The Science of Spelling: Why it Matters for Literacy

Why do so many children learn to read but still struggle to spell? And does it really matter?

The science of reading points us to effective methods to help students learn to read and spell, including explicit, systematic teaching of the relationships between the pronunciation of words and their spelling. This is an important component of Structured Literacy teaching, but in isolation, it doesn’t equip all students for full literacy. Spelling often lags behind reading, and this matters for literacy! To address this issue, we must factor in the way the English writing system works; all teachers need to know about the science behind spelling.

In this webinar, we will discuss the framework and foundation of the writing system, morphology, which allows us to understand the essential relationships between the smallest distinctive segments of spoken language—phonemes—and the letters and letter combinations that represent those phonemes in written words. We will talk about information encoded in written words that may have nothing to do with pronunciation at all, and we’ll explore why this information is so important for both spelling and comprehension.