Invented Spelling

What is invented spelling?

How might a kindergarten student write out, “The shirt has two buttons,” without teacher assistance? If you answered, “it S btlEES100455010310010555100100100”, you would be correct. This student-author, Jun Lee, was engaging in invented spelling. According the Lehr (1986), invented spelling is "young children's attempts to write words using their best judgments about spelling" (p.452). Students are able to practice invented spelling by using their phonetic knowledge to approximate the spelling of words (Gentry, 1982; Lutz, 1986; Pinto, Bigozzi, Gamannossi, & Vezzani, 2012). Young learners develop invented spelling skills in predictable patterns and were able to identify five stages of spelling development (Gentry, 1982; Lehr, 1986; Lutz, 1986).

The Five Stages of Invented Spelling

1. Pre-Communicative/ Emergent Writing Stage

In the Pre-Communicative/Emergent writing stage of writing, students do not use typical writing conventions to communicate. Students in this stage of writing will use techniques like scribbling lines across a page, writing letter like forms, and writing random sequences of letters and numbers to express meaning, like Jun Lee’s number sequence that represented “2 buttons” in Figure IS 1 (Dennis & Votteler, 2013; Gentry, 1982; Lehr, 1986; Manning, 2004). While most bystanders may not be able to interpret the meaning of these scribbles and strings of letters due to the writing's lack of letter-sound correspondence and even left-to-right direction, young writers are understanding that writing symbols conveys meaning and often understand meaning in their unconventional work (Calkins, 2011; Dennis & Votteler, 2013; Lehr, 1986; Lutz, 1986).

Figure IS 1 - Precommunicative stage of spelling

2. Letter Name/ Semi-Phonetic Stage

Once students begin to gain basic phonological awareness like the names and sounds of the letters of the alphabet, they attempt to represent words with the letters they think match the sounds in the word (Dennis & Votteler, 2013; Gentry, 1982; Lehr, 1986; Lutz, 1986; Manning, 2004). Students will often write the beginning and/or ending consonant sounds of words like Jun Lee did when he wrote “vkeon” to represent “volcano” or "Pns" to represent "pants". These initial and final consonants can be used to label pictures or even develop sentences to describe an illustration or event (Calkins, 2011). Some conventions like writing from the left to the right are practiced (Gentry, 1982). In the Letter Name/ Semi-Phonetic stage, students are developing their understanding of how writing and speech are connected.

Figure IS 2 - Letter name stage of spelling

3. Phonetic Stage

The phonetic stage is marked by students being able to "represent all surface sound features of a word" (Lehr, 1986, p.453). According to Gentry (1982), "Though some of the inventive speller's letter choices do not conform to conventional English spelling for some sounds, the choices are systematic and perceptually correct" (p.195). The writer relies on the sounds a word makes to invent spelling, but does not incorporate spelling conventions. A sympathetic reader should be able to read some of what is written in the phonetic stage (Manning, 2004). Writers will likely begin to use spaces to separate words (Gentry, 1982). In figure IS 3, Grace describes shopping with her mom, seeing an ice cream party, riding a bike, and riding a kickboard using spelling consistent with the phonetic stage of spelling.

Figure IS 3 - Phonetic Stage of Spelling

4. Transitional Stage

In the transitional stage, writers begin to adopt some conventional spelling practices into their writing (Gentry, 1982; Lutz, 1986). Transitional spellers identify patterns they see in English spelling and being to adapt those patterns to their writing, such as spelling 'united' [Younited]. This example highlights the visual strategy transitional spellers use. Because of their reliance on visual cues, transitional writers may include every letter of a word in their spelling, but mix up the letter order (Gentry, 1982; Manning, 2004). In Figure IS 4, Aiden uses some conventional spelling practices like the silent e in 'blue', ck in 'jacket, and double consonants in 'getting', 'overall', and 'Halloween'.

Figure IS 4 - Transitional Stage of Spelling

5. Correct Stage

When a speller is able to understand most rules governing spelling, word structure, double vowel use and silent 'e', and words with irregular spelling, they have entered the correct stage (Gentry, 1982). A correct speller should be able to spell almost all age appropriate words (Manning, 2004). By better using the visual strategies to spell, correct learners should be able to identify spelling errors in their own work or the work of others (Gentry, 1982).

Importance of Understanding Invented Spelling

How do the stages of invented spelling affect how a teacher manages a writing workshop with kindergarten students? Awareness of the stages of spelling development can save teachers and students frustration when the teacher acknowledges that young writers in the initial stages of spelling will not use 'correct' spelling conventions. This understanding frees the teacher to develop other areas of students writing skills. As Chapman (1996) says, "Writing is more than spelling. It is a language process, a process of making meaning. We need to move beyond spelling to look at children's writing more as a form of language" (p.318). By putting less focus on using conventional spelling, a teacher can focus on building a writing community, choosing writing topics, sharing effectively, and any of the other skills addressed by Writing Workshop.

Teachers must acknowledge that progressing through the stages of invented spelling is a process and that students in a classroom will be at different stages at any given time. The teacher must provide an encouraging, safe environment where students feel comfortable writing, even if their writing seems unintelligible. Students may feel frustrated if peers develop more advanced writing pieces, so caring for student egos and self concepts as authors is important (Calkins, 2011; Behymer, 2003; Hertz & Heydenberl, 1997; Dennis & Votteler, 2013).

Transcribing invented spelling from verbal conferences during a workshop can help a teacher identify a student’s stage of spelling development and target areas for improvement. The transcription will also aid in revising, editing, and publishing student work, and allow students to compare their invented spelling to conventional spelling (Behymer, 2003). To help students progress through the stages of spelling acquisition and develop writing skills, a teacher can “lift the level of what children can do and show them what proficient writers do that they might try” (Calkins, 2011, p.9). A teacher needs to push students to try new things they cannot do, but may be able to do with practice through mini lessons and conferencing found in the writing workshop model (Calkins, 2011; Behymer, 2003; Hertz & Heydenberl, 1997; Dennis & Votteler, 2013). Invented spelling can be a helpful assessment tool for reading skills as well. McBride-Chang (2010) noted, "The associations of invented spelling with phonological awareness measures were approximately equivalent to associations among phonological awareness tasks themselves, supporting the idea (Mann et al., 1987) that using invented spelling as a proxy for phonological awareness may be reasonable and useful" (p.156). By understanding that learning spelling is a process, teachers can better allocate classroom time and resources to developing writing skills not related to spelling. Teachers can also focus on the most relevant aspects of spelling in a student's stage of development.