Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Elementary School inventive spelling ... hmmmm :(

I am assuming "inventive spelling" is common in Kindergarten in most school districts?

I didn't start learning English until I was in middle school, at which point I was already proficient in writing in another language so learning English spelling was a totally different game for me than it is for my kids.

Seeing DS5 will be using inventive spelling really worries me though. He's the type of kid who once he learns doing something one way, he's really hard to switch. I just can't imagine him learning to write something the "wrong' way just to relearn it correctly later on. I just don't see that happening!

Am I worried about nothing? To me it just feels really strange to not encourage kids to spell words correctly right from the start? Is this really common? If you have kids who like to follow their rules and are hard to retrain, how did you handle it???

he's too much of a perfectionist (and so am I) to just do things poorly knowing there are better ways

Inventive spelling is a developmental thing. Once he becomes a strong reader and sees that he is misspelling words, he'd start caring and would learn to spell correctly. He's ask you over and over "How do you spell..." and you'd wish that he stayed on the inventive spelling stage a bit longer. If the transition never happens naturally in then next year or so, then you might want to put him on a structured spelling program but I personally won't worry about it right now.

He's a bit on the autism spectrum, which is why he's such a stickler to the ways he learned to do things. With him it's always about learning it the right way the first time because anything that comes after that is a no go ... or a huge struggle (one of the very few reasons why we still keep him IEP active).

I am so thankful that DS3.5 is already a great speller and will never go for wrong spelling! At least with him I won't have to worry about any of this.

I just corrected mine when he got a word wrong. No biggie. But he was a natural speller at that age.

DeeDee

I think you should insist that the teacher always correct his spelling. For some children, having prolonged uncertainty about spelling (uncertainty that is intentionally imposed by adults), makes their view of the world less secure.

Plus we have been worried about dyslexia / dysgraphia in his case so all that together just scares me. Everything else comes so easy to him, he's extremely verbal but other than knowing some sight words, reading and writing is a very strange world to him. He knows phonetic rules but can't use them, a lot of letter reversals, writing mirror images of letters, etc. The whole reading / writing thing is why we even put him to Kindergarten. Otherwise he'd be homeschooled for now but I want to make sure professionals can pick up on any LDs if there are any to worry about.

MK personally I think it's possibly fine for some kids but mostly a terrible idea. Especially so in your own child's case. I'd also gently suggest that you'll probably have way better chance of figuring out if he's just a bit ansynchronous and those very normal for age issues will settle down or if he has a problem. Schools can be VERY slow to agree an LD is possibly at play.

that's what I'm a little worried about. It's quite possible that by the time they even get to writing / spelling, he might had already been pulled out of school by then. He keeps complaining about not learning much and at the same time not having any chance to play and to top it off has already started his old "trick" of answering all of my more challenging questions with "I don't know. We haven't learned that yet!". So it's all turning out to be way more disappointing than we expected.

Mostly a lurker, but wanted to chime in. Inventive spelling allowed my perfectionist newly 5 year old feel comfortable writing her first book in kindergarten. It allowed her the confidence that her ideas/story/writing didn't need to be perfect. Funny thing is that in 2nd grade she was in her own spelling group and easily spelled words I had to look up for definition to be certain (auspicious, auspiciousness). She is inherently a great speller and the inventive spelling that was allowed and encouraged in kinder allowed to to continue developing her writing ability without hindering her eventual spelling. She is not on the spectrum. She has some other vision issues, an odd pencil grasp and a few other things. Just our experience with a DD with perfectionist tendencies.

ETA: Inventive spelling wasn't necessarily encouraged, but accepted as a normal part of writing development. Meaning the main thing was to get the kids to write down their ideas and thoughts. The corrected spelling was added underneath if the word wasn't easily able to be figured out. And correct spelling wasn't discouraged.