Learning styles _ Just want to share something i learnt regarding spelling ( Although i do not teach English). :)

Everyone learn and process information in 3 focal ways.

–         Visually
–         Auditory
–         Kinesthetic (Feelings and movement)

Although all of us can process information and learn in all 3 ways, we all have a dominant learning style. Hence, some children pick up music fairly easy, some children, like me, struggle in coordinating my fingers with the chords.

I, however, understand science concepts pretty fast especially doing some experiments. In the past, I just accept it that different people are good in different things. Yes, all that is true. But we ALL CAN achieve so much more with the right learning strategies. I have read so much on children performing beyond their standards after their parents exposed them to certain learning methods.

When children use only one of the learning method, they most probably have a difficult learning journey.
Hence, they must be taught to USE ALL 3 learning mechanisms simultaneously as often as possible.

SPELLING (some kids ace it, some kids simply hate it)

Children with spelling difficulty usually don’t see the words in the mind. They simply try their best to make up the letters of the word through sound. But Oh No… spelling of the word doesn’t always match the way it is pronounced in English, thus children end up misspelling the words.

I have researched a few ways of learning and teaching spelling and found a powerful method in Adam Khoo’s resources. I have personally used this method with one of my Secondary 1 China student (whom I gave some spelling lessons to help him in his English although I teach him Mathematics and Science).

Adam Khoo calls it the powerful spelling strategy and it works as follows:

1) Pronounce the word the right way
2) Pronounce the word in its broken up form
3) Write (Visual) the broken up parts and at the same time read it aloud ( Auditory).
4) Spell the word forward and backward a few times. ( Spelling the word backwards is tricky at first but it is very effective in imprinting the words in a child’s mind. )

I also found a few good spelling online games for young kids too.

May more parents and teachers work to incorporate these visual + audio + movement methods to stimulate the learning of our children today. 🙂

2 thoughts on “Learning styles _ Just want to share something i learnt regarding spelling ( Although i do not teach English). :)

    • Hi Elston,
      Take a word that you always have problem remembering its spelling. Try spelling forward and backwards. For instance, “apple”, you have to try saying it “E, L, P, P, A “.
      In order to spell it backwards, our mind automatically creates a visual image of the word. I do not think it will confuse the child because they know they are spelling it backwards and the image formed in the mind is the CORRECT sequence of the letters.

      Try it yourself! 🙂
      For me and one of my China student, it works well!! 🙂

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