Name: Spreading the Feast Gathering
Start: 2025-07-11T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-07-12T23:59:59-05:00
Location: LaGrange, KY

This topic has 13 replies, 8 voices, and was last updated 13 years, 4 months ago by Julie.

Viewing 14 posts - 1 through 14 (of 14 total)

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January 31, 2012 at 8:19 pm
Julie
Participant
I’m trying to figure out if my dd is a natural speller and would like some input from others.
thanks!
January 31, 2012 at 9:11 pm
Sara B.
Participant
I am a “natural speller.” I think that just meant I picked up on words easily and rarely misspell (mistyping is another issue altogther LOL). I was an early reader, and I read anything and everything I could get my hands on. I took 1st place in our elem school’s spelling bee in both 2nd grade and 5th grade, and 5th place in the school district (5th through 12th grades, I believe) in 5th grade (and would have probably picked up more except we were always on vacation at the cabin whenever spelling bee tryouts rolled around grrrr…). I guess all that qualifies? Hope that helps you with your dd!
January 31, 2012 at 9:35 pm
Bookworm
Participant
Natural spellers spell primarily visually. If you want to know what your daughter does, find a word she would have no way of knowing and ask her to learn to spell it and then describe to you how she did it. If she mentions looking at the word, or if she closes her eyes or looks up to see it, or can spell it better if she writes it on a page and then sees it, then she is spelling visually and you will rarely have to do anything to help her, unless she decides to go the spelling-bee route, in which case she will also need some other helping skills due to the enormous volume of words. Be especially cautious with young visual spellers and misspelled words–try to get them kicked out of the house quickly. (Don’t know what to tell you if your newspaper is like mine, lol–hard when “professionals” put misspelled words in 36-pt headlines.)
Sara, early readers are often very good spellers because many early readers read visually at first. I was an early reader and also a spelling-bee kid, although my nerves got so bad the year I could have gone to state that I didn’t end up going (how lame is that?) because I was so afraid of being in front of all the people. I’m certain now I wouldn’t have won anyway. I didn’t even have a coach! Didn’t even know there WERE coaches. LOL I was just an oddball kid who read dictionaries for fun.
Hey, this question might pull in the right number of people–I’ve become interested in something lately and am having a hard time “sampling” enough people to figure something out. Do any of you or any of your visual/early readers/spellers have a “ticker tape” that runs through your head when you or others speak? Kind of like subtitling on a TV? If so, could you let me know–I’ve found a half-dozen people but need a few more to talk to. If you belong to this unusual group could you PM me?
January 31, 2012 at 10:14 pm
Julie
Participant
Thanks Sara and Bookworm. My dd was an early reader and “read” most of her books by memorization. She could recite the book Hop on Pop after only a few times of having it read to her. Her dad (my husband) has a photgraphic memory, so I’m wondering if she takes after him. She is only 6 and I’ve just been wondering what do with her for spelling. She is almost finished with a phonics program, which she has breezed through. I don’t plan on starting any formal spelling for at least another year, so I’m really just “thinking” ahead and curious.
Thanks Bookworm for the idea on “testing” her. I’m going to try that and see what she does.
So for natural spellers, how do handle spelling rules?
January 31, 2012 at 10:34 pm
Bookworm
Participant
I really never taught spelling rules. To me they are superfluous, past the obvious stuff you learn in phonics. We always rubbed out the rare misspelled word quickly, and we moved directly to studied dictation when they were old enough, and that is an ideal method for visual spellers. I have one son who has never misspelled a single word since he was ten years old and began dictation. Once he began making his natural inclination to treat words visually “formal” in dictation, he began doing that automatically to the words he read. He has asked me how to spell a word ONCE in the last 8 years. IF he’s seen it, he can spell it. No worries. I would watch and wait for a while before deciding she needs any intervention. Load her up with good-quality literature and she may take care of it herself.
January 31, 2012 at 10:38 pm
Jenni
Participant
I’m a naturally skilled speller as is my dd7. We just know by looking at a word whether it is correct or not. I never remembered all the “I before E except after C….” type of rules. (As a grammer gal, I have issues with those “rules” that are not die-hard, consistent rules at all, but rather suggestions for most of the time.). Anyway, as a beginning speller, I just looked at the word and if it didn’t look right, I changed it.
That is how I’m working with my daughter. We have been doing exercises where I give her mulitple choices of words (several, write, reading, scripture, place names… just random words that I know she has seen, or I compile them from a book she recently read) and she picks out the one that is spelled correctly. We also do a “drill” where I give her several commonly misspelled words and she fixes them. She can usually do these type of exercises really well on her own, but I make sure to walk her through as many as I can so she doesn’t feel overwhelmed or pressured. I just want her to have a natural affinity for words, spelling, grammar, etc, so I am trying hard to make it low-key, low-stress. I’ve been using a neat little worksheet book with her called “Very Very Vocabulary” for a year (very very sporadically, I might add) and she really enjoys it.
As far as how I’ll handle those rules with my daughter, I’ll probably touch on them briefly, but won’t require her to memorize them or explain how she knows a particular word is spelled correctly or incorrectly. I realize that she likely just “knows” whether it is right or not.
Bookworm – I also read dictionaries as a kid. Phonebooks, too. Church directories, instruction manuals, encyclopedias, yearbooks… any publication that I thought would reveal a typo! Even as a 10-year-old, I carried a red pen everywhere.
January 31, 2012 at 10:43 pm
Bookworm
Participant
Ah, we were obviously separated at birth.
January 31, 2012 at 11:27 pm
my3boys
Participant
I have something like that going on in myself and find that my 9yo is similar. I can’t say that he spells perfectly everytime but he definitely “spells” by memory rather than any kind of phonics rule. I don’t teach rules either. I just ask if it “looks” right or ask if that’s how they remember seeing it in books, on television (well, that might not work out with all the short cuts), signs, etc. And, I have a horrible tendency to watch for spelling errors or be more focused on the errors than content, especially with my dh. He can tell I’m spell-checking his cards, notes, letters, etc. when I read them and not really reading the content (I am reading them but can’t help myself).
And, I’ll read anything. Shampoo bottles, dogfood bags, game directions…anything.
As I type, I have a dictionary on my lap. Sad, I know, cause that’s pretty exciting to me!
As a side note: I read somewhere, maybe a CM article, that those that read, alot, are just naturally better spellers. They have “seen” the printed word more frequently than those that don’t read as much. That may seem obvious to some of you, but when I read that, I looked at my husband and said, “Aha, we now know what your problem has been your whole life!!” He didn’t think that was very funny, but I thought it revealed a great mystery.
Interesting thread.
February 1, 2012 at 2:51 am
Julie
Participant
Thanks so much for everyone’s insight and suggestions. I can breath a sigh of relief now.
my3boys “those that read, alot, are just naturally better spellers. They have “seen” the printed word more frequently than those that don’t read as much.” I’ve read that too and had a “aha” moment!

February 1, 2012 at 3:14 am
simple home
Member
I have a very visual memory and spelling was always easy for me. (as well as spelling bees) My hubby thinks it’s a photographic type memory. I can see, for example, a phone number one time and I can usually remember it without looking again. I did enjoy reading as a child although I don’t remember reading a lot, so I’m not sure if that played a part in being a natural speller.
February 1, 2012 at 5:36 am
my3boys
Participant
I agree, simple home. Not sure how that pertains to each person, but…in my house it seems to be the rule. I think it’s an actual interest of mine, knowing how to spell or being accurate in my spelling, like I’m overly conscious of it. On the other hand, my dh couldn’t care less and has never taken the time to make it a priority. He just doesn’t store that information away (and probably thinks it’s pretty nerdy of me) but he sure knows his tools/job/cars/computers, etc., and I couldn’t care less about that kind of stuff. Well, maybe the computer, but he really likes to know how they work, I just want it to work.
February 1, 2012 at 6:05 am
SueinMN
Participant
Natural spellers are usually visual learners. Other learners can be early readers too but you’ll know the difference because a visual learner just naturally spells things correctly. I’m a visual learner and half my children are also. The other half take after my husband and are either auditory or kinesthetic learners. You have to work on spelling with them.
February 1, 2012 at 4:28 pm
missceegee
Participant
I’m a natural speller who cannot remember how I learned to read, but cannot remember being unable to read. I know we had the standard issue spelling book in elementary school and I don’t remember if I was taught spelling rules or phonograms to help, but I know that I’ve always thought words in chunks or phonograms and I’ve always used spelling rules in my thinking. My kids don’t seem to be natural spellers like me, but seem to do well with a phonics approach to spelling. The two oldest are both a combination of visual/auditory learners.
Interesting conversation here.
Christie
February 1, 2012 at 6:06 pm
Julie
Participant
I think my dd is a combination of visual/auditory as well, but maybe more visual. That’s one reason why the “spelling rules” keep me up at night! lol I read somewhere recently (maybe in this thread) that auditory learners need to “hear” the rules, so they can apply them, where as visual learners just need to see the word. Not sure if I worded that right so that it makes sense or if that’s true.
I was never taught phonics and only remember a few of the spelling rules, so all through school and even through college I struggled, so I’m on a mission that my girls learn phonics, spelling and anything else they need to read and write well (it’s a hang up I have)LOL!