What do you think are the pros and cons of invented spelling?

Yes, I do! It is very developmentally appropriate.

When children are first learning to write and learn the sounds of the letters, I encourage them to listen to the word and write down the sounds they hear. This way they are able to write and read their writing (and I am able to read what they write, which gives them confidence in their abilities and encourages them to continue) without first having to learn the many rules of our spelling. As they continue to “kid-write” they will gain confidence and want to learn the rules of conventional spelling because they will want to move from kid-writing to book writing.

Allowing students to use invented spelling (kid-writing, phonetic spelling or whatever you wish to call it) allows the students to be successful and at the same time you can teach them how to write in different genres even in kindergarten. Students who use invented spelling usually become very good readers and writers because they are learning the craft at their level of understanding.

Not allowing them to use what they know when writing would be like not allowing them to use crayons until they learn to stay inside the lines or not allowing people to use a computer until they know how to write their own code.

Learning growth can’t take place without making mistakes, and errors should be welcomed as signs of growth. If infants we prevented from walking until they could do so without falling down, they’d never learn. There has been a good deal of research over the years showing that spelling matures as children grow older and that particular invented spellings are, like baby talk, a stage that children pass through. A good way for parents to monitor the change that occurs is to take a story written several months earlier by one’s child and dictate the whole story, or several of the words spelled inventively in it, back to him/her to see how his/her spellings have changed over time. Even words that aren’t correctly spelled yet are likely to have different, and perhaps more sophisticated spellings.

In writing class I encourage the students to spell it the way they think it is spelled(invented spelling). Some students won’t write if they don’t know how to spell something. My goal is to get them to write. I don’t allow them to get out the dictionary until the story is finished. I guess the downside would be if you never taught them the correct spelling of words.

In my second grade classroom I encourage the students to spell on their own. This inventive spelling should be close because they should put many sounds they hear in the word. I then conference with the student and we correct this together. The student must then rewrite to publish the corrected paper.

Hmmm….interesting. I’ve not heard of this. I think I could see some value here, as it encourages the child from a young age to write. Society, as a whole has becoming stiff in what is expected to be learned. The creative side of education is being dismissed as unimportant….look at what’s happening to our fine arts programs!

I see invented spelling as opportunity for a child to express themselves void of right and wrong. It also defends left-brain / right-brain learning.

Thanks for asking this question….you’ve made me think!

I’ve never heard the term “inventive spelling” before. Is that the equivalent of phonetics?

If it is, when we started in elementary schools in NY in the early 1960s – it made it easier for a student to try to write — but it made so many poor spellers – never to get it right to this day.

Could you elaborate on the term for me? Thank you.