SPELLING INSTRUCTION FOR STUDENTS WITH LEARNING-DISABILITIES - IMPLICATIONS FOR RESEARCH AND PRACTICE

We reviewed 27 published studies on spelling instruction for students with learning disabilities (LD) and coded them for the following varia bles: (a) student characteristics, (b) instructional activities, (c) n ature of materials to be learned, and (d) criterial tasks (Jenkins, 19 79). Most of the studies investigated the impact of instructional acti vities on the production of targeted spelling items by elementary-grad e students with LD. We interpret the results of this review as suggest ing that the following activities may enhance learning for some studen ts with LD: (a) limiting the number of new words introduced each day, (b) facilitating student-directed and peer-assisted instruction, (c) d irecting students to name letters aloud as they are practiced, (d) inc luding instruction in morphemic analysis, (e) providing immediate erro r imitation and correction, (f) using motivating reinforcers, and (g) providing periodic retesting and review. Only limited information is a vailable on interventions that promote generalization of spelling know ledge to untrained words, use of trained vocabulary in a variety of wr iting activities, and maintenance of vocubulary across time. We discus s current research issues and future research directions in spelling i nstruction for students with learning disabilities.