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The cost of English spelling

7-8 June 2008

Coventry University, UK

Interim Conference report

Conference theme:

How much time, effort, and money is spent in schools, and in educational contexts generally, merely to cover the complexity of the current ?traditional? English spelling system rather than teaching the joy of reading and writing? This conference aimed to draw attention to the financial, educational and cultural costs for all levels of the English Educational system, comprising Universities, Schools, teachers and students arising from the difficulties in teaching reading and writing in the current spelling system, using recent research and comparisons related to the ease with which better structured orthographies in other languages are learned and taught. The above costs also include the often unrecognised expense (time and money) that employers and authorities incur in offering remedial courses to help otherwise vocally skilled people who have not managed to master the illogicality of English Spelling while being verbally adept in the language. The event was sponsored by the Spelling Society.

The conference was attended by almost 30 people at various times, both from within the Society and from non-members attracted by the conference publicity, with particularly high attendance for the key-note presentation by Prof John Wells. At various times in the conference members had the opportunity to view personal displays by members of the Society, which proved a very popular aspect for those attending.

The formal ?Proceedings? are in preparation and are intended to be circulated to delegates and members in printed form in about September 2008. As much material as possible will also be added to the Society web site.

Schedule and abstracts

Saturday 7 June 2008

• Welcome: Mr Jack Bovill, Chair of the Spelling Society
• Ms Masha Bell: ?The most costly English spelling irregularities?

  The spelling inconsistencies which cause the biggest reading and spelling problems and overlap between the two, i.e. to explain which spelling inconsistencies absorb most learning time and incure the greatest teaching costs. I give a brief explanation how English spelling makes learning to read and write harder, with a few examples. e.g. when a letter always spells just one sound, or if the letter o in English always spelt just the short o sound of 'on, of, hot, not, spot' or 'ou' always the sound of 'out, shout, found, round, ground', learning to read and write is very easy.
  Learning to read English is slower because children cannot be taught the basic system in a few months and then left to practice the application of these rules of the system on their own. They keep getting stuck on words like 'once, could, colour' and need regular practice with an adult sitting next to them, helping them to make sense of the words that make no phonic sense.
  Much of this one-to-one teaching is done by parents at home. Schools spend money on such one-to-one tuition when the parents can't, or for some other don't provide it. In severe cases intensive one-to-one help is administered in a bout of a few months by outsiders (e.g. Reading Recovery) which costs around £ 2500.- per pupil.
  But such help is also provided less formally in every primary school by teachers and classroom assistants to thousands of children every day, from reception up to the end of secondary school in some cases.
  Overall, I emphasize the 'time is money' theme and explain which spellings are particularly time-absorbing. I also refer to unchanging standards, employers complaining about them officially since 1921, research findings about English spelling.

• Ms Zuzana Kotercová: ?The cost of teaching English in primary schools?

  An initial survey and analysis of the amount of time (and therefore money in staff salaries) spent by teachers in teaching English spelling to primary school pupils. The research was partly financially supported by the Spelling Society.
  Speakers at the Spelling Society's conference at Coventry University argue that £18m is "wasted" each year teaching 15th-century spellings to 21st-century pupils. If spellings were kept up to date teachers wouldn't have to teach them because they'd be common sense. The figure of £18m emerges from this final-year student research project on the costs of English spelling. Zuzana Kotercova, studying English and business at Coventry University, calculates that teaching spelling in primary schools costs £2.85 per hour, per teacher. This ends up as £556 per teacher, per year, based on the average salary of a primary school teacher and the typical time he or she spends teaching spelling. The Spelling Society, which celebrates its 100th anniversary this year, has extrapolated this for its forthcoming conference.. It says that if there are 369,000 teachers in nursery, primary and secondary schools, then teaching spelling costs £18m a year.

• Keynote speaker: Prof John Wells, President of the Spelling Society, Emeritus Professor of Phonetics, University College London: ?Why do we need pronunciation dictionaries??

  This relates to the new, third, edition of my /Longman Pronunciation Dictionary/, published in March 2008. If our spelling system were not so opaque and inconsistent, there would be very little need for a dictionary devoted exclusively to pronunciation.
  Unsurprisingly, then, there are three competing English pronunciation dictionaries on the market: the Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, the Oxford Dictionary of Pronunciation, and my own Longman Pronunciation Dictionary. As well as showing the pronunciation of vocabulary words in British (RP) and American English, they also cover - to varying extents - proper names and inflected forms.
  The Longman Pronunciation Dictionary is the only one to offer statistics derived from public preference polls. In preparation for the new edition, I conducted a new on-line poll, with the publishers' help, in April-June 2007. Responses were accepted only from those respondents who indicated their geographical origin as Britain (= England, Wales, Scotland and the Channel Islands, but not Ireland). The number of valid responses varied by question, but was in the range 800-825.
  There were 30 items in the questionnaire: accept/except, adult, applicable, Asia, careless, contribute, debris, diphthong, dissect, during (initial consonant and stressed vowel), egotistic, electoral, H, homogeneous, hurricane, impious, kilometre, lamentable, liquorice, mischievous, necessarily, omega, poor, protester, tinnitus, tune, via, were, yours. As in previous questionnaires, each question was multiple-choice, asking which of two or more pronunciations the respondent preferred for the given word. Selected findings are presented.

• Mr Christopher Jolly: ?Remedial teaching of reading: a trial with reformed spellings?

  The severe cost of failure in learning to read provides an opportunity for publishers. The teaching community, and parents, have a willingness to buy radical solutions to the problem provided such solutions are credible.
  This paper describes a study that took place in four primary schools with children struggling with reading. The children had storybooks with a reformed spelling as well as traditional orthography. They used the reformed spellings when they got stuck (as they frequently were). The children made high levels of progress, especially those with the more severe difficulties. The results and the responses will be described, along with the future plans for this programme.

• time for members to visit displays by members
• 1730 Ms Raffaela Buonocore: ?Does being a Chinese speaker reduce the time of learning English spelling?? (in her absence presented by Dr John Gledhill)

  In this essay I wish to raise the problems which Chinese speakers face today in the acquisition of English; these problems include the complexity of English spelling, the lack of training students receive in spelling which has an impact on gaining necessary English skills, and above all the rigid methods used by Chinese schools which affect the attitude students adopt towards the language, thus influencing the progress that they make in the language.
  I also wish to offer my views towards effective methods of teaching English spelling, according to my experience of teaching English in Asia for over five years; and offer suggestions as to which methods might improve the way in which English spelling is taught in Chinese schools, and how these methods may aid students to make quicker progress in the language, hence influence the way in which English is regarded by Chinese speakers today.

Sunday 8 June 2008

• Time for members to visit displays by members (continued)
• Prof. Anatoly Liberman: ?The emotional costs of learning modern English spelling?

  My perspective is that of an American professor, reviewer, and panelist. Bitter experience has taught millions of people that the difficulties of English spelling cannot be overcome. Young Americans, perhaps more pragmatically-minded than their European peers, often take their illiteracy for granted, almost as one takes an inborn physical defect. Time and again I have heard the statement (usually followed by a giggle): "I am a terrible speller." This "defect" has devastating consequences in many areas, and especially in academe. I remember losing interest in the manuscript of an article in which on the first page principle was written instead of principal. Though I hated myself for my snobbery, I could not help it. While reading the dissertations of my advisees, one of my main concerns is not to miss any of their spelling errors. I have also spent years teaching English as a second language. Foreigners have no choice but to be docile and learn what they are taught, but here, too, it would be more profitable to concentrate on phonetics, grammar, and words, rather than spelling. As far as I can judge, among the native speakers of the European languages, the resignation of English speakers, when it comes to spelling, has no parallels.

• Dr Valerie Yule: ?The international costs of English spelling, and the comparative costs of improvement? (in her absence presented by Dr John Gledhill)

  This paper analyses the ways in which difficulties in spelling as the technology of written communication carry personal, social and economic costs, world-wide, with an assessment of the particular points of difficulty, and who are disadvantaged by them. Quantitative research still requires collation and extension.
  The difficulties of unpredictability in English spelling have in the past served elitist social purposes as a barrier to social mobility.
  Today the costs are more serious and obvious. It is in the public interest, internationally, that access be as wide as possible everywhere to the major lingua franca for commerce, science, technology, education and transmission of cultures. This necessity also carries the condition that removing the traps in English spelling does not hinder access to our heritage of print and everything now in print in English. This is feasible. Introduction of needed changes can be inexpensive and move quickly, but requires reserch and application of existing reserch, especially in cognitive psychology, pilot experiments and an International Commission on English Spelling.

• Mr Tom Zurinskas: ?The costs of poor reading skills?

  There are many articles written about cost issues regarding the lack of reading skills. This paper addresses summaries of several culled from the internet within the past few years. Internet adresses are given for more thorough investigation.

• Close and thanks: Mr Jack Bovill

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