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TitleAn investigation on the invented spellings of grade one childrenaged between 5-6 years old in a Hong Kong primary school
Author(s) Ho, Civen;OU`z
Citation
Issued Date 2015
URL http://hdl.handle.net/10722/223647
Rights Creative Commons: Attribution 3.0 Hong Kong License
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An investigation on the inventedspellings of grade one children
aged between 5-6 years old in a
Hong Kong primary school
By: Civen Ho
BEd. Language Education (Primary English),
The University of Hong Kong
A research dissertation
A classroom-based research project submitted in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the Master of Education in Early ChildhoodEducation at The University of Hong Kong
31st August 2015
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Declaration
I hereby declare that this dissertation is a representation of my own work, and it has not
been previously submitted to this University or any other institution in application to a
degree, diploma or other qualifications.
Signature:
Name: Civen Ho
UID: 2010527587
Date: 31st August 2015
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If this research dissertation were to be described using a metaphor, I would say that it was
fairly similar to a roller coaster ride. There were many moments where I experienced
highs and lows, ups and downs. This research dissertation was truly an unforgettable ride.
Firstly, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor Ms. Diana Lee for
her never ending support throughout this year. I deeply appreciated the guidance and
constructive feedback from the very beginning of this research. It would not have been
made possible without your continued support. I truly appreciated the constructive
feedback, which has allowed for improvement during the writing of this research
dissertation.
Secondly, I would like to thank the school and research participants who were kind
enough to agree to participate in this study. The contributions they have made to this
research dissertation has been invaluable. It would not have been made possible without
them.
Lastly, I would like to thank my family for their continued love and support during the
writing of this research dissertation.
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!/-,01",The research conducted can be classified as an intrinsic case study, which sought to
examine and analyse the invented spellings made by grade one children in primary school
within the Hong Kong context. The research hopes to develop a better understanding of
the common errors made by grade one children and the spelling development progress
they underwent. One grade one class was chosen to participate in this research. They
were required to provide their writing summative assessments they had completed during
the course of the school year. There were four writing summative assessments for each
child. In total, eighty samples were collected and five hundred and forty eight words were
identified as invented spellings. The invented spellings were then given a score from a
10-point scale to determine the type of error that was made. From the results, it suggests
that children’s spelling development is not fixed to a specific level, and that the spelling
errors made can be attributed to the phonological differences between Cantonese and
English.
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21/'( %3 "%$,($,-
4516,(0 7 8$,0%)9",:%$Page number
91.1 Contextual background 9
1.2 Research rationale and foci 10
4516,(0 ; :(& 132.1 Definition of invented spelling 13
2.2 Stages of spelling/invented spelling2.2.1
Prephonetic stage
2.2.2 Phonetic stage2.2.3 Transitional stage
2.2.4
Conventional stage
1313
1415
162.3 Linguistic description of English and
Chinese
17
2.4 Component processes involved in invented
spelling2.4.1 Phonemic awareness
2.4.2 Working memory2.4.3
Orthographic awareness
2.4.4 Oral vocabulary2.4.5 Knowledge of morphology
17
18
1919
2021
2.5
Benefits of invented spelling2.5.1 Improves conventional spelling
2.5.2 Improves reading skill2.5.3 Improves writing skill
2122
2223
2.6 The case of Chinese ESL learners and
spelling/invented spelling2.7 Phonological differences between
Cantonese and English
23
25
4516,(0 ? @(,5%)%'%*A 303.1 Research questions 303.2 Methodological approach 30
3.3 Research setting 303.4 Participants 30
3.5 Procedure 313.6 Ethical considerations 32
3.7 Data analysis methods 323.7.1 Spelling sophistication: Scoring
method
32
3.7.2 Categorization of invented
spellings
34
4516,(0 B C:$):$*- 354.1 Number of invented spellings across the 35
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two terms4.2
Spelling sophistication in the first term 36
4.3 Spelling sophistication in the second term 394.4 Comparison of spelling sophistication in
the first and second term
42
4.5
Invented spelling errors made in the firstterm 43
4.6 Invented spelling errors made in the
second term
46
4516,(0 D @(,5%)%'%*A 495.1
Common spelling errors made by grade
one children
49
5.2 Comparison of invented spelling errors in
the first and second term
51
5.3 Implications 53
4516,(0 E 4%$"'9-:%$ 546.1 Key issues and insights 54
6.2 Limitations 546.3 Scope for further research 55
=(3(0($"(- 56
!66($):"(- 641. Sample of Spelling Sophistication Scoring
Method
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The acquisition of literacy was always thought to follow a specific sequence, where you
learn to read, spell and then write. However, Chomsky (1971) has suggested that it was
possible for children to learn basic spelling strategies before they were able to read. At an
early age, children already begin to interact with written language as they attempt to
represent words in print. When they start experimenting with the written code, they can
be seen to create their own spellings. While these spellings may stray far from the
conventional spelling, they should not be overlooked. These early pre-conventional
spellings are often referred to as invented spelling. Invented spelling is used to describe a
child’s first efforts in spelling words, which they have yet to master (Cramer, 1998).
Through invented spellings, children are able to create written versions of words based on
the letter-sound relationships that they know, and represent their interpretations of how a
word is spelled based on how it sounds (Savage, 2011). Moreover, Read (1975) states
that children are capable of spelling a word based on “how it is articulated or felt in their
mouths” (He & Wang, 2009, p. 45). This can be seen as an indication that they have
begun to develop awareness to the internal structure of words, in particular, awareness tothe phonemic segments that are represented by the alphabet (Tangel & Blachman, 1992).
Moreover, children start to analyse the phonological components of words and access the
phonemic structure of words, which can only be gained through writing or formal
teaching (Pontecorvo & Orsolini, 1996; Ferreiro, 1991; Vernon, 1998 as cited in Silva &
Martins, 2003). Thereby carrying the implication that invented spelling is related to the
child’s phonological awareness and product of how particular grapheme-phoneme
principles are used (Treiman, Tincoff, & Richmond-Welty, 1996). Children gradually
reach the point of conventional spelling as they fine-tune their productions as they learn
more on how speech is mapped to print and the rules of standard English orthography
(Tangel & Blachman, 1992).
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According to Gentry (2000) invented spellings can be considered to be a window, which
“allows the observer to assess and teach not only spelling, but also important aspects of
phonemic awareness, phonics, writing and other essential elements of literacy” (p. 318).
Since it reveals the writer’s awareness of the relationship that exists among the speech
sounds and the principles regulating the correspondences between graphemes and
phonemes (He & Wang, 2009). In order to ensure that children are able to become
competent spellers, it is essential for the teacher to determine, which stage of
development each child is at (Sipe, 2008 as cited in Westwood, 2014).
Therefore to better understand the spelling development that occurs in children,
researchers have examined their spellings from different perspectives, which include
spelling development based on their second language (L2) acquisition. Children whose
native language differs from the instructional language used in school can be faced with
the challenge of mastering skills, such as reading and spelling abilities, in a language they
have not yet fully acquired (Jongejan, Verhoeven & Siegel, 2007). Since writing systems
are graphic representations of the spoken language, it helps facilitate literacy
development, which involves learning the association found between the printed and oral
forms of the language (Adams, 1990). By observing the development of spelling
knowledge, it can help to understand and facilitate L2 literacy acquisition.
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The Hong Kong government has imposed a language policy, which aims for children, at
the end of their secondary education, to be biliterate and trilingual. They are expected to
be proficient in writing Chinese and English, while being able to communicate
effectively in Chinese, English and Mandarin. Once entering primary school, young
children begin their formal instruction in becoming proficient language users of Chinese,
English and Mandarin.
Many of the children entering school will be learning English as a second language (ESL),
and have Chinese as their L1. It should be noted that English and Chinese are two
languages that greatly contrast one another. English is classified as being in the Indo-
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European language family (Yule, 1985, as cited in Chan & Li, 2000). It is an alphabetic
script and is considered to be orthographically deep due to the complexity of the letter-
sound relationships. In comparison, Chinese is in the Sino-Tibetan language family (Li
and Thompson, 1981, as cited in Chan & Li, 2000). The writing system is considered to
be morphosyllabic since the characters each represent a monosyllabic morpheme
(Marinova-Todd & Hall, 2013).
Several studies have suggested that bilingual speakers are capable of transferring the
required skills for literacy development from one language to another (Gottardo et al.,
2001; Sparks, Patton, Ganschow, Humbach, & Janorksy, 2008). It has been suggested
that the processes linked to the development of English literacy skills are similar in
monolingual and bilingual children (Marinova-Todd & Hall, 2013). However, the
differences in the Chinese and English writing system has lead some researchers to
question whether the phonological awareness skills in English have the same important
role in Chinese literacy development.
Phonological awareness plays a crucial part in helping children learn to read and spell
since it helps one understand the language’s sound structure and includes the ability to
segment speech and detect and manipulate phonemes (Jongejan, Verhoeven & Siegel,
2007). Since studies have shown the transfer of phonological awareness skills from one
language another, it would be beneficial to examine ESL children’s invented spellings in
order to deepen understanding and provide further insight on their spelling development.
The school chosen for the research has established a positive and encouraging learning
environment for children to utilize invented spellings in their writing. They are given
many opportunities to practice and develop their spellings through using invented
spellings. The findings of this study will contribute to the perspective of an ESL’s
invented spellings and understanding on young children’s spelling development
particularly in invented spellings as they progress through their first year in primary
school.
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The present study investigated the invented spelling errors made by grade one children by
tracking their invented spellings in their writing summative assessment across the school
year. The writing summative assessments approximately occurred every two to three
months.
Objectives:
1. To identify the common errors in invented spelling made by the grade one
children.
2. To compare the invented spelling errors made between the first and second term.
In the next chapters, I will look further into the literature gap identified, which is the
development of ESL children’s invented spellings over their first year in primary school.
I will explain in greater detail how this research examined and tracked ESL children’s
invented spellings over their first year.
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This chapter will explore the nature of invented spelling by examining the stages of
spelling, and highlighting the component processes needed. Particular attention will be
paid to the spelling development of Chinese ESL learners, who share the same first andsecond language as the participants chosen for the study. All of these will be covered in
hopes to enhance understanding of invented spelling among young children and
especially in Chinese ESL learners. In addition, this will be referred to in later chapters to
guide and facilitate discussion on the invented spellings analysed.
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Invented spelling is used to describe a child’s early attempts at spelling, where they
essentially make up their own spellings for words that they do not know or remember the
conventional spelling (Ott, 2007). It is the result of the writer trying to apply what they
understand about the internalized principles of grapheme-phoneme associations to their
spelling of words they have not mastered yet (Gentry, 2000; Read, 1971, 1975 as cited in
He & Wang, 2009). Invented spelling is a normal part of the child’s on-going
development as a writer and acts as a powerful indicator on their literacy awareness
(Savage, 2011).
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Spelling is a developmental process, where as children develop their ability to write, they
progress through the different stages of spelling development. There are four broad stages
of spelling development that have been identified accordingly, which are prephonetic,
phonetic, transitional, and conventional (Savage, 2011).
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The prephonetic stage is where children begin to develop the concepts crucial to literacysince they begin to “draw pictures, imitate writing, and begin to learn some letter names
and forms” (Savage, 2011, p. 158). Within this stage, children’s writing and spelling
capabilities include scribbling and random spelling (Savage, 2011). At a glance their
efforts may be overlooked, however their efforts will soon take on characteristics
resembling features of written English (Cramer, 1998).
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At the age of three years old, children soon develop a basic awareness between the form
and function of print, where they begin to understand the differences between drawing
and writing (Savage, 2011). While they are aware of the relationship between writing and
spoken language, they are not yet aware of the alphabetic principle (Savage, 2011). With
more exposure to print they gradually enter random spelling, where their writing is absent
of letter-sound connections. Initially their writings appear to be random scribbles, but
soon mimic the shapes of written language with the presence of “curves, circles, straight
lines, dots, joining strokes” (Cramer, 1998, p. 12). Towards the end of this stage, children
soon start to learn how to read and some sound-symbol relationships become apparent in
their writing (Savage, 2011).
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At the phonetic stage, children learn to apply the alphabetic principle and more letter
sound correspondences emerge in their writing as they become more aware of the
relationship between sounds and letters (Savage, 2011). Children’s spelling is driven by a
phonetic strategy, which illustrate their capability to make systematic connections
between letters and sounds. This stage initially starts with the semiphonetic attempts that
children make in their spelling, where the initial or first couple of letters are included,
which are then followed by a string of random letters (Savage, 2011). According to
Henderson (1990), there are two factors influencing children at this stage as phonetic
spellers, which are the letter name spelling strategy and influence of surrounding speech
sounds.
The letter name strategy describes the child’s capability in determining, which letter best
represents the sound that they hear in the word they would like to spell. They are armed
with their knowledge of the alphabet principle and awareness that sounds are represented
with letters, which results in their attempts to apply the names of the letters to the sounds
(Invernizzi, Abouzeid, and Gill, 1994). Consonant letters frequently appear in their
spellings as they have letter names that resemble their sounds, as well as long vowel
sounds, which are identical to their letter names (Cramer, 1998).
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In terms of surrounding speech sounds, Read (1975) has shown that based on the context
in which letters and sounds appear in within the word determines whether they will be
included or omitted in the word the children want to spell. An example would be the
letters m and n, which are often found to be omitted before a final consonant so when the
word band is spelled, it may be spelled as bad (Cramer, 1998).
However, this does not ensure that children are able to spell the word correctly according
to the sounds of the given words. Since to represent the long vowel sounds correctly they
often need two letters, which with the letter name strategy, children would represent the
long vowel sound in coat as o instead of oa (Cramer, 1998). In addition, short vowel
sounds pose as a problem for young children, and accuracy does not come until much
later. Nevertheless as they progress through the later stages and develop their initial
reading skills, they are able to spell more written words that match to conventional
spelling (Savage, 2011).
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The transitional stage demonstrates children’s increasing awareness that there is a more
complex nature towards the English orthographic system. They are able to fairly
consistently use consonants and vowels in their spelling and move past the one-to-one
letter-sound correspondences (Savage, 2011). This stage can be broken down even
further into two separate stages, which include within-word pattern, and syllable juncture.
Within-word pattern is a stage demonstrating children’s understanding that spelling is not
merely about the one-to-one match of letter to sound. There are a few key indicators that
demonstrate children’s progress away from the phonetic stage. One of which includes the
emergence of silent vowel markers, where the “long vowels are ‘marked’ or ‘signaled’ by
the presence of a silent vowel letter” (Cramer, 1998, p. 20). They are now progressing
towards spelling with long vowels correctly or “marking” the vowel (Cramer, 1998).
Another progression is in spelling correctly using short vowel patterns, consonant blends
and digraphs.
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At the syllable juncture stage children are beginning “to understand how single syllables
are combined into polysyllabic words” (Savage, 2011). At the syllable juncture, where
syllables meet, letters are dropped, doubled or changed (Cramer, 1998). This is often
where most of the spelling errors occur. According to Bear et al. (1996), there are two
concepts that need to be understood, which are related to adding the suffix –ed or –ing .
The final consonant is doubled in a consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) pattern, and the
final e is dropped in a word with a consonant-vowel-consonant-silent e pattern (CVCe)
(Bear et al., 1996).
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Children at the conventional spelling stage are gradually approaching to consistently
applying the standard rules of orthography, where they are aware of the consistencies and
variations in sound-symbol correspondences (Savage, 2011). They develop awareness to
derivational relationships, where words similar in meaning also share similar spellings.
Cunningham (1998) has stated that spelling is what preserves the meaning linkages
across words. For example the spelling-meaning relationship is demonstrated in the three
meaning-related words of reside, resident and residential, where the spelling is stable in
the derived forms even with slight changes in the sound (Cramer, 1998). Thereby
stressing the importance of vocabulary study so as to enhance their understanding of the
meaning relationships that exists among words, which would ultimately help them when
they encounter more polysyllabic words.
These stages of spelling development can be seen to provide important insights as to how
learners develop their spelling over time. However, stage-based accounts of spelling
development is neither static nor fixed as there is considerable overlap in between the
stages. This has resulted in differing opinions on whether these stage-based accounts of
spelling development are adequate in portraying an accurate picture of spelling
development. Treiman and Bourassa (2000) have argued that while they give a rough
idea of spelling development, it does not fully capture the complexities of phonological
and morphological representations. Children are in full possession of strategies that are
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available to them at the early stages, which help them and it is not limited to the advanced
stages of spelling development.
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Spelling is a complex skill, which “involves the integration of complex perceptual and
cognitive (brain-based) processes” (Santoro, Coyne and Simmons, 2006 as cited in
Westwood, 2014, p. 7). Ouellette and Sénéchal (2008) conducted research investigating
the cognitive and linguistic underpinnings of invented spelling, and have proposed that
phonemic awareness, working memory, awareness of orthographic rules, oral vocabulary,
and knowledge of morphology were essential elements that facilitated early spelling
sophistication. This will be used as a basis in which to explore invented spelling.
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Phonemic awareness is having the ability to hear, identify and manipulate the sequences
of basic discrete speech sounds, which are what make spoken words and syllables
(Savage, 2011). It combines auditory discrimination with the ability to mentally breakdown words and blend the sounds together for the purpose of reading and spelling
(Westwood, 2014). Moreover, it helps children become aware of how language works as
it involves them being conscious of the sounds that make up words as being a separate
entity from the meaning of these words (Savage, 2011).
Research has shown that phonemic awareness is essential in early reading and spelling
development (Melby-Lervåg, Lyster and Hulme, 2012; Caravolas, Hulme & Snowling,
2001; McBride-Chang, 1995). Adams et al. (1998) states that a child’s level of phonemic
awareness is a strong single determinant on the success of the child’s experience in
learning to read. Considering that it “primes the reader for print and helps make sense of
phonics instruction” (Vacca et al., 2009, p. 148). In addition, Torgesen and Mathes
(2000) have specified how phonemic awareness is crucial to learning how to read, which
are due to that it helps children understand the alphabetic principle, how spoken words
are represented in print, notice how letters represent the sounds in words, be able to
match letters to sounds when decoding words, and generate possibilities for partially
sounded out words.
Moreover, Ouellette and Sénéchal (2008) discovered that phoneme awareness along with
letter sound knowledge is important predictors for invented spelling in English L1
children. Yeong and Liow (2011) also found out that it was the strongest predictor for
spelling sophistication for English L1 children. When young children develop their
spelling, they need to be able to recognize the consonant and vowel letter sounds in
words in order to be able to choose the correct letter to spell the words they want to spell,
and phonemic awareness helps them to achieve this.
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Working memory correlates to short-term memory, and involves holding onto a piece of
information in the mind, where another piece of information can be added or omitted (Ott,
2007). Verbal working memory is regarded as the “simultaneous processing, storage andretrieval of verbal information” (Salthouse, 1990 as cited in Keilty & Harrison, 2015, p.
89). Stage and Wagner (1992) have indicated that working memory resources among
young monolingual children limits them during spelling tasks. Nevertheless, Verhoeven
and Siegel (2007) discovered that verbal working memory was an important predictor of
variance in spelling ability for both lower and upper grade L1 children, but not for ESL
children.
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Orthographic awareness is the correct everyday spelling of a given word, and involves
studying the spelling to ensure the correct shape and order of the letters (Ott, 2007). For
children to be able to read or write in English, they need to draw on knowledge of
orthographic, morphological conventions and phonological knowledge (Treiman, 1993 as
cited in Marinova-Todd & Hall, 2013). This is further supported by Berninger et al.
(1991) who have stated that there are multiple orthographic codes being used along with
phonological codes as children learn to read and spell. Moreover, in a study conducted byMcBride-Chang (1998), she discovered that in regards to invented spelling, a measure of
orthographic processing could be used to determine additional variance compared to
using phonological awareness, letter-name and letter sound knowledge. Her study
suggests that invented spelling is multifaceted and does not rely merely on
phonologically based skills but also on orthographic abilities.
Research studies have brought to light that the differences in orthographic complexity,
between languages, translates into differences in the development of literacy skills
(Marinova-Todd & Hall, 2013; Katz & Frost, 1992). Interestingly, there has been
research suggesting that L1 orthographic characteristics have an influence on L2 reading
and spelling processes. A longitudinal study conducted by Nassaji (2007) discovered,
through tracking the developmental changes occurring in a child ESL learner, that there
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was a possibility that his L2 spellings were either influenced or constrained by his L1
spellings. Moreover, Wang and Geva (2003) reported that Chinese children who were
ESL learners were found to have poorer spelling performance in spelling pseudowords
compared to their L1 counterparts. This was explained as being caused by the ESL
learners reliance on a direct non-phonological route due to their L1, Chinese, having a
logographic writing system.
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Vocabulary knowledge along with word recognition ability and reading comprehension
are all interrelated components, which attribute to a comprehensive reading program
(Rupley, Logan, and Nichols, 1998/99 as cited in Savage, 2011). Vocabulary instruction
serves a purpose in spelling in that the more information a child knows about a word,
they will have a greater chance in spelling that word correctly (Savage, 2011). When
children begin to explore the meaning relations among words and observe their common
spellings, they will learn the various patterns, in which roots and affixes are combined,
phonology of English words and how to look for these root forms in words that they
come across, which will help them learn many new words in one reading and develop
their own rich vocabulary (Henderson, 1990).
Raynolds and Uhry (2010) have reported that vocabulary knowledge is “related to the
ability to spell emerging phonemes for both native English monolingual students and
native Spanish bilingual students” (p. 510). As a result, a positive correlation was
determined between vocabulary and English spellings through the application of the
lexical restructuring model. In contrast, a study conducted by Wang and Geva (2003)
reported that despite having poorer English vocabulary scores, Chinese ESL children’s
overall spelling performance compared to L1 children was of no difference. Keity and
Harrison (2015) reported similar results, where L1 and ESL children little differences in
their spelling sophistication scores despite ESL children having lower oral vocabulary
and syntactic knowledge.
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Morphological information is described as the “component parts of words (morphemes)
and the way in which words are reconstructed as meaning changes” (Westwood, 2014, p.
17). It should be noted that morphemes are “the smallest meaningful part of a word andcan be a prefix, suffix, plurals” (Ott, 2007, p. 287). Having morphological awareness
involves being able to recognize the root words, compound words, prefixes, suffixes and
later on the origin and derivations of words (Westwood, 2014). Notably, Carlisle (1995)
has stated, “the extent of a child’s morphological awareness is limited by his/her
morphological knowledge” (p. 194). Children are at the final stages of mastering the
inflections when they begin to read and write at the kindergarten and grade one level
(Berko, 1958; Brown, 1973; Clay, 1982; de Villiers & de Villiers, 1973 as cited in
Carlisle, 1995).
Treiman, and Cassar (1996) depicted that children did not use morphological relations
among words even though they could have. Nevertheless, the study showed that when
children are spelling, they are capable of using other sources of information to spell,
which includes certain morphological relationships among words (Treiman & Cassar,
1996). Furthermore, they stipulated that young children are capable of using
morphological strategies only when there are a few demands competing for their attention
(Treiman & Cassar, 1996). Jones (1991 as cited in Carlisle, 1995) reported similar results,
where young children showed “awareness to the relation of surface representations and
underlying forms of morphologically complex words” (p. 195). Thereby demonstrating
the possibility that morphological awareness may be involved in spelling at an earlier
stage in invented spelling.
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Vacca et al. (2009) stated that the gradual sophistication of children’s invented spellings
should be celebrated as a display of intelligence and emergent competence in the written
language. Spelling errors made by children should not be seen as random nor as being out
of ignorance instead it should be seen as genuine attempts to apply the alphabetic
principle to written English based on their knowledge of phonics and sound-symbol
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relationships (Savage, 2011). According to Kolodziej and Columba (2005), educators
who informed parents of the positive benefits in regards to invented spelling were more
likely to change their attitudes and become more accepting.
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Spelling is a developmental process that children progress through as they develop their
level of sophistication and cognitive awareness on how spelling works. Gentry and Gillet
(1993) have stated that while invented spelling ultimately leads to conventional spelling,
it is not merely about acquiring expert spelling ability but setting the foundation for
expert spelling to be constructed from. The phonics element of invented spelling allows
children to interact and better understand how the alphabetic principle works and
involves them in meaningful writing. Therefore, the processes involved in invented
spelling allow children to actively construct and internalize the rules of spelling, which in
turn helps them progress to conventional spelling (Kolodziej and Columba, 2005).
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Invented spelling provides children with excellent and valuable practice for them to apply
their understanding of “phonetics, word analysis and synthesis, and letter-sound
correspondences” (Chomsky, 1979, p. 48). The exploratory nature of invented spelling
provides the opportunity for children to use an analytical approach, which promotes the
integration of the phonological and alphabetic information into initial lexical
representations thereby connecting the phonological and orthographic information
(Ouellette & Sénéchal, 2008). In turn these lexical representations, once refined, may
possibly facilitate the acquisition of reading.
When young children write, they are applying already internalized grapheme-phoneme
principles in order to spell words they have not yet mastered the conventional spellings of
(Clarke, 1987; Paul, 1976; Richgels, 2002 as cited in He & Wang, 2009). Children are
provided with a natural context, in which they have an authentic involvement with
phonics as they attempt to spell their desired word. They are engaged in applying their
“skills to segment phonemes and to represent them with corresponding graphemes” (He
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& Wang, 2009, p. 46). As a result, young children writers are able to “enhance their
phonological awareness, refine their phoneme segmentation skills, and establish as well
as modify their grapheme-phoneme principles” (He & Wang, 2009, p. 46). Furthermore,
phonological knowledge required in invented spelling strongly correlates to beginning
readers’ success (Burns & Richgels, 1989; Winsor, 1990).
!"@"2 E8(&*7'/ 9&-,-+1 /;-44
Invented spelling provides children with the opportunity to be able to write freely, and
experience a sense of control over the written word. While conventional spelling creates a
barrier, and restricts them as they become afraid to make educated guesses based on their
own understanding of the orthographic correspondences (Savage, 2011). While children
have large oral vocabularies, it should be noted that their spelling vocabularies are small
in comparison (Cramer, 1998). Through invented spelling, children are able to interact
with written language and develop understanding on the relationship between the written
word and their thoughts.
Several research studies have indicated that when young children focused more on the
message of their writing as opposed to their spelling, their writing achievement was
positively affected (Gettinger, 1993; Nicholson, 1996). Bear et al. (2004) have stated that
a hesitant writer, who focuses on conventional spelling, will lose the chance to express
their new ideas, and invented spelling allows them to freely write down their ideas.
Furthermore, Healy (1991) who found that journal writing of children using invented
spellings were three times longer and included more detail, elaboration and imaginative
language compared to children who relied on traditional spelling. In addition, young
children who used invented spellings were found to write longer and more fluent pieces
of writing compared to those who did not (Paul, 1976).
;GE 25( "1-( %3 45:$(-( LK< '(10$(0- 1$) -6('':$*M :$>($,() -6('':$*
Bilingual speakers may use the literacy skills developed in one language when reading
and spelling in another language (Marinova-Todd & Hall, 2013). There has been
evidence on the transfer of phonological awareness skills across other languages (Perfetti
& Liu, 2005; Gottardo et. al, 2001). Rickard Liow and Poon (1998) support this by
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concluding there is a possibility of the L1 influencing the nature and development of
phonological awareness in the second language, which could potentially affect the
strategies applied by children when reading and spelling in their second language.
A study conducted by He and Wang (2009) explored ESL beginner writers and their use
of invented spellings, and learned that even at a very young age, they were already aware
of the grapheme-phoneme principles needed in spelling English words. They were fully
capable of representing phonemes they either segmented or pronounced with the
corresponding graphemes accordingly. On the one hand, the young ESL writers with their
invented spellings show that they may have inaccurately or inappropriately distinguished
articulated phonemes (He & Wang, 2009). On the other hand, it shows they are able to
apply phonologically sophisticated principles in a systematic manner (He & Wang, 2009).
Hanley et al. (1999) have pointed out that children employed a whole-word, visual, and
rote learning strategy when they are taught to read and write in Chinese. It should be
noted that different teaching approaches in reading Chinese influence phonological
processing skills (Wang and Geva, 2003), and Chinese readers who used an alphabetic
phonetic system such as Pinyin were more successful at manipulating speech sounds than
those who became literate through Chinese characters (Read, Zhang, Nie & Ding, 1986
as cited in Wang & Geva, 2003). This seems to imply that having exposure to an
alphabetic phonetic system regardless of whether it was Pinyin or English that it would
positively influence their phonological processing skills. It was found that there was a
positive transfer effect from the L1’s reading experience, where they seemed to better use
their visual orthographic memory of a letter string “ensemble” compared to Chinese ESL
learners (Wang & Geva, 2003).
Similar results were reported by Dixon et al. (2010), where the visual approach benefited
Chinese ESL learners on the conventional spelling of high-frequency words in English.
Considering that Malay is also an alphabetic language and possesses a shallow
orthography, Chinese ESL learners were able to perform better than them on the
conventional spelling of English high frequency words. However they argued that the
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poorer phonological processing skills observed in Chinese ESL learners could possibly
lead to future difficulty in spelling unfamiliar words in English.
Wade-Woolley and Siegel (1997) found no difference between L1 and Chinese ESL
learners on a real word and pseudoword spelling task even though Chinese ESL learners
performed poorly on the phonological tasks. While, Marinova-Todd and Hall (2007)
reported Chinese ESL learners as having higher scores on real-world spelling tasks. In
addition, they were portrayed to have the fewest associations between phonological
awareness and spelling, which was suggested to have occurred due to their reliance on
other processing skills besides phonological awareness when spelling pseudowords.
Similarly, Wang and Geva (2003) found that Chinese ESL learners performed better on
spelling familiar real words than on unknown pseudowords. A possible explanation could
be that as Chinese ESL learners are spelling familiar or real words they are able to rely on
the direct and nonphonological route, which is what has already been acquired and
practiced in their L1 reading and writing activities (Holm & Dodd, 1996 as cited in Wang
& Geva, 2003).
;GN O5%$%'%*:"1' ):33(0($"(- /(,&(($ 41$,%$(-( 1$) L$*':-5
Cantonese and English are two languages that are typologically distant. They differ in
many respects, which include their phoneme inventories, characteristics of sounds,
distribution of phonemes, permissible syllable structure and rhythm (Chan & Li, 2000).
This poses a degree of difficulty for Cantonese speakers when mastering the standard
English pronunciation. It has been suggested in previous research findings that a learner’s
previous linguistic experience would influence their learning of other languages (Corder,
1883; Hung, 1993 as cited in Chan & Li, 2000). Therefore the English pronunciation
problems made by native speakers of Cantonese could be attributed to the phonological
differences between the two respective languages of English, and Cantonese (Chan & Li,
2000).
Taking into consideration on how invented spelling represents a child’s attempt to create
versions of words through utilizing their current understanding of letter-sound
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relationships, they are spelling a word based on the way it sounds to them. In order for
children to be able to spell, they need to be able to orally segment the word into
phonemes, map the individual sounds to their corresponding letter, write letters in the
correct order and then read the word to make sure it is spelled correctly (Savage, 2011).
Therefore a child’s pronunciation of the word itself plays a huge part in how they
ultimately decide to spell a word. It is important to be aware of the phonological
differences as they can affect how a Chinese ESL learner determines how to spell a word.
Chan and Li (2000) outline and discuss the pronunciation problems and difficulties faced
by Chinese ESL learners. The pronunciation problems were divided into consonants,
vowels, diphthongs and rhythm. All these categories with exception to rhythm will be
briefly discussed as they could possibly account for the invented spelling errors made by
Chinese ESL learners.
Plosives
Both languages have six plosive stops which include bilabial plosives /p, b/, alveolar
plosives /t, d/ and velar plosives /k, g/, however, in Cantonese these are all voiceless. In
comparison, /p, t, k/ are voiceless while /b, d, g/ are voiced. When the sound is voiced,
this refers to how the vocal chords vibrate when the sound is articulated (Savage, 2011).
In contrast, voiceless refers to when the vocal chords do not vibrate as the sound is made
(Savage, 2011). In Cantonese, there are no voiced syllable-final plosives, which results in
the substitution of the phonemes /p, t. k/ for /b, d, g/ (Chan & Li, 2000).
Fricatives
Fricatives refer to articulations that “involve turbulent airflow through a narrow channel,
resulting in a hissing noise” (Catford, 1994, p. 17). There are nine fricatives in English,
which include the labio-dental /f, v/, dental /!, ! " /, alveolar /s, z/, post-alveolar / ! , "/, and
glottal /h/ (Chan & Li, 2000). The following sounds among the English fricatives, which
are voiced include /v, ! " , z, "/ and the rest /f, #, s, ! , h/ are voiceless (Chan & Li, 2000).
While in Cantonese, there are only three fricatives, which are the labio-dental /f/, alveolar
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/s/, and glottal /h/ (Chan & Li, 2000). All of which are voiceless but they are articulated
similarly to English.
Chinese ESL learners tend to substitute a sound that is close to their native language
when coming across a difficult or unfamiliar sound. This is evident as few of the
fricatives are substituted with another sound since few of these fricatives /z, !, ! " , "/ do
not exist in Cantonese. The voiced labio-dental fricative sound /v/, at the beginning of the
word the sound /w/ is substituted for /v/, and at the end of a word /f/ for /v/ (Chan & Li,
2000). While, the voiced alveolar fricative phoneme /z/ is replaced with its voiceless
counterpart /s/ (Chan & Li, 2000). The dental fricatives /!, ! " / are often substituted with
either /t/ or /f/ and /d/ or /f/ respectively (Chan & Li, 2000). The “th” sounds represented
by /!, ! " /. The voiceless palato-alveolar fricative / ! / is often substituted with /s/ (Chan &
Li, 2000). Lastly, the voiced palato-alveolar fricative /"/ is substituted with /s/ or / ! /.
Affricates
Affricates are a “stop released into homorganic fricative” (Cartford, 1994, p. 220).
Chinese ESL learners tend to have a problem with two particular English affricates,
which are /t ! / and /d"/ (Chan & Li, 2000). These two English affricates /t ! / and /d"/ are
substituted with their Chinese counterparts /ts/ and /dz/, respectively (Chan & Li, 2000).
Nasals, laterals and / $/
Chinese ESL learners have problems in distinguishing the sound /l/ from /n/ or / $/, where
the / $/ at the beginning of words such as ‘ride’ / $a%d/ and ‘road’ / $&'d/ is substituted with
an /l/ -like sound (Chan & Li, 2000). Also, some speakers may consequently substitute
/w/ for / $/. In addition, there is variation when /l/ and /n/ are in the syllable-initial position.
At times, /l/ may be substituted for /n/ at the beginning of words and sometimes the initial
/l/ may be pronounced with an “n” quality, which gives a nasalized /l/ sound (Chan & Li,
2000).
Pure vowels
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Often the phonemes /æ/ and /e/ are indistinguishable to Chinese ESL learners and usually
the phoneme /e/ is substituted for /æ/ (Chan & Li, 2000). They also have problems with
long and short vowel pairs, where they are unable to tell them apart, which includes /i:/
and /%/, /u:/ and /'/, and /(:/ and / )/ (Chan & Li, 2000). The errors that the Chinese ESL
learners make are unique to the individual, at times, they may use a short vowel sound to
represent a long vowel sound, and vice versa.
Diphthongs
Diphthongs are often replaced with a pure short vowel that sounds similar to the Chinese
ESL learners as they have difficulty in articulating certain diphthongs (Chan & Li, 2000).
An example of which would be with the word ‘point’ /p(%nt/ may be pronounced as /p )nt/
where /(%/ is replaced with the short vowel / )/ (Chan & Li, 2000). Similarly with the
diphthong /e%/ is replaced with the pure vowel /e/ (Chan & Li, 2000).
Consonant Clusters
Since there are no consonant clusters in Cantonese, Chinese ESL learners tend to cope
with this difference by using either deletion or epenthesis, where deletion is when the
consonant cluster is reduced and epenthesis is when the consonant cluster is broken up
through the addition of a vowel thereby creating an extra syllable and the onset contains
only one consonant (Chan & Li, 2000).
Word-final consonant clusters
When Chinese ESL learners encounter word-final consonant clusters, they tend to delete
one or more of the consonants, which are often the phonemes /l, t, d/. In addition,
Chinese ESL learners tend to have problems with pronouncing words in the past tense as
such the past tense marker sound /t/ or /d/ is dropped (Chan & Li, 2000). Epenthesis may
also be used when facing word-final consonant clusters, where an extra syllable is added
so ‘film’ /f %lm/ becomes /f %l&m/ (Chan & Li, 2000).
Word-initial consonant clusters
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Word-initial consonant clusters are often simplified through either deletion or epenthesis,
and an example would be when / $ / is deleted after a plosive, where ‘produce’ /p $&dju:s/
becomes /p&dju:s/ (Chan & Li, 2000). Another example would be an epenthesis, where an
extra syllable is added with ‘clutch’ /kl*t ! / becoming /kal*t ! /.
A study conducted by Wang and Geva (2003) compared the lexical and visual-
orthographic processing in the spelling performance of Chinese ESL learners and native-
English speaking children. In the pseudoword spelling to dictation task conducted, they
used the consonant digraphs (sh, th) and consonant clusters (st, sp) because it is absent in
the L1 phonology of the Chinese ESL learners. They discovered the presence of negative
transfer attributed to the absence of certain phonological units such as th and sh was
evident when they were in grade 1 but not in grade 2, which was when they took part in
the research. Therefore, it was concluded that the L1-specific transfer only occurs in the
early stages of learning their second language, and it did not affect their spelling
performance.
After reviewing the literature, there is limited research specifically looking at the
invented spellings made by Chinese ESL learners in the first grade. This poses to be an
area of interest as there appears to be a significant growth in Chinese ESL learner’s
spelling development between the first and second grade as described by Wang and Geva
(2003). It would be beneficial to track and examine their invented spellings made
throughout the year to understand Chinese ESL learner’s spelling development progress,
and determine how to address their learning needs accordingly. This resulted in the
following research questions, which seek to explore the invented spellings made by grade
one children:
=(-(10"5 P9(-,:%$-1. What are the common errors found in grade one children’s invented spelling?
2. What are the similarities and differences in the common errors in invented
spelling made by grade one children between the first and second term?
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4516,(0 ?F =(-(10"5 J(-:*$ 1$) @(,5%)%'%*A
The research questions outlined in this chapter served the purpose of narrowing down the
scope of research. The research methods chosen for the use of this research will be
explained with supported literature. Detailed information on the nature of the researchand methodology will be given by providing information on the research site and
participants. The data collection and data analysis will also be included and explained in
detail.
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1. What are the common errors found in grade one children’s invented spelling?
2. What are the similarities and differences in the common errors in invented
spelling made by grade one children between the first and second term?
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The methodological approach implemented for this research was an intrinsic case study,
which are defined as studies that attempt to understand the particular case in question
(Stake, 1994). The particular case, in this research, are the invented spellings made by a
single grade one class. The research aims to examine and understand the invented
spellings in attempts to develop a better understanding on the types of spelling errors
made by Chinese ESL learners.
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The school is an English Medium of Instruction (EMI) primary school in Shek Mun,
Hong Kong. The school has a school-based curriculum, and draws reference from a
Western curriculum. There is a whole school approach towards invented spelling, and
this is implemented and encouraged by all English teachers in the school.
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The research sample was of convenience sampling, which comprised of the collected
writing summative assessments from a single grade one class. From the time of the first
writing summative assessment, the children were aged from 5-6 years old. All of the
children are ESL learners and have Cantonese as their L1. The grade one class consisted
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of twenty-two children, who have been streamed into the class based on their English
ability. There were sixteen girls and six boys. These children were streamed into the
middle group therefore showing average English ability. Each child has a total of four
writing summative assessments they have completed over one academic school year.
After obtaining ethical consent, the sampling was narrowed down to twenty children. The
sample consists of writing summative assessments from fifteen girls and five boys.
?GD O0%"()90(
Children’s writing summative assessments, which they have completed over the
academic year 2014-2015, were collected. These were collected in order to identify their
invented spellings. Within one school term, there were two writing summative
assessments. The academic year consisted of two school terms, which equates to fourwriting summative assessments given and completed to students.
The writing summative assessments were based on an unknown topic given to the
children, which they were then given space to write about. However, the writing genre
and assessment criteria remained the same as the writing formative assessment completed
in class. All children were given the same topic respective of the term. They were given
forty-five minutes to complete the assessment. The writing summative assessments
referred to those that were completed during these time periods as shown:
Table 1: Writing summative assessment timeline
Summative assessment Period
Term 1 Mid-term Writing Assessment October 2014
Term 1 End-term Writing Assessment December 2014
Term 2 Mid-term Writing Assessment March 2015
Term 2 End-term Writing Assessment June 2015
They were not given any help with their spelling during the writing summative
assessment. Therefore, the invented spellings reflect their own attempts at conventional
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spelling. The writing summative assessments were collected after marking, grading and
data entry had been completed. In total, there were eighty samples collected from their
writing summative assessment across the academic school year.
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Before distributing the consent forms to all the participants (i.e. children’s guardian and
school principal), the ethical requirements of the university were met accordingly.
Participants’ confidentiality was ensured as they were aware of their right to review or
withdraw the data they submitted, as well as how the data collected would be kept
confidential and used for the research purpose.
Participants were required to give informed consent and provided detailed information onthe researcher’s intent and purpose in conducting the research before data collection
commenced. As stated on the consent form, they had the right to withdraw at any time
during the data collection period.
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After the collection of the data, the writing summative assessments were each examined.
Any misspellings of words were considered as a form of invented spelling and recorded
onto a spreadsheet. The invented spellings were grouped according to when they were
completed. The conventional spelling of the word was determined by the context in
which the invented spelling was written in. Afterwards, it was written next to the
invented spelling.
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The scoring method chosen to assess children’s spelling sophistication is an adapted
version of Treiman and Bourassa’s (2000) (See Appendix 1) scoring method. Originally,
Treiman and Bourassa’s (2000) scoring method is a composite system, which is able to
examine the phonological and orthographic features of children’s spellings. The adapted
version taken from Yeong and Rickard Liow (2011) was chosen to evaluate the invented
spellings made by children because it was perceptive to the spelling developmental
sequences observed. Yeong and Rickard Liow (2011) used this scoring system in a
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similar context with ethnic Chinese children, aged 5 years old and English as their second
language. This particular scoring method took into consideration of the difficulty
highlighted by Treiman and Bourassa (2000), which occurred when children grouped
separated phonemes together. The number of points was increased in order to account for
another level of sophistication reached when a child is able to represent all four sounds in
a word. This scoring method was used to track and provide a deeper understanding on the
children’s spelling progress across the academic school year.
The scoring system was adapted (Table 1) so that it became a 10-point scale (0-9). The
last and highest score of 10 was omitted because it represented that conventional spelling
was produced. However, the purpose of the research was to collect and examine all of the
invented spellings. The scoring system was able to assess the phonological and
orthographic features present in children’s spellings since the number of points increased
when children were able to represent more sounds found in the target word in their
spelling. This helped determine any patterns in their invented spellings and these were
grouped according to the six developmental stages of spelling, which was described
earlier.
Interrater reliability was assessed by having two raters score all of the invented spellings
recorded. Another English teacher was invited to use both scoring methods to score all of
the invented spellings. When a disagreement arose in the scoring, the invented spelling
was reviewed by the raters and a consensus score was given.
Table 2: Spelling sophistication scoring method for hypothetical spelling of “train”
Spelling Description Points
7 Does not include any letters 0
R2D Includes some letters that are not related to the sounds in the word
and some other symbols
1
ohreas, pl Includes only letters that are not related to sounds in the word 2
risv, Begins with letter that is related in sound to initial phonemic or with 3
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nesenn a letter that represents a phoneme other than initial phoneme
t, tiso Begins with a conventional initial letter 4
tad, tissn Two of four phonemes represented with conventional letters, letters
related in sound or highly visually confusable with conventional
letters. Intrusions allowed
5
tadre,
triap
Three of four phonemes represented with conventional letters,
letters related in sound or highly visually confusable with
conventional letters. Intrusions allowed.
6
tain, taen Three of four phonemes represented with initial and final consonant
represented conventionally. Intrusions allowed.
7
tarin,
triatn
All four phonemes represented with initial and final consonant
represented conventionally. Intrusion allowed.
8
tran, tren All four phonemes represented with all consonants represented
conventionally. No intrusions allowed.
9
Note Adapted from Yeong, S. H. M. & Rickard Liow, S. J. (2011). Cognitive-linguistic foundations of
early spelling development in bilinguals. Journal of Educational Psychology, p. 7, Table 1.
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After the invented spellings were grouped, each of the groupings was looked at in detail
and the errors were listed accordingly. The errors were categorized into four main
categories of substitutions, omissions, insertions and transpositions. These categories
were taken from a research conducted by Cook (1997), which explored the spelling errors
made by second language speakers of English. By drawing from spelling errors examined
in previous works, the four main categories were used as a skeleton in order to provide a
more detailed description of typical errors made by L1 and L2 English language speakers.
This is applicable to the current research as it is able to provide a foundation on which to
base the spelling errors made the Chinese ESL learners. This provided greater insight as
to the specific errors the children were making across the school year based on their
writing summative assessments.
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4516,(0 BF C:$):$*-
In this chapter, the data collected from the children’s writing summative assessments will
be presented. The invented spellings of children will be sorted according to their level of
error. Based on their respective terms, the spelling errors made will then be categorizedinto four main categories. The findings will be presented in a manner to answer the two
questions, which are (1) What are the common errors found in grade one children’s
invented spelling? (2) What are the similarities and differences in the common errors in
invented spelling made by grade one children between the first and second term?
BG7 25( $9+/(0 %3 :$>($,() -6('':$*- 1"0%-- ,5( ,&% ,(0+-
From children’s writing summative assessments, a total of 548 words were considered to
be invented spellings as they were seen as children’s genuine attempts in spelling a word.
Figure 1 presents the total number of invented spellings identified from each of the
writing summative assessments. The percentage of invented spellings was calculated
using the equation (a/548) x 100, where a represented the number of invented spellings
identified from the writing summative assessments.
Most of the invented spellings identified were taken from the first mid-term writing
summative assessment, which had a percentage of 33.76%. This could be attributed tochildren having just started their formal instruction in English and as such have not had
as much exposure to the English language. Then, the second end-term writing summative
assessments accounted for 26.09% of invented spellings identified. From the first end-
term and second mid-term writing summative assessment, a similar number of invented
spellings were identified 20.44& and 19.71% respectively. Overall, a total of 54.19% of
invented spellings were identified from the first term writing summative assessment, and
the remaining 45.81% from the second term writing summative assessment.
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Figure 1: The invented spellings across the two terms
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Based on the spelling sophistication scoring method, the invented spellings were grouped
according to their respective scores. The scores each represented a specific error feature
that had to be identified in the invented spelling. Figure 2 shows the score points given
from the 10-point scale (0-9) and the percentage of invented spellings that were given the
particular score. From the first term writing summative assessments, a total of 297
invented spellings were identified.
A total of 185 words were identified as invented spellings from the first mid-term writing
summative assessment. A majority of the invented spellings were given a score point of 6
or 7, and shared the same percentage of invented spellings (23.24%). Then, the invented
spellings scoring an 8 followed after with 16.22%. The score point with the least
percentage of invented spellings was 2 (2.16%). This represented the least error of this
type in the first mid-term.
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Figure 2: The invented spellings in the first mid-term
Figure 3 shows the invented spellings in the first end-term. In comparison, there was
considerably less number of words identified as invented spellings in the first end-term
writing summative assessments. Only 112 words were identified as being invented
spellings. Noticeably, there was an increase in the percentage of invented spellings being
scored a 9 (22.32%). Similar to the first mid-term assessment, the percentage of invented
spellings scoring a 6 or 7 was fairly similar with 22.32% and 24.11% respectively.
Interestingly, the score point of 4 had the least percentage of invented spellings (0.89%).
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Figure 3: The invented spellings in the first end-term
Figure 4 combines the results from the first mid-term and end-term writing summative
assessment. This provided a general assessment on the invented spelling made by
children in the first term. None of the invented spellings received a score point of 100 or
1. The score point of 2 had the least percentage of invented spellings (1.35%). The
majority of the invented spellings seemed to fall under the score point of 6 (22.3%) and 7
(23.57%).
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Figure 4: All of the invented spellings from the first term
BG? K6('':$* -%65:-,:"1,:%$ :$ ,5( -("%$) ,(0+
From the second term writing summative assessments, a total of 251 words were
identified as invented spelling. Figure 5 shows the invented spellings made by children in
their second mid-term writing summative assessment. In the second mid-term writing
summative assessment, 108 words were identified as invented spelling. A majority of the
invented spellings have been scored either an 8 (22.22%) or 9 (27.8%). Similar to the first
term, the score point of 6 and 7 share similar percentages of invented spellings, which are
8.52% and 17.59%, respectively. The score points of 2 (1.85%), 3 (1.85%) and 4 (0.93%)
had the least percentage of invented spellings.
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Figure 5: The invented spellings in the second mid-term
Figure 6 shows the invented spellings identified from the second end-term writing
summative assessment. A total of 143 words were identified as invented spelling. The
results differed from the second mid-term writing summative assessment in that the score
point of 7 had the highest percentage of invented spelling (24.4%). This was closely
followed by score points 8 (23.78%) and 9 (22.38%). There were no invented spelling
errors made between the score points 0 to 2. The second end-term writing summative
assessment had a higher percentage of invented spellings receiving a score point of 7
compared to the second mid-term writing summative assessment. There was also a
significant decrease in the percentage of invented spellings made under the score point 9.
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Figure 6: The invented spellings in the second end-term
Figure 7 combines the invented spelling errors made in the second mid-term and end-
term writing summative assessment. Generally, there appears to be a descending
percentage of invented spelling going down the score points. The score point 9 has the
highest percentage of invented spellings (24.7%), which is then followed by the score
point 8 (23.11%) and 7 (23.57%). Interestingly, the score point of 3 (2.4%) has the higher
percentage of invented spellings compared to the score point of 4 (1.2%). The lowest
percentage of invented spellings still remains to the score point of 2 with 0.8%.
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Figure 7: All of the invented spellings from the second term
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Figure 8 compares the invented spellings, using the scoring method, across the first and
second term. The first and second term show a similar pattern in the distribution of
invented spelling errors made across the 10-point scale. Both terms show children’s
invented spellings being scored from 2 to 7 with a slight difference. There is a smaller
percentage of invented spelling errors made in the second term. Interestingly, in the first
term the score point 8 and 9 have a lower percentage of invented spelling in comparison
to the second term.
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Figure 8: The invented spellings across the two terms
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From the first mid-term writing summative assessment, only 2.16% of invented spellings
were given a score point of 2, which indicates that a small portion of the words include
letters that are not related to the words. This means that the remaining 97.84% are able to
begin their words with a letter that is related in sound to the initial phoneme in the word
they want to spell. Most of the invented spellings are related in sound to a phoneme in
their respective word. The words are often spelled with the correct conventional letter at
the beginning of the word. However, there are a few that are not spelled with the
conventional letter at the beginning. These words have spelling errors that are related to
substitution, where one letter is replaced with another letter. A common error was with
the /+/ sound, where it was being substituted with the letter /f/.
The rest of the spelling errors encountered were related to the middle and end sounds.
This was often due to vowel substitutions made by the child. The vowel sounds were
often represented with a vowel that had the same sounding letter name. In addition,
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consonant substitutions affected the word ending as children substituted similar sounding
vowels or consonants in place of the correct one. This resulted in words such as pleys,
where the /s/ is represented with the letter s itself.
Based on the score points, 50.27% of invented spellings received a score lower than 7.
This indicates the percentage of invented spellings that have zero to three phonemes
represented. As such, there was a large portion of invented spellings that had omissions.
The invented spellings were either missing the silent vowel, a consonant cluster, vowel,
syllable or showed consonant doubling. Among the omissions, the omission of a vowel
was the most common spelling error made. In comparison, there were less insertion and
transposition spelling errors made by children at this stage.
Table 3: Invented spelling errors made in the first mid-term writing summative assessment
Spelling error Examples of invented spellings
Substitution
Vowel substitution
-Representing the sound of /u:/ with /'/
-Representing the sound of /i/ with the letter e
-Approximating the sound of /(/ by representing it
with the letter o
-Approximating the sound of /,/ with the letter a
because its name /e/ is similar to /,/
-Approximating the sound of /%/ with the letter e
because its name /i/ is similar to /%/
-Representing the sound /,/ with the letter e because
its sound is /e/
Fud (food)
Mumne (money), tide (tidy), mane (many), candee
(candy)
Owst (always)
Dask (desk), pancil (pencil), bast (best)
Eeve (if)
Frens (friend)
Consonant substitution
-Representing the sound /&n/ with the letter n
-Approximating the sound of /l/ with the letter o
because /o/ is similar to /l/
-Representing the sound /s/ with the letter s because
the sound is /s/
Crdrn (children)
Tabo (table), pipo (people), aoso (also)
Pleys (place), introdus (introduce), bekos (because),
nis (nice)
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-Representing the sound /+/ with the letter f
-Representing the sound of /w/ with the letter r
-Approximating the sound of /t/ and /k/ with the
letter d
Fing (thing), fink (think)
Ritboard (whiteboard), rad (wide)
Ardwerd (artwork)
Omission-Omission of silent vowel
-Consonant cluster reduction
-Consonant cluster deletion
-Omission of a vowel
-Omission of a syllable
-Consonant doubling
Thy (they), Mak (make)
Libaryion (librarian)
Sool (school)
Corr (classroom), bar (borrow)
Her (hear)
Rubish (Rubbish), runing (running)
Insertion Gentaly (gently), colock (clock)
Transposition Calss (class)
Table 3 shows the invented spelling errors made by children in the first end-term writing
summative assessment. In comparison, there is a lower percentage of 38.39% of invented
spellings that have zero to three phonemes represented. This indicates that the remaining
invented spellings had more phonemes represented, which is shown by how 95.54% are
spelled with the correct conventional initial letter. The spelling errors were mainly related
to the middle and end sound of the words. A minimum of two to three phonemes was
represented in every word. The common error type was the omission of vowels, and
consonant clusters.
Table 4: Invented spelling errors made in the first end-term writing summative assessment
Spelling error Examples of invented spellings
Substitution
Vowel substitution
- The /i/ sound represented with the letter e
-The sound of /(/ approximated by representing it
with the letter o
-The sound of /i/ represented by the letter e
-The sound of /,/ approximated with the letter a
because its name /e/ is similar to /,/
-The sound of /aI/ represented by the letter I
yumme (yummy)
Osle (also), caso (castle)
Cooke (cookie)
Bad (bed)
Tim (time), rid (ride)
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-The sound of /e/ represented by the letter a Classmat (classmate)
Consonant substitution
-The sound of /l/ approximated with the letter o
because /o/ is similar to /l/
-The sound /+/ represented with the letter d-The sound /+/ represented with the letter f
-The sound /t ! / represented by the letter string ch
because its sound is /t ! /
-The sound of /z/ approximated with the letter s
-The sound of /f/ represented with the letter v
-The sound /p/ approximated with the letter b
Aso (also), caso (castle)
Dat (that)wife (with)
pecher (picture)
Desey (dizzy)
Haf (have)
Pinseboll (Principal)
Omission
-Omission of silent vowel
-Consonant cluster reduction
-Consonant cluster deletion
-Omission of a vowel
-Consonant doubling
mak (make)
playgane (playground), wen (when)
mon (month)
tim (tim), tek (take), scoter (scooter)
allmost (almost), siting (sitting), canot (cannot)
Insertion Morening (morning)
Transposition Paly (play), friut (fruit)
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Comparatively, the second mid-term writing summative assessment shows children’s
development towards more sophisticated spelling. Only 32.41% make invented spellings
that have a score point of 6. This demonstrates that children are even more capable at
representing more of the phonemes they hear in a word. This has led to a noticeable
pattern in their spellings where there are more invented spellings with insertions as
children try to represent all of the phonemes. Children are becoming more capable in
representing the beginning and end sound of the word.
Table 5: Invented spelling errors made in the second mid-term writing summative assessment
Spelling error Examples of invented spellings
Substitution
Vowel substitution
-The sound of /i/ represented by the letter e Pelole (pillow), slipe (sleepy)
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-The sound of /,/ approximated with the letter a
because its name /e/ is similar to /,/
-The sound of /*/ approximated by representing it
with the letter a
Badroom (bedroom), tham (them)
Brash (brush)
Consonant substitution
-The sound of /+/ represented with the letter d
-The sound of /+/ represented with the letter f
-The sound /b/ approximated with the letter p
-The sound /d/ approximated with the letter p
-The sound /d/ approximated with the letter t
De (the), ader (other), den (then)
Theef (teeth), clofs (clothes)
Planket (blanket),
Hoop (hood)
Nit (need), net (need)
Omission
-Omission of silent vowel
-Consonant cluster reduction
-Omission of a vowel
-Consonant doubling
Pople (people)
Bush (brush), seep (sleep)
stry (story), teth (teeth)
brrush (brush), of (off)
Insertion finieshes (finish), myslelf (myself)
Transposition Siad (said), saop (soap)
In the second end-term writing summative assessment, there is a decrease in the
percentage of invented spellings (29.37%), which has a score less than 6. This means that
a higher percentage of invented spellings are spelled with two or more phonemesrepresented. They were able to spell their words using the correct and appropriate basic
conventional letter. There is an increase in invented spellings that are spelled with
insertions present compared to previous writing summative assessments.
Table 6: Invented spelling errors made in the second end-term writing summative assessment
Spelling error Examples of invented spellings
SubstitutionVowel substitution
-The sound of /aI/ represented by the letter I
-The sound of /e/ represented by the letter a
-The sound of /,/ approximated with the letter a
because its name /e/ is similar to /,/
Min (mine)
Mak (make)
Than (then)
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-The sound /*/ approximated by representing it with
the letter a
Tack (tuck)
Consonant substitution
-The sound /+/ represented with the letter f-The sound /+/ represented with the letter d
-The sound of /f/ approximated with the letter v
-The sound of /v/ approximated with the letter w
-The sound /t/ approximated with the letter d
-The sound /d/ approximated with the letter t
-The sound /-/ approximated with the letter n
-The sound /s/ represented with the letter s because
the sound is /s/
Fersd (third) Ford (fourth)
Give (gift)
Wermit (vomit)
Wend (went)
Resterond (restaurant)
Swin (swing)
Nise (nice)
Omission
-Omission of silent vowel
-Consonant cluster deletion
-Omission of a vowel
-Omission of a syllable
-Consonant doubling
befor (before),
cocolate (chocolate)
plese (please), set (seat)
diffront (different)
beautifull (beautiful), thiner (thinner)
Insertion Thakeking (taking), bute (but)
Transposition Siad (said), frist (first),
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4516,(0 DF J:-"9--:%$ 1$) :+6':"1,:%$-
In this chapter, the key findings from this research will be critically analysed in attempts
to better understand Chinese ESL learner’s invented spellings by exploring their invented
spellings made during writing summative assessments across the school year. This isdone in hopes to fill in the literature gap on Chinese ESL learner’s invented spellings.
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Based on Chan and Li’s (2000) research on the difference between English and
Cantonese phonology, there were some spelling errors that overlapped with learner
difficulties for native speakers of Cantonese. This supports the notion of taking into
consideration of the language and orthographic differences when learning a second
language (Wang & Geva, 2003). Furthermore, in a study conducted by Wang and Geva
(2003), they found that Chinese ESL learners had difficulty in representing L2-specific
phonemic elements in their spelling because it did not exist in their L1 phonology.
Therefore it is important to take into account of these differences when teaching Chinese
ESL learners.
Based on the invented spellings identified from children’s writing summative assessment,
some of the common errors can be matched to the three categories of consonants, voweland diphthongs, which were identified as pronunciation problems and difficulties faced
by native speakers of Cantonese when learning English.
Consonants
Plosives
Many of the children substituted the sounds /p, t, k/ for /b, d, g/ when they spelled words
that contained these sounds. For example, blanket was spelled as plenket (taken from the
second mid-term writing summative assessment), where the /b/ sound was substituted
with /p/. This is due to how in Cantonese there are no voiced syllable-final plosive sounds.
Fricatives
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These were common errors identified in children’s invented spellings from this research.
Substitution was the main strategy used to help them spell when they encountered a
difficult or unfamiliar sound.
At the end of a word, the /f/ sound was substituted with /v/ so have was spelled as haf.
Children would substitute /w/ for /v/, where vomit would be spelled as wermit (taken
from the second end-term assessment). Interestingly, they did not substitute /f/ for /v/ at
the end of a word. They instead substituted /v/ for /f/.
The /z/ sound does not exist in Cantonese, which if why is replaced with the voiceless /s/.
So dizzy (taken from the first mid-term) is then spelled as desey, where /z/ is substituted
for a /s/.
The /+/ sound was substituted for either /d/ or /f/. This is evident with with being spelled
as wife (taken from the first end-term assessment). Another example would be that
spelled as dat.
Nasals, laterals and / $/
In this circumstance, the sound /w/ was substituted for / $/, where whiteboard became
ritboard , and wide became rad .
Long vowels
It has been said that Cantonese learners are unable to differentiate between the long and
short vowel pairs. In this case, representing the sound of /u:/ with /'/. So food is then
spelled as fud.
In addition, there were other common errors where /e/ was represented with the letter a
because the name of the letter sounds the same as the vowel that needs to be represented.
This is similar to the letter sound /aI/ being represented by the letter I because of the letter
name having the same name as the sound. This was a familiar occurrence in children’s
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invented spellings, and it was because children began to realize that the conventional
names of the vowels correspond to the sounds of the vowels (He & Wang, 2009).
When the words contained the phonemes /*/, /-/, /i/ and /(/, they are often spelled
according to the similar letter sounds of /a/, /n/, /I/ and /l/, respectively. Similarly, this is
also done with the phonemes /, /, /+ /, and /Z / are spelled with similar letter sounds /I/,
/d/ and /s/.
The letter o was used to represent the sound /l/ because of its name o, which resulted in a
close mid-back vowel, where castle becomes caso. The three phonemes /l/, /(/ and /o/ are
all similar in regards to their place of articulation based on how the voiced lateral
approximant /l/ becomes syllabic at the end of a word, and is then follo
