No link, but I saved the actual writeup...


DS9 was a pretty early reader, and his spelling is still phenomenal. DD11 is absolutely a top heavy visual learner, and hers is still pretty quirky. FWIW, DS is extremely visual too, but in a more balanced way. His reading speed has always been very high. DD11's is quoted as very high from the school, but pales in comparison.

Okay...this sort of goes in a different direction, but is worth sharing. Note it doesn't say that a child is necessarily gifted because of good spelling, but rather that most gifted children are indeed good spellers. Note too it's a very small sample size. FWIW, when I compare my own children, the poor speller is truly LD in that area.

From Miraca Gross's Exceptionally Gifted Children...

"Several of the children in this study have expressed their concern that, throughout their school career, taechers have repeatedly contrasted the maturity and richness of their vocabulary and the sophistication of their written language with a seeming immaturity in spelling....As can be seen (tables), the children all have spelling achievement levels which are considerably in advance of their chronological age."

It does go on, but the point I think is that teachers sometimes are harsher on smarter kids, because there is some level of asynchronous production here. I know I was harsher on the expectations I had for my daughter, who tested dead average in spelling. Dead average though is apparently MUCH lower than I ever expected, .

I think I lost track of what the original question was asking, but there are some more thoughts to ponder. While probably rare, I do feel that a child can have an almost Rainman like ability to spell well, without the higher level cognitive thinking.

Interestingly, the spelling subtest IS one of the three random achievement subtests that our district regularly uses to confirm IQ gifted findings, . It is NOT on the CTY approved list for signing up for their talent search.

(P.S...after googling the subject, I found myself right back here, LOL! So let's be profound for the next curious seeker!)

I can't promise profound...

I was an absolutely LOUSY speller as a kid, despite being GT and positively addicted to reading. In the big 5th grade spelling bee, I went out in the first round. No one could believe it, since I was the "smart one" in the class, especially verbally. The teacher actually gave me a second crack at the word because she figured I must have misheard her or something. It was very embarrassing.

To this day, I cannot spell a difficult word unless I can write the word down, and then I often make a mistake the first time. I do SEE the mistake as soon as it is on paper, but I need to use my eyes to catch it. I think I am a visual-verbal person, if there is such a creature, because I'm very visual but not spatial. (I'm beginning to suspect that might be what DS7 is, too, BTW.)

DS7 is very good at sounding words out, but his spelling tends to be phonetic, which is not always correct in the goofy English language. I wouldn't say he's a better speller than average. He does fine, but I don't think he spells things that other kids his age couldn't spell.

I suspect spelling is one of those odd obsessions kids might choose to have, as my son chose cars or Transformers. But NOT choosing spelling as an obsession doesn't necessarily mean a child isn't GT. I suspect the English language is so goofy that a child isn't likely to have a natural talent for spelling--at least not with very advanced words--without some study. But if the child studies spelling, that could indicate GTness.

No evidence, just anecdote...

This is the what I read: "Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe."

It looks like it's a misinterpretation of some research that was done previously, there's an interesting discussion of what the research actually says at http://www.mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk/~mattd/Cmabrigde/ I'm sorry I referenced this without checking it out!

Even if the references in the article aren't correct, I still suspect that being a good speller might be helped by being a careful reader (which my DS6 isn't, he's fast and has good comprehension, but not careful).

ETA: Dottie and Kriston got in while I was writing this (it's one of those mornings, lol)!

I just went back and looked at DS6's achievement scores and interestingly his spelling is exactly a year below comprehension and 2.5 years below word decoding, yet still 2 years above age level. So, maybe I'm doing just what the article Dottie referenced was talking about- penalizing him because his spelling isn't at his reading level instead of giving him credit for being well above age level.

I also wonder about spelling in tests vs. spelling in actual work. I know perfectly well the difference between there, their, and they're and can get them right all the time on a test. But when I look back on my posts here, I see that I have used them wrong more than once. I am sure that I am so caught up in my profound thoughts that the edit function of the brain takes a back seat. My fingers are just typing the sounds I am hearing in my head and my higher brain is working on the idea and there is no part of my brain that is left to make sure I follow the rules.

I see DS doing this all the time in the stories he writes. When you have a kid trying to work out a big intersting idea and his fingers aren't keeping up with his brain anyway, it seems unfair to also ask him to stop and review spelling. It's just an obstacle to the writing process. If the work ever goes from a rough to a final draft that is when you get a chance to think about the spelling.

I absolutely agree there ACS, and doubly appreciate your profound excuse for my own misspellings, . I love how you worded that.

Different brains can "multi-task" in different ways, too. When DD11 is writing ALL thoughts of spelling leave the area, but DS9 can still manage both. DD11's writing is more engaged though, while DS9 is more formulaic. Different brains, both quite gifted, though in very different ways.

Ditto on the average situation, LOL! I have always been fascinated by spelling because it doesn't seem to have a clear connection to GT. I suspect there's a high % of great spellers who are GT, but I know oodles of amazing GT people who spell poorly.

I have one kid who can spell most anything and virtually never makes any mistakes. I have no idea of level, but even in K, he once saw the spelling bee on TV and wanted to play at home. He kept yelling at me for giving him words that are too easy. He really is remarkable and I'd guess he spelled better than most adults by 6 or so. He was an early reader, but not my earliest. He is definitely detail oriented and has a phenomenal memory. I think he spells well due to the memory. If he's seen it, he can spell it.

Another DS read early, but isn't nearly as detail oriented. He spells well, but makes some typical mistakes -- failing to double a letter, or ending something with "or" when it's "er" kind of thing. I'd guess he's at least a few grade levels up, but it's not the natural, effortless spelling of my other DS.

And finally, there's DD who tests GT but cannot spell. It's taken me some time to figure out that all kids don't remember any word they've read and that can be "normal" but I also think DD may have an LD because it seems quite hard for her. She certainly gets words right on a spelling test, but her natural spelling is mostly phonetic and she literally has to memorize every invididual word, with effort, to learn to spell it. She learned to read the same way -- with phonics, effort, and memorizing word by word as it was taught in K, whereas the DSs just seemed to know how one day. I keep trying to figure out if that's a different LOG, an LD, or just my own DD's individual quirks.

Wiw, tiis is so cuil! I usid to wijkir if I wes smuwt! I ciond riad thit, so I midt be! Yiy!

This is me too -- DS spells absolutely at dead average for his age, but that's nothing like being able to spell what he writes! Argh! And it isn't exactly his most favorite thing to work on (nor mine...) so we aren't as consistent with it as other things.

One suspicion I have about spelling as a marker for giftedness is that I think it's one of those things that responds to experience/ practice. So you'll get more distinction between a kid who has worked on it than one who hasn't, or between one who has been presented an approach that works for him vs. one that doesn't, rather than strictly based on ability. And then it's likely affected by all kinds of LDs, just to complicate things! So while I'd say early spelling is definitely a "plus" it's not quite diagnostic. If you know that the ability is (relatively) spontaneous then I think it probably is an indicator, but for the purposes of norming tests and making generalizations, they can't really distinguish the gifted speller from the well-trained speller.