SPELLING AND THE GROWTH OF CONCEPT OF WORD AS FIRST GRADERS WRITE

Abstract

Word is a critical concept in beginning literacy, a foundation for both reading and orthographic understanding. In this study, the development of concept of word in children's own writing during first grade was examined and its relationship with developing spelling ability was described.

Children in three intact first grade classes were assigned concept of word tasks "typical" of first grade instruction at the beginning and end of the year. The spaces left between words as the children copied from the board, wrote from dictation, and created their own stories in a free writing task were counted and compared across tasks and between Fall and Spring. In addition, the children were given an assessment of their developmental spelling level at both times. The spelling scores were compared with the concept of word measures.

Analyses of the Fall data revealed that the word concept tasks were significantly related to each other, suggesting that the tasks tap different aspects of the same construct, concept of word. Spelling development was also related to concept of word, and children who demonstrated use of a letter name strategy in spelling were more likely to perform well on the concept of word tasks.

A 3 (word concept tasks) x 2 (trials) MANOVA identified a significant interaction between tasks and trials. Post hoc analyses found significant differences among all of the concept of word tasks overall. In the Fall, all comparisons among the tasks were significant, and in the Spring, all except the difference between Copied and Dictated were significant.

There appears to be a developmental hierarchy in acquisition of concept of word which is related to the perceptual demands of writing tasks. Though important gains in conceptual understanding are made during the first grade year, there are still differences in performance on concept of word tasks at the end of first grade.