Responding to a message by Dan, to Charles on ...
DT>.EL>that there is acceptable and unacceptable behaviour BUT if a child
DT>.EL>is not  permitted to practice spelling as a golfer is permitted to
DT>.EL>practice strokes how will they learn?
DT>CB> 
DT>CB>If a golfer practices the wrong swing over-and-over again, or even 
DT>CB>swings differently every time he hits the ball, he will have some 
DT>CB>terrible habits to break when it is time for him to learn to do it 
DT>CB>correctly.  Some theory should come first - left arm straight, bend
DT>CB>at  the knees, shift your weight, etc.  Without that, he might well
DT>CB>miss the  ball altogether.
DT>
DT>I suppose then if you carry your reasoning further here Charles then we 
DT>shouldn't allow children to draw because when young children draw they 
DT>are drawing incorrectly.  Many of my kids draw just a head and arms and 
DT>legs protruding out from the head.  
You don't see the analogy as I see it.  The golfer is allowed to 
continue to swing as long as he receives some instruction first, and 
throughout the learning process.  Children should be allowed to draw 
- as long as it preceded and accompanied by instruction.
Why do we place children in school if not to teach them?  Why allow 
those budding artists of yours to continue to draw the arms and legs 
coming out of the head?  Teach them a little today and a little more 
tomorrow and soon they may actually have quite a few things 
connected together properly.  If you allow them to keep drawing the 
figure improperly without encouraging them to improve, their growth 
will be much, much slower.
And so it is with writing and spelling.  I see no sense in the 
notion that children should waste their time putting gibberish on a 
page under the pretense of language development.  There should be 
some initial instruction and the writing process should be critiqued 
and worked on every day.  Practicing the art of marking gibberish on 
a piece of paper does not develop language skills any better than 
would the process of storytelling or news-time each day.
DT>I have watched 5,6 and 7 year olds children playing soccer.  I don't 
DT>think they should be allowed to play soccer at such a young age because 
DT>they have no concept of team work, a concept essential to a good soccer 
DT>team.  Their ball handling skills are awful and yet these kids are 
DT>allowed to play in organized games!  Unthinkable!
You stretched the analogy using a variety of examples, but you 
simply didn't look at the process very carefully.  Does the soccer 
team have a coach?  Are the kids given instruction before the first 
game?  Is there coaching throughout the season?  Or are the kids 
allowed to kick the ball into their own net game after game without 
anyone telling them to kick it the *other* direction?
Under the auspices of "inventive spelling" the children are kicking 
the ball into the wrong net day after day and nobody is teaching 
them any differently.
DT>Your view that children will learn spelling habits that cannot be broken 
DT>or will be difficult to correct is not supported by the experience of 
DT>most early childhood teachers (K-2).
But my view *is* supported by virtually every intermediate teacher 
(4-6) teacher that I know.
DT>Children eventually become aware of more complex spelling 
DT>patterns (Usually beginning with initial sounds, then ending 
DT>sounds, and then the stuff in the middle.)  We can see a 
DT>_consistent_ developing pattern of spelling skills when children 
DT>are allowed to write.
I understand that you aren't a proponent of the extreme forms of 
whole language and inventive spelling, so perhaps we're not talking 
about the same thing.  I'm not indicating that each child has to 
have every misspelled word corrected every time they write, but I 
*do* believe that they ought to be getting spelling instruction and 
that they ought to be encouraged, when writing, to use words they 
can spell or to look up words they can't spell.  Many of the 
children will work to the lowest acceptable standard and the higher 
you set that bar, within reason, the more the children will do.
DT>I don't think the traditional method of teaching spelling has the best 
DT>track record either.  In fact, the method I grew up with (and the one 
DT>you learned in school) is not supported by research data.
Here we go again .  What research data?  Which methods don't work 
and what don't they work as well as?  Many of the teachers I know 
who work in the intermediate grades and middle school teach spelling 
not only because of the desire to have kids spelling words 
correctly, but because spelling is also a means of teaching letter 
sounds and word recognition skills.  Do the studies indicate this is 
ineffective as well?  If so, why does *anyone* bother to spell correctly?
Sorry, Dan, but it does not compute (with me) that teaching spelling 
does not help the language development process.
Chuck Beams
Fidonet - 1:2608/70
cbeams@future.dreamscape.com
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* UniQWK #5290* "My God," exclaimed the tagline, "I'm in the wrong joke!
--- Maximus 2.01wb
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