Understanding Orthography and its
Implications for English Language Learners
By Wendy Sheets, Intermediate Literacy Trainer
In
understanding approaches for reaching our English Language Learners, I’ve been
doing some studying lately. The book English Learners: Reaching the Highest
Level of English Literacy, edited by Gilbert G. Garcia (2003), is a useful
resource. As I looked at chapter four, written by Donald R. Bear, Shane
Templeton, Lori A. Helman, and Tamara Baren, I was able to glean (and would
like to share) a better understanding of orthographic development and its
implications for the support we give to our English Language Learners. As
educators, we may be better equipped if we understand how orthography propels
reading development and how word-study instruction can be a powerful practice
to increase literacy learning.
Understanding
the Layers of Orthography
Although
there are many different orthographies, most of them are composed of sound, pattern, and meaning, which are evolving
layers of information. A shallow or transparent orthography is one that is
highly regular in its sound-symbol correspondences, such as spelling in Spanish
or Italian. In these orthographies, it is easy to decode written words because
there are fewer sounds and a direct correspondence between sounds and letters.
A deep or opaque orthography, such as French or English, often includes a less
direct correspondence between letters and sounds. Chinese, which is also a deep
orthography, includes characters that represent morphemes, and they contain
sound, pattern, and meaning layers. Semitransparent orthographies, such as
German, are characterized somewhere between shallow and deep orthographies. According
to Rieben, Saada-Robert, & Moro, the progression within a student’s
literacy learning often takes place in stages or “phases of dominance” (as
cited in Garcia, 2003, p.73). Those reading and spelling stages are a
progression from sound to pattern to meaning, and may be broken down to include
the following: Emergent, Letter Name-Alphabetic, Within Word Pattern, Syllables
and Affixes, and Derivational Relations. If you have used Donald Bear’s or
Kathy Ganske’s developmental spelling inventories, you should be familiar with
these stages of spelling and reading.
I found
it interesting to consider the impact on development that a deeper or more
opaque orthography has. For instance, in English, patterns are examined earlier
and for a longer period of time than in more transparent orthographies, such as
Spanish. Where a character represents a single syllable, such as in Chinese,
young children may make the match between the sound and written symbol early
(around age 4). Within a shallow orthography, emergent readers and spellers may
appear more advanced because of their ability to track text and make a few
sound-symbol correspondences. We see faster reading rates among Spanish readers
because it is easier to read more words accurately within a shallow
orthography. However, reading with expression and building an extensive sight
vocabulary is more complicated.
How
Bilingualism Affects Development
It is
helpful for educators to have knowledge about the spoken and written languages
of their students in order to understand their development. The interaction between
spoken languages has an impact on what students hear and how they pronounce
words. For example, a teacher may hear the short i in hit, but to her
students, it may sound more like a long e
(as in heat). There are several
sounds in English that may be difficult for Spanish-speaking students to
pronounce. Those include /d/, /j/, /r/,
/v/, /z/, /sh/, /th/, /zh/, /ng/; beginning and ending with s, and ending sounds with r.
Knowing that it may be logical for the j as
in jump to be pronounced like chump, for example, can be helpful for
teachers. The good news, according to Tolchinsky & Teberosky (1998), is
that in comparative studies of orthographic knowledge, bilingual learners
negotiate between languages and literacies (as cited in Garcia, 2003, p. 75). Instead
of different orthographies causing confusion, learners apply their knowledge
about spelling and reading from one language to another. There are some
cognitive advantages to bilingualism in growing a stronger knowledge base with
respect to each language. In young children, the phonetic or sound quality of
words should be emphasized, as those phonological processes create a foundation
for reading.
Word Study Activities
In
order to develop a word-study program, it is recommended that a spelling inventory
be used to reveal what students know about English orthography and their
primary language. I’ve found useful spelling inventories in the publications: Words
Their Way: Word Study for Phonics, Vocabulary, and Spelling Instruction and
Word Journeys: Assessment-Guided Phonics, Spelling, and Vocabulary
Instruction. Words that can be spelled can also be read, so spelling
assessments reveal a measure of word reading or decoding. Bear, Templeton,
Helman, and Baren suggest engaging students in instructional activities of
sorting and charting to explore patterns and facilitate vocabulary development.
Emergent learners may explore and make distinctions through concept sorts,
using objects and pictures such as buttons, plastic animals, and macaroni
according to different criteria. They may play “Concentration” games, sort by
the way pictures or objects sound at the beginning, or by other criteria, such
as size. Later, sorts may become more abstract, with the purpose of examining
contrasting words with stress assignment, or words in the past tense. Beginning
charting experiences include shared opportunities for students to talk about
what they know, watch a teacher or another student model the writing, listen to
syllables, think about word parts, and use analogies to spell. They may build
webs together and may chart known words from around the world. These
experiences also broaden English-speaking students’ vocabulary and appreciation
of other languages. Collecting and charting interesting words and clarifying
meaning (through questioning, discussion, noticing relationships, and using a
dictionary or thesaurus) is a way older students may explore vocabulary as
well. Students may learn to make meaning connections between words for various
reasons. As they notice connections and relationships between words, they
understand more about the structure of words and are able to pose important
questions about word meaning. Word study is not a matter of naming rules, but
of discovering patterns. Physically manipulating words provides the active
process of construction to take learning beyond the verbal level, leading to
automaticity. Sorting and charting activities may be explored within content
area studies as well. Throughout all of these activities, it is important to
support English language learners with practices that use oral language to
bridge an understanding to the written.
Talk,
Talk, Talk!
It is
imperative to note the understanding that learning is a social process, and
that English language learners (along with all
of us) need multiple opportunities for discussion and interaction with others.
As we consider orthography and the acquisition of language, we also must
remember that while a student is able to decode or write a word, without
building meaning, the process is not truly reading. Although I am able to
“decode” text in Spanish, my understanding is quite limited. I have to agree
with Marie Clay’s assertion that “Reading is a message-making, problem-solving
activity, which increases in power and flexibility the more it is practiced”
(Clay, 1991). In order to build comprehension and engage students in making
meaning, much conversation needs to take place. “Dialogue seeks to harness the
‘collective intelligence’…of the people around you; together we are more aware
and smarter than we are on our own” (Isaacs, 1999, p.11). It is through purposeful talk with others
that we construct ideas and visions of possibility for ourselves and each
other. As we do this, we create that
habit of mind to think reflectively and critically, rather than passively
absorbing information in isolation. We know that new knowledge connects to
previous knowledge. As our English language learners synthesize by building on
oral language resources, background experiences, and literacy in other
languages, it is my hope that we, too, may create new understandings as we
strive to improve our practices to best support all of our learners.
References
Bear, D.R., Invernizzi, M., Templeton, S., & Johnston, F.R. (2000).
Words Their Way: Word Study for Phonics, Vocabulary, and Spelling
Instruction. Upper Saddle, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Clay, M. (1991). Becoming Literate: The Construction of Inner Control.
Heinemann.
Ganske, K. (2000). Word Journeys: Assessment-Guided Phonics, Spelling,
and Vocabulary Instruction. New York: The Guilford Press.
Garcia, G.G. (2003). English Learners: Reaching the Highest Level of English
Literacy. International Reading Association.
Isaacs, W. (1999). Dialogue: The Art of Thinking Together. New York: Random
House.
