CHILDREN & SPELLING

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 9, Issue 62, 12 April 1946, Page 5

CHILDREN & SPELLING

DETERIORATION IN STANDARD LIVELY DISCUSSION ENSUES A lively discussion took place at the meeting of the ParentTeacher Association held at the school on Tuesday evening, on the question of the present day standard of spelling, and whe- ' ther it has deteriorated during the past twenty-five years. The subject arose appropos of a question asked by one of the parents, who stated that at the inaugural meeting of the Association, the Headmaster, Mr I. B. Hubbard, when discussing education had said that spelling was now regarded in a different light, and although it was still recognised as being important, if a child could not spell, then he could not spell, and that was all there was about it. The questioner, in view of Mr H. G. Warren’s address oh Education in Relation to Business, asked the speaker how important ability to spell correctly actually was ip business.

Replying, Mr Warren said it was impossible to over estimate the importance of correct spelling in the commercial world. The average principal of a business today, dictated his correspondence, and relied upon his typiste to copy the letters correctly. It created a very bad impression upon the receiver of the letter, if he found several spelling mistakes in the text.

In reply to a question as to whether he thought that a young person who was weak at spelling should not take up commercial work, Mr Warren replied that such a person might perhaps be brilliant at some other subject, and should persevere until he attained a reasonable degree of proficiency at spelling.

Varied Opinions Expressed In reply to g question, “Is the average spelling ability of a child today, worse than it was''2s years ago’’, the following opinions were •expressed:— Mr Warren: Certainly not, but I think that the average vocabulary of a child must be far greater now than it was 25 years ago, and likewise, the demands on general education .are far greater. There are so many 'things now such as motor cars, and electricity, to mention but two, with which the child comes into contact, and which open up a much wider vocabulary—a vocabulary which in .our day was unknown.

Rev. A. F .Attwood: I question -that statement. The vocabulary is being extended certainly, but at the -same time, numbers of words, for instance those connected with horses .and buggys, and gas, are becoming ■ obsolete. In my opinion, the worst aspect is that ordinary everyday •.words are being spelled wrongly.

Modern Methods The Headmaster (Mr I. B. Hubbard): In the days when most of the parents of today were at. school, a pupil was taught 20 or 30 words ,a day, and if he could not pass examinations in spelling, he was failed again and again until in the end, he found himself, often at the age of 14 or so, still in Standard 4. If he had been allowed to advance with the rest of the class, it would probably have been found that he was very good at some of the other subjects, but because he was weak at spelling, he was denied the chance to prove his worth in any other direction whatsoever, and consequently left school with a very poor education. Today, it is known that a person can speak, and make himself understood on a minimum basic -vocabulary of 400 words. Most people have a knowledge of from 2000 to 3000, some up to four or five thousand, whilst those highly educated may know the meaning of from 20 to 30 thousand. From this, it is apparent, that if a child is •taught 20 new words per week, that is 800 per year, in the course of five years of schooling, he will have mastered 4,000 words, which is no mean feat. When he commences work, he learns all the new words connected with that particular trade or profession. Education now, is totally different to what it was even 15 years ago. The system of automatic progression from class to class means that although a high school education is not as advanced as it

was, many more pupils are able to

benefit by it. Certainly the school work of our day was of a high standard, but it was of a very narrow range. The spelling, as we teach the children today, is not really shaky at all in the basic words which go to make up the English language. Mr Rushbrook (Awakeri) advanced the theory that the present downward trend in spelling might be attributable to the number of harmful influences in force today, such as comic papers, talkies and modern songs. One method, he said, in which parents could aid their children to speak, and ultimately spell correctly, was by making sure that their own diction was at all times correct:

The discussion terminated with a well received suggestion from Mr J. E. Bigelow, that if Mr Warren would submit a list of business words and expressions which' he found in most cases to be wrongly spelled the Commercial teachers would be willing to introduce them into their lessons.