To: jbe who wrote (2591 ) 5/23/1999 12:58:00 PM From: Joana Tides Read Replies (1) | Respond to
JBE, Marilyn Vos Savant's studies of intelligence are fascinating and usually right-on-the-money. My daughter belongs to the present generation of high-schoolers, who were taught to write before they were taught to spell. The present teaching theory that setting spelling standards too high and too early causes inhibitions in the creative flow has served her well; her writing has the introspection, freedom, and maturity that can be so often be observed in the young people of today. What in former times stood out as talent, is now more of a given. Certainly, the drills and academics teaching rules of spelling and grammar have not been assigned the same importance lately as they were in our own school days. My child certainly wasn't subjected to the rote of the endless dull drills that I endured, to attain her ability to communicate in writing. She spells well on her own, corrects by spell-checker, and types like lightning online. Communicating with her friends via multiple IM's while crafting her post to a metal music forum is great practice for her future in the internet-connected workforce - and perhaps someday she'll be here on SI! A large measure of her continuing improvement in grammar and spelling has come from the use of the spell-checker on the computer at school and at home. We all learn mostly by doing. While visual/photographic memory plays a huge role in the ability to spell by automatically memorizing how words should look; it's not the whole picture. Perhaps my daughter has inherited family abilities; plus she just got lucky in those early years. Many folks have learning blocks around some of their best early skills; some are caused by the best intentions such as being given "rewards" which become "punishments" for excellence in a subject in their early years in school. I was a nervous wreck for awhile in second grade until my Mother figured out the problem and requested the teacher to leave me alone. Reading and writing came early and naturally to me. So I was singled out to stand in front of the class to read to them, my works were hung for display, and I was sent around to upper grades to demonstrate my abilities...it embarassed me, especially as my literary performances didn't sit well with some of those older kids on the playground who wouldn't have bothered me otherwise. I'm lucky that this was caught in time and my desire to proceed wasn't blocked (til adolescence came along, LOL). Am fortunate to have had the opportunity to carry this experience forward and align it with modern ways of teaching, to help others when I was a teacher myself. Many of those tough-looking, dumb-acting kids are only seeking to hide their light under that bushel. The trick is, to be casual and sparing with the praise while giving them creative work-bytes chosen to allow them to bring their abilities forward privately, without fear of being unmasked by their peers as a standout. Speech/spelling/academic/physical/social difficulties and talents in the early years can cause agonies in the classroom and especially later on the playground; and our older generations didn't get the benefits of the new knowledge of the psychological dangers of singling out the students from any extreme of the spectrum. I'm certainly not saying this is why your husband has difficulty spelling and you don't...but I will state my own personal observation of many professors of English I have known, who had more trouble with spelling than many of their students. So many professional writers of talent and great communicators are bad spellers; which gets back to not having a Block in place from any source about it - and to a praise of the present methods of teaching writing before teaching spelling. Or, coming from the difference of ways our generation was educated; perhaps your husband had to make his choice between One or The Other in his early years, to get The Flow going. If that's the case, he chose wisely.
