Learning to read and spell constitutes a major societal concern. As a result, different studies have been conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of different instructional methods. However, few studies have investigated how teachers appropriate and implement a newly reading and spelling instructional method in the classroom. In order to grasp…

Spelling programs in elementary school grades are a controversial topic among teachers, parents, and researchers in the field of best practices. Because spelling is a foundational skill of literacy, recent education publications continue to stir contention among teachers to resolve what is the best approaches to spelling instruction. Proficient…

Alphabet training of primary school students is an essential, but challenging activity. Alphabet knowledge is an important fundamental literacy skill which has been found to directly impact the future academic success of students. Game-based learning and the use of multimodal engagement activities have been found to be effective intervention…

Peer tutoring methods were implemented in a 2nd grade classroom using an alternating treatments design with a baseline. In the baseline phase, 18 participants spelled words they had not yet learned. During the treatment phase, teacher-led spelling instruction was alternated each week with peer tutoring for spelling. Peer tutoring for spelling was…

Educators nationwide are receiving training through Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling® (LETRS®), a program rooted in a structured literacy that encompasses all five essential components of literacy recommended by the National Reading Panel (NRP, 2000): phonemic awareness, phonics skills, fluency, vocabulary, and…

The Better Start Literacy Approach (BSLA) is a strengths-based approach to supporting children's literacy learning in their first year of school. Previous research has shown the approach is effective at accelerating foundational literacy knowledge in children with lower levels of oral language. This study examined the impact of the BSLA for…

Background: Intervention studies have reported the advantage of teaching children about morphemes for spelling, but direct comparisons between explicit and implicit teaching have been examined systematically in relation to only a few morphological rules. Aims: This study compared explicit versus implicit teaching of the functional rule for the…

Learning to spell is a difficult but essential task for children learning to read. Several spelling tasks involving different cognitive demands are used in classroom. To provide better guidance for teaching practices, a critical question is whether spelling performance of beginner readers is task dependent. The present study focuses on the…

A century ago, spelling skills were highly valued and widely taught in schools using traditional methods, such as weekly lists, drill exercises, and low- and high-stakes spelling tests. That approach was featured in best-selling textbooks such as the "Horn-Ashbaugh Speller" of 1920. In the early 21st century, however, skepticism as to…

Students can learn in a meaningful way through the use of educational games. When students apply their skills and information in order to progress through a game, a huge degree of engagement is generated among them in the classroom as a result both their capabilities and their learning increase. 153 children from primary schools in Vietnam…

This sequential explanatory mixed methods study examines the impact of the Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling (LETRS) professional learning intervention on teacher knowledge within the context of South Carolina's reading policy. Quantitative analyses of pre- and post-assessment data indicate significant improvements in…

Children who struggle with writing are a heterogeneous group and may experience difficulties in a range of domains, including spelling, reading, and oral language. These difficulties are reflected in their writing and may influence their responsiveness to writing interventions. The effectiveness of a targeted sentence-combining intervention to…

The present study assessed the effectiveness of the ECRIMO educational application designed to build first-grade level spelling skills. We tested whether using the app to teach spelling would be as effective as providing the same training using traditional paper exercises. The effect of integrating gamification into mobile learning apps, which has…

In this experiment, we examined whether beginning readers benefit more from grapheme-phoneme decoding (GPD) than from whole-syllable decoding (WSD) instruction in learning to read and write words. Sixty Brazilian Portuguese-speaking first graders (M age = 6 years 1 month) who knew letter names but could not read or write words were randomly…

Research syntheses have demonstrated that morphological instruction can improve the literacy skills of poor readers and spellers. However, studies have used a wide variety of training methods. Questions remain about what type of morphological instruction is most effective and under which circumstances. In this study, we conducted a randomized…