Deficient Linguistic Rule Application in a Learning Disabled Speller

Abstract

This case study investigated linguistic rule application skills in an adult with spelling disabilities. Two tasks were designed to assess and remediate skill in applying morphophonemic-morphographemic spelling rules. In the first task, inflected and derived words were dictated for written spelling. The second task was the same as the first, but dictation of the base word preceded dictation of the inflected or derived word. Spelling performance improved in the second task, suggesting that isolating the base word facilitates the spelling process for inflected and derived words. However, several spelling errors were also present in the second task. These errors reflected deficiencies in morphophonemic-morphographemic rules, phonemic-graphemic correspondence rules, and phonemic analysis. The results and related background data indicate that numerous processes may contribute to spelling performance. The data also suggest that in cases where spelling subskills are deficient, increased task structure may enable the LD speller to apply rule knowledge and subskill competencies more effectively.