Bad Spelling
One of my few pet peeves is bad spelling. It just bugs me. I can look at a full page of written material and the misspelled words will jump out at me from wherever they appear on the page. Not to say I don’t make mistakes from time to time… I do… but it bothers me even more then!
The population of poor spellers seem to be growing in size. I haven’t researched it but I’m betting this is true. If so, why?
- Education system - I’ve said before that this is one critical area that needs reform. Our schools are not getting the job done and spelling is just a small indicator of the problems within this institution
- not enough focus on teaching the basics and too much on social issues.
- less pressure to perform - seems like competitiveness has been edged out of the classroom in an effort not to hurt the students’ self-esteem.
- passing students from one grade to the next even though they haven’t mastered the material.
- graduating students from high school who do not know how to read, write, and do arithmetic well. We are doing them no favors at all as this will quickly be discovered in the workplace and limit their options for advancement.
- Text messaging - I have a love-hate relationship with cell phones. They are very convenient when you need to get in touch with someone… but they are also just another “interrupt factor” in our daily lives. And text messaging just adds exponentially to that problem. People will always try to do things in the easiest way possible, and when it takes pressing 9 three times to type in a Y (if you don’t have a full alpha keyboard on your phone), shorthand will evolve. And manufacturers have tried to make it easier, too. So, there are two parts to this:
- use of abbreviated pseudo-words - “UR” equals “you are”, “JK” equals “just kidding”, “BBL” equals “be back later”, and so on. When people, especially kids, get in the habit of using this shorthand, it then creeps into their writing and degrades their memory of how to spell any given word.
- predictive text - since it is hard to text on a regular phone keypad, manufacturers created a tool to match possible words after a keystroke or two… sort of like spell check, which then inserts the desired word (without having to know how to actually spell it). This just makes for a lazy mind.
- Instant messaging (IM’ing) - same as for text messaging but on the computer
- Spell check - in most modern word processors, an internal tool will check the spelling of words and correct it if wrong. All well and good, except it removes the need for someone to know how to spell the word. It also explains why we sometimes get messages with the totally wrong, but similarly spelled, word used in a sentence which makes no sense at all.
Add all of this up and it indicates we’re becoming a less literate society… and that can’t be good.
So, is the solution to work harder to simply teach our children how to spell well? As much common sense as that might make, not everyone believes that is the answer! The American Literacy Council (NOTE: their website seems to ONLY work in Internet Explorer!?!?!? And every page pops a new browser window. Stupid site design.) advocates spelling words phonetically. Here’s an example of their approach to the problem:
Right.
It appears many agree that the inability to spell is a problem in our society. Of all things, it would seem our great country could make some significant strides forward in this area… but it seems those strides have been in the wrong direction.
By the way, I’m not suggesting everyone should aspire to win the Scripps National Spelling Bee. I’m sure I couldn’t. But, if you’re going to use words, why not learn how to spell them correctly?
