Study Strategies for Learning Spelling: Correlations with Achievement and Developmental Changes

Abstract

Students at three grade levels (Grades 3/4, Grades 7/8, and undergraduates) were pretested to identify 10 words each student could not spell. The students were then asked to “think aloud” as they studied the words; their utterances were tape-recorded and later transcribed. Immediately after the study session, students were given a posttest over the 10 studied words. Analyses of the study session protocols indicated that: (1) The amount of study time was not positively correlated with posttest spelling scores. (2) The two most commonly used study strategies, word pronunciation and letter rehearsal, accounted for the majority of the think-aloud utterances but were not positively correlated with posttest scores. (3) Overpronunciation, in which words were overenunciated or mispronounced in a way that more closely matched the word's spelling than normal pronunciation, was correlated .51 with posttest scores for the undergraduates, the only group who used this strategy with any frequency. (4) While overpronunciation (an effective strategy) was more frequently observed for older students, letter rehearsal (an ineffective strategy) was observed more often for younger students. Implications for spelling theory and educational practice are discussed.