We now know that spelling is not necessarily an indication of intelligence, but that it does have an influence on other people’s perception of the writer. Here are a few tips on how to improve your spelling:
- Use as many senses as possible – look at the word, say it out loud, hear it (and the sounds it makes) and write it down. This is not only a great trick for learning spelling, but the more senses we use in all our activities, the richer the learning experience will be.
- Read a lot – not just books, but read everything around you e.g. food packets, billboards, road signs, and newspapers. The more you see the correct spelling of words, the better you will remember it.
- Test yourself on spelling – relying on spell-checks can be to your detriment more than to your advantage. Spell checks notice spelling errors and won’t pick up on words that may be spelled correctly, but is used in the wrong context.
- Pay attention to your mistakes – if you always misspell a word, drill yourself. Practice until you get it right.
- Try writing down what someone says, while they speak – this causes you to quickly put letters to sounds and can strengthen your grapheme-phoneme mapping skills.
- Study spelling and the exceptions – revise a few spelling rules and familiarise yourself with it.
- Challenge yourself – short words are usually easy to spell. If you hear a long or unfamiliar word, try to spell it. Sound it out loud and visualise it. The more you do it with hard words, the easier the rest will seem.
- Use mnemonics – this turns words into a picture, a rhyme, a sentence or anything else that makes it easier to remember. For example, rhythm – Rhythm Helps Your Two Hips Move.
- Learn commonly misspelled words – there are many lists of commonly misspelled words available online.
- Make a list of the words you usually spell incorrectly – practice these words.
- Check the origin of the word in the dictionary – many English words have Greek or Roman origins. If you understand where the word comes from and how it is put together, you will remember the spelling.
- Break it into syllables – sometimes words are difficult to spell because they are too long. Syllables are much easier to spell. E.g. embarrassed – em-bar-ras-sed.
- Sound it out – this does not work with all words though.
- Play word games – it not only helps with spelling, but also assists in developing relationships in families. Everybody can have fun together, while learning new words and practicing their spelling.
- Make flashcards or posters of words you always struggle with and put them up in your room.
You might want to read more about words that we commonly misspell.
