If the alphabet could fly...
By Ravina Gandhi

EVER received complaints from your child’s teacher, saying, "He folds his spelling test papers into paper airplanes?" Or have you observed him, week after week, making the same spelling mistakes — the ones circled in red? Kids have been known to be able to recite all 29 lines of a complicated poem, but can’t keep ‘to, too and two’ straight?

Even though some kids resist learning to spell, all can learn to spell. They just need spelling remedies of the best kind. Those tricks and tips that teach kids to spell the way they learn best.

It’s our duty as a parent to make the teacher realise that there are times when a red pen is definitely not the answer to spelling errors. Why? If a student is very visual — that is, he or she likes to learn by seeing — red ink will only reinforce the mistakes; visual learners tend to take mental ‘snapshots’ of whatever you draw their attention to . A number of parents who have come to me, have confessed to carrying a camera inside their own heads. Making corrections at the top of kids’ paper is recommended. Spell out misspelt words correctly at the top or in the margin of the paper and a visual child’s mental picture will be of a correct spelling rather than an incorrect one. We’ll come across a few more tips for "kodak-kids" below.

Then there are spellers who favour learning by listening. For them the involved lyrics of even our National Anthem are easier to remember than some simple words that sound alike, but are spelled differently.

And at the end we come to kinesthetic learners. These kids are the kind who always have to sharpen their pencil when they aren’t supposed to and especially enjoy watching a paper plane make its rounds. Kinesthetic kids learn best when they hear "do, walk, go, and move". Usually they hear "sit down".

The spelling eye

Most people think of spelling as a purely visual skill concerned entirely with the appearance of words on the page. But kids who are strongly visual will often substitute words that are almost right for words that really are. To help, teach your child these tips.

Look at the length of a word

When a visual speller makes a mistake, the misspelt word will often have the same general shape as the correct spelling. For instance, among and ‘amoung’ look more or less alike to someone who sees a pattern quickly. They’re both a series of little letters with a descender at the end. But amoung does not just have U where it’s not supposed to; it‘s also too long. Kids can learn to see this if they fine - tune what they’re already good at — seeing.

Learn to look what’s inside a word

Most people, especially those with strong sight skills, use the same basic processes for spelling as they do for reading. They recognise the whole word, and quickly realise its meaning. While that’s a great way to read, it doesn’t work very well for spelling out a word. Some spellers need to slow down. They’re great at recognising the whole of a word; but they have to learn to recognise its parts.

Learn to spell the individual syllables of words

One good trick, especially for long words, is to break up words into their syllables. For example, the word machinery in three parts could be : ma—chin— ery. Ma and chin are easy to spell since they are similar. Ery, though not a word (and actually two syllables, not one), is easy to remember. Visual learners are likely to remember the Y at the end with its distinctive tail, specially if you point it out.

Group words of similar configuration together

A lot of words look superficially alike. It’s often helpful to learn these words in groups, this way their differences are played up. Try teaching the following ‘ei’ and ‘ie’ words as a unit: Weird, receive, their, protein and thief, relieve, sieve, chief.

For really hard words, make up visual
mnemonic devices

Even the best spellers have a few words that constantly cause trouble. When nothing else works, it’s time for mnemonic devices: something that will be easy to visualise and will help to recall the correct spelling of the word. While there are no real rules here, mnemonic helpers work best if students make them up themselves. Here are some to get them going: To remember that defendant is correct, and defendent is wrong, students could picture a person in court with a three-foot ant on his head. The more vivid (and ridiculous) the image, the better it will be.

Remember to try everything

Have visual kids keep all the above hints in mind, but watch how successful they are. Mnemonic devices, for instance, have limited usefulness. If a kid makes up memory joggers for more than a handful of words, they become harder to remember than the words themselves! When necessary help your kids reinforce their visual mnemonic with a kinesthetic-like aid. Get your child to really participate in the device he or she has created. Is there a rat in separate? Have the child illustrate this visual rodent — the ears at the tips of the r and the tail that the t makes. If the child forgets to picture a polo stick when he or she tries to spell the word apologise, then help with an auditory phrase. "I never apologise for playing polo", says Prince Charles. Be imaginative and spelling will be fun!

The spelling ear

To the strongly auditory child, spelling, like other skills, is best learned through a kind of inner voice and ear. In other words, auditory kids like to learn by talking to themselves. When your kids who hang around the music system or move their lips when they read need some help, try out following five tips for starters. You can improvise as you see your child responses to them.

Pronounce each word to yourself

This is perhaps the best advice on spelling that an auditory learner can receive. Auditory children generally have an easy time learning to read through phonics; such a method makes sense to them. And as they learn to spell, the same principles apply — but only up to a point. As their reading becomes more sophisticated, many children, especially those with an auditory preference, will begin to substitute more or less phonetic spellings for the correct ones.

Take the word ‘friend’. What the auditory child can do is to pronounce friend aloud as "friend", but say it inwardly as "fry-end". This way the student can remember the inward pronunciation when it comes to spelling an unfriendly word.

Say silent letters to yourself

When a word has some silent letters, it often helps auditory kids to pronounce them in their mind. For instance, to say the ‘n’ in column. This is part of the above suggestion, of course, but it is important enough to require special attention. Many auditory kids tend to leave out or change silent letters in words such as honest, business, guard, fascinating and rhythm. If they remember to pronounce the silent letters to themselves as they read and write such words, the correct spelling will become easier to remember.

Be careful with homonyms

Words that are pronounced alike, but spelled differently are troublesome for the auditory child. Auditory learners like to write a word the way they hear it.

Some homonyms can be learned by pronouncing them to oneself phonetically — for and four, for instance. But others, such as there and their are harder to distinguish phonetically. Perhaps then the auditory learner could try a trick from the kinesthetic mode: reiterate the idea of possession by having puzzled kids write word ‘their’ on their chests. As they do so. They should spell out aloud "t-h-e-i-r. Next have them point "Over there", and spell "t-h-e-r-e".

Be especially careful with words that are frequently mispronounced

Because auditory kids tend to spell things the way they say them, words that are often mispronounced are often misspelt. Government is often spelt ‘govenment’ because people say it that way. Other words that frequently cause this kind of trouble include: arctic, athletic, drowned, everything, February, hundred, interest, library, literature, mischievous, probably, recognise.

The cure for this problem is, of course, correct pronunciation. If students learn to pronounce the words more carefully, they will be much more likely to spell them correctly, too.

For really hard words make up an auditory mnemonic device

The best mnemonic devices for auditory learners are phrases or sentences that can be memorised by oral repetition and recalled whenever a difficult word comes up. Again, the child must find out what works. Here are some mnemonic devices that people with strong auditory skills have found useful.

There’s plenty of fresh air in dairy.

Eight stories are in a height.

Don’t believe a lie.