earticle

영어

Spelling is a complicated skill, which is difficult to acquire even for native language learners. During the early stages of learning to read, children use various orthographic strategies to spell and their spellings show different developmental characteristics. This present study examines Korean elementary school students" English spelling. This is a cross-sectional study: three hundred and fifty seven students" spelling data was collected from 4th, 5th and 6th grade students and analyzed for comparison from the developmental spelling view. The data was analyzed into two categories: accuracy of spelling at each grade and the children"s invented spellings. Results showed that the EFL children"s spellings have developmental features similar to native language learners or ESL learners. The fourth graders omitted vowels and substituted letter names instead of short vowels. As the grades increase, the salient features of spelling were changed; whereas the fourth graders showed low level achievement in CVVC words, the six graders" spelling presented increased achievement in the same category. However, they have different aspects in detail, e.g. Korean learners acquire diphthongs earlier than CVck, which is unusual compared to the native English learners. Finally, a conclusion was drawn from the data and instructional suggestions are provided.