Assumption-Free Teaching, Part 2

Back in May, I authored this post in which I talked about assumptions I found myself making in my teaching, and their sometimes-detrimental effects on my students. 

Today another unhelpful assumption of mine became apparent.  I was unhappy when a student in my class wrote an essay that contained four different spellings of the word “different.”  (The four spellings were all reasonably close to being correct, but none were quite right.)  As I began talking with this student about why she would spell the same word four different ways, knowing that at least three of those had to be errors, it suddenly dawned on me.

I had never told my students that invented (or phonetic) spelling was not a good thing anymore.

In kindergarten through first grade, and somewhat still in second grade, these same students were praised for taking a risk and spelling phonetically instead of always asking for help.  In my third grade classroom, they are now expected to spell properly (except when including a particularly advanced vocab word in their writing).

But how would they have known that?  Although I’ve spent lots of time explaining spelling patterns already this year, I wondered why I sometimes didn’t see a high level of carryover into students’ writing.  Now I know: they were simply writing like they had always been encouraged to do — using “invented” spelling.