misunderstandings either. The confusions and difficulties of learning to spell vowel sounds conventionally will be well-known by all primary teachers, particularly the variants of vowel sound ‘e’, sometimes referred to as the silent ‘e’. Having juniors learn to spell vowel sounds is a major area of ineffectiveness for phonic spelling programmes which often rely on learners mastering and applying to their writing, a series of quite complex generalisations . What sense will Years 1–3 make of phonic rules such as ‘Beginning /k/ is spelled with c before a, o, and u or a consonant and with k before e, I, or y’? Often the rules are more difficult to apply than the spelling itself. Rules may help those who can spell but do little to help the early learning of spelling. Why rush to teach quite complex spelling patterns to learners whose early writing is showing mainly examples of semi-phonetic or perhaps phonetic spelling? 2. Phonic Programmes Typically, phonics programmes e.g. Jolly Phonics have a series of tasks such as letter names, letter formation, letter sounds, identifying sounds in words, segmentation and so on, all to be taught in a predetermined sequence without reference to learners present development or classroom writing. The tasks are in seven groups each with six letters or combinations in order to cover the 44 phonemes in regular English spelling, The groups vary from single letters such as ‘s’, ‘a’, ‘t’, ‘i’, ‘p’, ‘n’, to blends ‘ou’, ‘oi’, ‘ue’, ‘er’, ‘ar’. The complexities involved in spelling the numerous irregular words are dealt with simplistically by teaching the well-known Look, Cover, Write, Check, procedure so irregular words may be learnt by rote, a form of learning largely rejected within primary schools. Catering for irregular words which are present in such large numbers is a major weakness of phonic programmes as the irregular forms challenge the very basis of these programmes. Much of the learning in phonic programmes is of the lowest order, but expecting juniors to generalise from all the discrete sounds they are taught in isolation and integrate these into meaningful whole words is a much more complex undertaking. And without integrating this learning into complex wholes, English spelling will never be mastered. A feature of assessment for some phonic programmes e.g. Spelling Under Scrutiny is the so called pseudo word test which attempts to use a series of nonsense words to isolate the 44 phonemes in English to identify in a ‘pure’ form the phonemes individuals cannot spell. The apparent reasoning for the pseudo word test is that if ‘real’ words are used the individual may have just learnt to spell that word by chance, but does not really know the spelling of the individual phoneme. Pseudo word tests have never been demonstrated as valid for classroom use (although they are a more legitimate research tool) and their use is a waste of time generally. If teachers want to know which phonemes an individual cannot
mmes in Junior Classrooms
spell a test consisting of ‘real’ words will be more valid. But better still, analyse the errors in writing by using a developmental framework such as the one outlined Monitoring Progress in Spelling Using Developmental Information. From Years 4–8 a test such as the Supplementary Spelling Assessment (SSpA), which includes specific diagnostic assessments, may be useful. 3. What Makes English Spelling Difficult? Research has identified the length of words, the degree of irregularity in words, and a writer’s knowledge of the meaning of words as key aspects of difficulty in spelling. Other aspects being equal, shorter words are generally easier to spell than longer words. Hence, ‘bet’, will be easier to spell than ‘betterment’. Again, other aspects being equal, regular words are generally easier to spell than irregular words. Hence, ‘acting’ will be easier to spell than ‘aching’. The implication is that shorter regular words are easier to spell than longer irregular words. Generalisations cannot be made so readily however, about the relative difficulties of longer regular words versus short irregular words, except to say that irregularity is more a source of difficulty than word length, per se. Length of words and regularity of words are features of English vocabulary and these aspects of words are largely outside teachers’ control or influence. But the third aspect of spelling difficulty, namely a writer’s knowledge of the meaning of the word certainly is. It is likely that the power of knowing a word’s meaning is sufficient to moderate somewhat, the effects of both length and irregularity as sources of spelling difficulty. This is unlikely to surprise most teachers as there is an element of common sense to the proposition that a writer more often uses words they know the meaning of, and writing the word is an element in learning and remembering how to spell the word. Learning what words mean by either listening to them, speaking them, reading them, writing them and hence spelling them, is an integral part of a thoughtful classroom language programme. As words are learnt and used as whole words, rather than as discrete bits (as happens with phonic programmes), whole words provide a better basis for learning new words by analogy, and learning by analogy is one key aspect in learning to spell new words. 4. Is there a place for phonics in classroom spelling programmes? It is important that children learn phonic principles that will help with their spelling, provided that any instruction or direct teaching of these phonic principles is done within the context of writing tasks which emphasise meanings and uses of words, not just spelling. Where a child or class group are consistently misspelling given words in their writing there are opportunities to tutor the learners in aspects of words causing difficulty, and to generalise this tutoring to other words with similar spelling patterns. In this
way relevant phonic knowledge is built through ‘word families’ for example, with the emphasis on the whole words not the discrete sound in isolation. The important point is that the spelling difficulties were demonstrated in writing first and the opportunity was taken to help the learners to extend their knowledge of relevant phonic principles that generalise to other like words. Instruction in phonic elements of any given word or group of words within the context of current writing is likely to have positive effects on written spelling. This approach is poles apart from systematic and lockstep programmes which teach phonic principles in a set order, irrespective of the learner’s developmental stage, and in isolation from any need or requirement to write words showing these principles. Proponents of systematic phonic programmes may believe that learning to spell is a precondition of learning to write. However this is far from the truth as shown by the extensive literature on developmental spelling and the everyday observation of how four and five year-olds quite happily ‘write’ messages without much
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concern for conventional spelling. The important issue is not whether children benefit from knowledge of phonic principles, (as they do) but how these principles are packaged and taught, and what opportunities there are to consolidate and utilise these skills in writing. But what about the cases where phonetic programmes are used in conjunction with whole word approaches linked firmly into writing, or in other words, where the phonetic programme is an adjunct to the writing-based programme? Given that a consensus from research is that about 80 per cent of Years 1–3 learn to read, write, and spell quite naturally and readily in a whole language programme, what is the point of subjecting all children to a lockstep phonetic programme that may deny them the richer experiences of broader language-based programmes? And the jury is out on whether the remaining 20 per cent of Years 1–3 do much better in advancing their writing skills under phonic programmes. If phonic programmes have any place it is certainly not in the first three years in my view. 5. Are Phonetic Programmes Likely to be Effective? An unqualified ‘yes’ or ‘no’ seems unrealistic as like most evaluative judgements concerning classroom programmes, there are broader matters to consider. There is an exception however. If a phonetic spelling programme is to be used as the sole or major approach to spelling in the first three years of school, without a focus on writing or what is being learnt in beginning reading , my response to the initial question is a resounding no! If a teacher is satisfied that students should simply learn letter names, letter sounds, the 14 vowel sounds, the 18 consonant sounds plus their combinations, a phonetic classroom
programme would probably achieve these modest goals in due course The degree to which low- level learning of this type will be retained and applied in writing is another matter. Verbal material that is learnt with limited understanding is soon forgotten. A research study from 2003 on the effectiveness of phonic spelling programmes in 14 European languages showed that students learning in English ranked last for spelling achievement. The students learning in English scored at less than 30 per cent of the top scoring students learning in Finnish, Greek, and German (more regular languages) on both pseudo words and real words. English was the least suited to learning spelling by phonics. This conclusion has quite profound implications for principals I think, particularly where schools value the role of research to inform school-wide practices. I am not aware of reputable research that concludes that students in Years 1–3 who are taught to spell solely or mostly via a phonic programme divorced from their writing, become more competent writers or able spellers than those who have received a broader programme. Most research into phonetic programmes is about mastery of the 44 phonemes, not how this knowledge is generalised and applied to writing in authentic classroom programmes. Given the 2003 research noted earlier, what then is the point of spending valuable classroom time on activities that are unlikely to improve written spelling? A better focus is on writing, learning whole words within context, linking these words with reading, plus emphasis on learning to spell and write as an aspect of vocabulary development. A lockstep phonetic spelling programme in Years 1–3 offers little realistic chance of these important outcomes being met.