Introduction to special issue on spelling

Abstract

This special issue of Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal focuses on one important aspect of writing, spelling. Just as one cannot be a fluent reader if one has to laboriously sound out each word, so one cannot be a fluent writer if one must puzzle over each spelling. Learning to spell accurately and automatically is an important part of learning to read and write, and brings with it valuable experience in analyzing the sounds and meanings of language. Despite the importance of writing and spelling, there has been less research on these topics than there has on reading. For example, research articles in psychological journals have many more references to ‘reading’ (a total of 18,359 from 1974 to early 1997, according to a PsycLit search) than to either ‘writing’ (5,140) or ‘spelling’ (1,993). The purpose of this special issue is to refocus our attention on spelling as an important linguistic skill.