In spite of the apparent irregularity of the English spelling system, Chomsky and Halle (1968) characterize it as “near optimal”. We investigate this assertion using computational techniques and resources. We design an algorithm to generate word spellings that maximize both phonemic transparency and morphological consistency. Experimental results demonstrate that the constructed system is much ...

In three experiments, we compared the effectiveness of rainbow writing and retrieval practice, two common methods of spelling instruction. In experiment 1 (n=14), second graders completed 2 days of spelling practice, followed by spelling tests 1 day and 5 weeks later. A repeated measures analysis of variance demonstrated that spelling accuracy for words trained with retrieval practice was highe...

Spelling is a language skill supported by several linguistic knowledge sources, including phonemic, orthographic, and morphological knowledge. Typically, however, spelling assessment procedures do not capture the development and use of these linguistic knowledge sources. The purpose of this article is to describe a new assessment system, the Spelling Sensitivity Score (SSS), and then demonstrat...

Our project studies social aspects of innovative vocabulary use in early English letters. In this abstract we describe the current state of our method for detecting neologisms. The problem we are facing at the moment is the fact that our corpus consists of non-normalized text. Therefore, spelling normalization is the first step we need to solve before we can apply automatic methods to the whole...

Text analysis includes such things as dividing the text into words and sentences, assigning syntactic categories to words, grouping the words within a sentence into phrases, identifying and expanding abbreviations, recognizing and analyzing expressions such as dates, fractions, and amounts of money, and so on. Word pronunciation is the problem of translating orthographic words -words in ordinar...

In the pursuit of a remedy for the poor spelling of dyslexic writers, a software system has been developed which features centrally a user model of the writer’s spelling error patterns. Dyslexic writers are poorly catered for by most spelling programs because of their diverse errors. In this system, Babel, a user model directs the search towards likely corrections considering the writer’s commo...

There has been less research on how children learn to spell than on how they learn to read, but a good deal is now known about spelling development. This article reviews studies of normative development, beginning with children’s early scribbles and proceeding to prephonological spelling involving letters, phonologically influenced invented spelling, and more advanced spelling. Most of the stud...

This study used a copying task to examine spelling acquisition in French and Spanish from a perception and action perspective. Experiment 1 compared French and Spanish-speaking monolingual children’s performance. Experiment 2 analysed the behaviour of bilingual children when copying words in French and Spanish. Gaze lift analysis showed that in French, first graders tend to use letter and sylla...

The spelling of many words in English and in other orthographies involves patterns determined by morphology (e.g., ed in past regular verbs). The authors report a longitudinal study that shows that when children first adopt such spelling patterns, they do so with little regard for their morphological basis. They generalize the patterns to grammatically inappropriate words (e.g., sofed for soft)...

This paper presents a method to elicit spelling error corpora using an online typing race game. After being tested for their native language, English-native participants were instructed to retype stimuli as quickly and as accurately as they could. The participants were informed that the system was keeping a score based on accuracy and speed, and that a high score would result in a position on a...