Summary
One of the fundamental objectives, not only in the Cuban educational system, but in any country, has been aimed at achieving in students an adequate command of the Mother Tongue, which is promoted by the development of language and communication sciences that in general, they instill in him a communicative character as he had never had before. Spelling is one of the language disciplines, due to its importance, a significant space is devoted to exercise. One of the aspects that today is holding back the successful academic training of schoolchildren, is that related to accentuation, a question addressed by different authors, which currently within the direction of the teaching and learning process has not had the required response.
The research is aimed at the instrumentation of an exercise system with the objective of contributing to the development of spelling skills with an emphasis on the accentuation of the acute, plain and esdrújulas words in the fourth grade students of the Pedro Hernández Seminternado. It is structured in two chapters. Different methods were used to obtain the results: an intentional non-probabilistic diagnosis was applied, interviews, surveys, pedagogical test. Within the theoretical methods, analysis and synthesis, induction-deduction, historical-logical and statistical methods, which allowed, among other issues, to analyze the information and draw conclusions and recommendations. The system allowed to substantially improve the results of the schoolchildren, in the Spelling,demonstrating the scientific-pedagogical nature of it.
Introduction
In our country, for years, research has been carried out, which has included educators and teachers who have, in fact, been active collaborators who have enriched their experience, have made valuable contributions to the research itself, and have understood that only through the research it is possible to obtain good results to guide your pedagogical work scientifically.
They have shown that when this is accomplished, students are able to act independently, to understand more deeply their role as a student and then as a worker in general. It is important to note that to become a research teacher or professor, further research interest is required. The scientific character implies taking sides for scientific truth and its humanistic use, responding to an ideology, which is the Marxist-Leninist conception. Thus, the scientific and the ideological form a dialectical unit, which supports the entire process of education of multilaterally developed personalities.
The illustrious Cuban pedagogue Enrique José Varona expressed: “The teacher must know the research methods, to teach how to apply them, because man is a perpetual researcher, conscious or unconscious. Knowing is as basic a need as nurturing. " (Enrique José Varona)
The cultural-historical approach to psychology, pedagogy offers a profound explanation about the great possibilities of the educability of man, thus constituting a theory of psychic development, closely related to the educational process, and which can be described as optimistic and responsible.
Therefore, the teacher has a leading role, he has the honorable, responsible state task of the formation and communist education of the new generation and that is why the fundamental objective of the teacher's pedagogical activity is to provide the students with knowledge, based on the essential objective of communist education, "Comprehensive general formation".
It is considered that the class as a fundamental cell of the educational teaching process must be the starting point to achieve the integral development of our students.
The work carried out by the teacher is mainly aimed at eradicating the insufficiencies that students have in the direction of learning at a high scientific level.
Regarding the direction of learning in our center, difficulties have been detected fundamentally in the Spanish Language subject, specifically in spelling skills, seen in inspections carried out, in joint methodological training visits, observations to classes, applied instruments and student sources. the achievement of this work, there is a faculty of teachers who have Programs, Methodological Orientations, the Editorial Freedom Program, Audiovisual Programs (Computers, Videos, TV), bibliographies, and research works carried out by different authors. Despite the existence of diverse and in-depth studies on the work of spelling, not all teachers are prepared from a theoretical and methodological point of view, the new technology is not fully exploited,spelling is not worked in the other subjects of the degree study programs in a coherent way, bibliographies that can enrich the content are not systematically consulted. Priority as a methodological work objective given by the management structures is insufficient, which causes an unsystematic treatment.
According to the author of this research, the Spanish Language subject is one of the prioritized subjects within the study programs, and that spelling is one of its vital components for the development of our Mother Tongue, where it cannot be maintained. regardless of the criteria related to developer learning, nor of what is related to this cognitive-communicative approach. Whichever functional component predominates in a class, it is always possible to treat the content and spelling skills. Spelling is a slow and difficult training skill where it is necessary to insert what has been called a developer learning, through which the student assimilates learning tools,a strategic thinking style and prepare to "learn to learn". This conception of teaching-learning, based on the assimilation of strategy, is based on the Vigostskian postulates.
Development
Historical sketch of the Spanish spelling
Our current alphabet consists of 27 letters to represent 24 phonemes. This alphabet has undergone modifications long before 1994 at the X Congress of the Academy of the Spanish Language.
But the spelling of the Spanish Language, including its alphabet, was not from its beginnings as we know it today. The modern spelling of Spanish, based on mixed criteria where the etymological and the pronunciation alternate, is the product of a long historical process.
Despite numerous attempts by grammarians to unify Spanish before the creation of the Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) in 1717, there were many and frequent spelling confusions, which are still recorded in the works of the Spanish classics of the 16th centuries and XVII. The use of mon before b and p was hesitant, the use of m before another m, among other examples.
The evolution of the spelling accent was quite slow. Texts from the 16th and 17th centuries can be read without a single tick, and in others we find whimsically accented spelling words. The academy developed rules about it that not everyone followed. It was in the 19th century when a general agreement was reached. Most of the rules currently in use were cast at this institution in 1884, the removal of the tilde in the preposition a and in the conjunctions e, or, u was promulgated in 1911, in monosyllables in 1952.
The use of the capital letter also had great fluctuations until arriving at the present ones, already quite simple. It can be seen in the earliest writers that there was no fixed rule regarding the use of punctuation. There are documents from the 16th century that do not have a single sign.
American writers and scholars made important proposals to reform the spelling of the Spanish Language, some of them have been accepted by the academy. Among those personalities are the Venezuelan Andrés Bello and the Cubans Felipe Poey and Esteban Ricardo.
Contrary to what many people think, the Royal Spanish Academy has developed since its foundation a commendable work of spelling significance. The orthographic reforms are made after extensive consultation with all the academies since 1951, these corresponding academies of the Royal Spanish Academy hold successive congresses in which important agreements are adopted that make it possible to fix and defend the language, and a rational significance of its orthography.
Just started the second half of the 20th century, the illustrious Spanish lexicographer Julio Casares, then perpetual secretary of the Royal Spanish Academy, presented a report to the RA E board that served as the basis for legislating its new regulations
Prosody and Spelling effective on a mandatory basis on September 1, 1952, and mandatory application from January 1, 1959.
One of the spelling modifications and innovations was made in the accentuation, where the spelling accents of the monosyllables were removed was, I went, gave, saw and it was advised not to brand the adverb alone, nor the demonstrative pronouns this, that, that and its plurals if there is no amphibology in its use.
In the latest editions of the spelling published in November 1999, the RA E made significant modifications to the Spanish spelling. A slight analysis of the academic rules shows that they are not systematized according to a particular linguistic criterion, which is why the exceptions and the mixture of heterogeneous elements abound in the same statement.
Correctly writing the signs that conventionally represent the sounds of the language is a highly debated issue at the present time, since correct writing allows the graphic use that corresponds to our code.
Spelling motivation and awareness
Throughout the history of pedagogy, the so-called problem of orthographic awareness has been widely carried and brought up. All the pedagogues who have devoted themselves to the teaching of spelling have referred in one way or another to this question; however, few and sporadic examples of its existence have been given in school practice.
To speak of orthographic consciousness, one must necessarily refer to consciousness, a term of which, according to the Oxford dictionary (Moreno, 1998), there are six definitions:
-conscience as shared knowledge, consciousness as realizing something and consciousness as self-consciousness; consciousness as knowledge that is acquired in society, in social interaction and consciousness as knowledge of one's cognitive possibilities, in addition to consciousness as responsibility and moral commitment to the task.
"This implies that the student will have to face not only a wealth of orthographic knowledge, but he will also have to know and develop his mental processes in a conscious way, in other words, he will have to" learn to learn "spelling and he will have to do it in a process of social interaction and with the disposition to contribute responsibly ”. (Marero 1998).
The author fully agrees with the author since the student must know in order to develop their mental processes, where they must interact in a conscious way, to learn to learn.
For this reason, it is not enough for the teacher to give an attractive class, capable of arousing the student's interest at a given moment, nor for it to reward in any way the successes achieved: the interest should be related to the creation of intrinsic motives that they start from the knowledge of the own deficiencies and needs, and from the knowledge of the development of the own cognitive processes and their potentialities ”. "Motivation can be seen as a requirement, a precondition for learning. Without motivation there is no learning ”, (Pozo, 1998), but for the student to feel motivated by learning content that has usually been worked on in as uninteresting a way as those of spelling, the first thing is to alternate the selection of texts; introduce variety of exercises and games;achieve the communicative orientation of the tasks; insist on the responsibility and protagonism of the students in their own learning and that of their peers; and give real validity to cooperation in the construction of knowledge, among other important elements. According to Claxton (1984), motivating is "changing a person's properties". (Pozo, 1998) and this is not just a problem for schoolchildren; it is, above all, a problem for teachers.1998) and this is not just a problem for schoolchildren; it is, above all, a problem for teachers.1998) and this is not just a problem for schoolchildren; it is, above all, a problem for teachers.
According to Bruner, "playing for the child and for the adult is a way of using the mind (…) it is a greenhouse in which to combine thought, language and fantasy".
These conditions are specified in two basic considerations that in turn are interrelated:
The orthographic evaluation must give a term to overcome the deficiencies and in the meantime, progress will be evaluated.
Failure marks schoolchildren; if the student does not advance, if her results do not meet her personal and social expectations, her motivation, her self-esteem and her self-concept will be affected and even future results will be compromised.
When adequate connections are established, these are so difficult that the student can always know if he is in error or not and, if necessary, know how to correct it.
As suitable factors for the motivation of the teaching of spelling we can point out:
The desire of mastery of the subjects by the student.
The desire for stimulation, which can take two forms:
- individual (self-stimulation) collective (emulation with other grades or schools)
It has been proven that when the student knows the result of his work, he stimulates himself and multiplies his efforts towards the objective:
Master the subject of study.
Francisco Alvero Francés in his preparatory shorts "The essential in spelling" refers to the fact that the student cannot be a passive but an active lens; that is to say that it is required that the exercise, not only of the rules which should not be extensive or be learned mechanically without the proper understanding of it, must control the development of the student with respect to them systematically.
The author assumes the author's criteria since the application of the orthographic rules requires sufficient previous exercises that allow the careful observation of the particular cases and the indication of what they have in common regarding the graphic form; that is, that the inductive route be used to arrive at the formulation of the general conclusions, in which the elements that constitute the rule in question are present. This must arise by itself and its formulation must be made by the students.
But it does not end there, if it is a starting point to apply them deductively to new situations, it is therefore necessary to verify the validity of the spelling rule in numerous similar cases, in addition to the considerations of the exceptions, being you are systematically controlled.
Problems facing the teaching of spelling at school
"Orthography is a necessary field of reflection… the gaps in its systematization and the failures in its teaching require urgent didactic contributions" (Linares 1974). That is why the teaching of orthography needs to be attended to quickly and for this it is necessary from the application of various methods and procedures to work systematically with the achievement of sensory perceptions with a systematic, preventive, incidental and corrective character.
For this reason, the work of the mother tongue and primarily of the orthographic knowledge is an essential element, starting from its importance if we take into account what was expressed by the eminent Spanish teacher Francisco Alvero Francés, when he said “it is good to speak well, better, much better, to speak and write well ”. Spelling, according to him, is the part of grammar that teaches how to write correctly through the correct use of letters and auxiliary signs of writing. This conception is endorsed by the RAE
It is considered that to write well one learns, of course, and in this, the school plays a fundamental role, it is not a day's work nor does it follow a school year, much less a specific education, but if it is attended accordingly it is possible to achieve in Students have an attitude that allows them to express their ideas and if they do so in writing, they can apply spelling knowledge and skills. At the moment, work is being done so that the students fix the correct writing of the words, that is to say that the work has a markedly preventive character.
“Speakers of different languages can easily identify the words, the points of view by which they are analyzed are not very precise. An attempt has been made to prove the existence of words based on criteria of accent, separability, meaning ”(Ortega, E. 1991)
Despite the theoretical difficulties involved in the identification of words, there is no doubt that they are fundamentally linked in the language system, it has been and continues to be favorite subjects of writers and linguists, the study of the origin, development and meaning of words., for its importance in the formation and expression of concepts, its evocative power and the thousand moods that are reflected in it.
Spelling is a highly complex area of language, yet it goes beyond the limits of the linguistic sphere as an object of study of a particular science to break into the school environment given its relevance as a communication tool.
The school has to face two large groups of problems or difficulties, those of the spelling itself and those usually presented by the students.
According to Osvaldo Balmaceda the spelling, he stumbles upon
- The arbitrariness of the written notation system with respect to the oral system. The contradictory nature of many spelling rules, most of which require complementary grammatical knowledge to be assimilated. The rules for accentuation are many and with numerous exceptions to be recognized, remembered and applied without difficulty. The temporary nature of the spelling rules. The configuration of the letters with which the student must operate to read and write are different.
This last difficulty, although related to calligraphy, should not be underestimated.
For their part, students may manifest: little interest in spelling, insufficient linguistic or grammatical competence that prevents them from massive access to the spelling of words, they suffer from psychological disorders that are reflected in their ability to focus attention on the processes of memory or perception, or having physical or neurophysiological defects that affect their auditory, visual or motor capacities, in this regard, Gaddes distinguishes five different types of heterographs depending on the conditioning neurophysiological deficit.
- For language deficit. For visoperceptive dysfunction. For hearing problems. For expressive motor disturbances. For combinations of two or more factors.
Other no less important factors are related to the development of the teaching process itself (those that would constitute a third group): functionality of the programs, teacher stability, quality, availability and use of teaching materials (texts, dictionaries, records and other resources), pedagogical mastery, mastery and updating of spelling and its particular didactics by the mother tongue teacher, the probable contribution of the rest of the pedagogical group, and the long-standing trend to homogenize orthographic teaching without attending to the heterogeneous nature of learning.
From all of the above, it follows that achieving the solid acquisition of spelling skills is only viable through a complex conscious and directed activity, in which various elements intervene.
The importance of orthographic knowledge is given in the role it plays in the reading and writing processes, in the first with a passive character, in the ability to remember and recognize the signs of the system and relate them to the linguistic elements they represent. In writing, with an active character, in the reproduction of graphic signs, which involves the act of writing of your thinking (self-dictated) or the thought of others (dictated or copied).
The objectives and content of school spelling
The objectives
The objectives determine the content, which manifests itself from the study plan to the class plan. ”The objectives are (…) the purposes and aspirations that during the teaching process are shaped in the way of thinking, feeling and acting of the student. (Álvarez de Zayas, Carlos M)
The objectives are the starting point to structure the content, methods and organizational forms of teaching, which guide the work of teachers and students in the process and allow evaluating its effectiveness by evaluating the results. As the transformations that must be achieved in the students, it is important to know how to formulate them.
Summarizing the criteria of various authors dedicated to the teaching of Spelling, the objectives that can be observed most frequently are:
- Facilitate the learning of the correct spelling of a nucleus of frequently used words, as well as the proper use of punctuation marks. Know the most general spelling rules of the language to enable the correct spelling of a large number of words. Provide methods and techniques for studying new words. Develop interest and desire to write correctly. Get into the habit of checking what is written. Use the dictionary appropriately and create the habit of consulting it frequently.
In the formulation of these objectives some of the central problems that are currently presented are reflected, of which we point out:
- The content of teaching objectives. The hierarchy and classification of objectives.
In order to elaborate and hierarchize the objectives of the teaching of Spelling, it is appropriate to take into account the types of skills and habits that are linked to knowledge, so that the formulation of the objective is precisely the determination of the skill that is you want to achieve. That is why we rely on the work of Nina Talízina, who suggests stating the objectives in a language of skills, since all skills are linked to the solution of specific tasks. According to this author, "when we use the language of skills we can select the knowledge we need." (Talízina, Nina)
But the levels of assimilation, depth and systematization must also be determined, achieving that in each objective the level of assimilation (knowledge and skills) that is intended to be achieved is made explicit. Accordingly, an adequate classification of the objectives would correspond to the following levels:
Familiarize: Students assimilate knowledge through the identification and distinction of words and signs, definitions, etc.
Reproduction: The students, through the reproduction of the phenomena studied, orally and in writing fundamentally assimilate the knowledge, have the possibility of analyzing their properties with the help of simple intellectual operations.
Apply: Students assimilate knowledge through the applications of a model, through complex, productive and problem-solving intellectual operations.
The actions that students must take to master the implicit knowledge in the formulation of objectives are displayed in the tasks, whose execution guarantees knowledge. In this regard, Talízina points out: "you cannot speak of knowledge without analyzing the skill, the knowledge that accompanies it, because as a rule concepts are not taught so that they can work with them". (Talízina, Nina)
The formulation of the objectives by levels, in the form of tasks, allows the teacher to establish relationships with other components of the process according to the degree of linguistic development of the student and give it greater dynamism and practicality to the teaching-learning process. This modality confers a true guiding role to the objectives, both for the teacher and for the student.
The objectives of the teaching of Spelling, formulated as teaching tasks, could be grouped by levels:
First Level: The student recognizes the concepts, basic and basic spelling rules, reproductively.
Second Level: Establish relationships between concepts and elementary rules based on applying them to a given situation. This involves a more complex cognitive process with a high level of reflection and a critical position, where the student must adjust to the diverse conditions that respond to the different topics of the language.
Third Level: You must recognize and contextualize the problem situation, you must adjust to different conditions, identify components and interrelationships, and also establish the solution strategy. This supposes of a more productive activity.
The author agrees with the author that in order to achieve the objectives of the teaching of Spelling, the exercises must pass through the three levels.
The content:
Much has been discussed about what to teach when it comes to Spelling. The most common thing is that the teacher is faced with an unfathomable aspect of words or as it has been said very graphically: "a jungle tangled with words", a group of students with unequal difficulties and a time limited by the duration of the course.
The criterion of adapting the spelling content to the needs of the students is considered, distinguishing the advantaged student from the one who has severe needs or from those who have slight ones so as not to spend time on spelling contents that are already mastered.
To determine the content, other learning related to language proficiency will also have to be taken into account.
To provide an adequate spelling command of the language, the content must include:
- The study of rules related to the entire Spanish spelling system, so that it favors the writing of a large group of words of important use value, including their graphic accentuation, as well as the use of capital letters and punctuation marks. The acquisition of procedures that facilitate fixing the graphic image of a significant nucleus of words not subject to rules, which are part of everyday vocabulary, as well as the resources that enable the proper use of punctuation marks. habits and skills that favor writing in accordance with the rules for the use of Spanish spelling. The development of spelling awareness, or what is the same,the habit of reviewing everything that is written and the interest in producing texts in compliance with current spelling rules. The ideal use of reference materials, such as dictionaries, glossaries, records, grammar summaries, etc.
It will be necessary to give the content an organization that allows it to be structured in a way that is affordable for the age and level of the students, but with much more emphasis on the process by which the student develops spelling knowledge than on the result of its appropriation, although This is an important element to consider.
The design by letters and signs follows a normative principle, in this, the declaration of the contents is made according to the statements of the spelling rules, so in fact this type of organization fosters a teaching based on the rules. Disadvantage is given in the contents that are taught independently and unrelated to each other, so that when each subject is concluded, if the teacher is not cautious, he usually does not go to him again, it is not possible to print a systematic character.
Spelling must have an objective and subjective motivation. Objective because the object of study must be attractive; and subjective, because the student must feel the need to learn. This "attractive character" is not only found in the orthographic content but also in the form, which is given in the organization and structuring of the teaching material.
For this purpose, we conceived a different structuring of the content referring to the spelling of the letter and that of the accent, based on five directions that, without losing their identity, as a whole turn out to be more effective than each one separately, so they constitute a complex and harmonious system.
The Methods for the teaching of orthography: an arid, monotonous, schematic and useless image that has long prevailed in Orthography, is due, in good measure, to the methods used in its teaching, very similar to medieval dogmatists, They have been characterized, in general, by leaning towards mechanical memorization, rather than to stimulate interest in knowing, and to awaken the spirit of inquiry in students, so necessary to master any sphere of knowledge and essential in the case of Orthography.
Currently, with the predominance of a communicative approach and comprehensive methods of teaching and learning languages, the discrete elements of the language (phonology-phonetics, vocabulary, spelling, etc.) receive little attention: It is thought that All these linguistic components are learned globally and integrated in acts of oral and written communication.
From the social point of view, spelling is one more indicator of the cultural and academic level of the subjects. Good spelling is generally associated with a good level of reading and writing. Although from a psychological point of view, it also depends on a good visual memory.
Another problem that manifests itself in the use of methods when spelling is taught or practiced is divorce with the other components of the process. Using methods without taking into account the proposed objectives, content or development achieved by the student is a fairly common feature in classes aimed at teaching the correct writing of the language.
For example, the expository method, in which the word of the teacher prevails and a certain passive attitude of the student- adopting one of the numerous classifications of methods- although it can be used in the teaching of Spelling, to explain or illustrate a phenomenon in In particular, however, it is not the ideal one to illustrate it with the frequency with which it is observed - much more desired - given the character of the objectives and the content of this subject.
Also many teachers invariably use a single path, the same for exercising, as for imparting new content or evaluating performance, favoring monotony, forgetting that spelling must be given life and color; José Martí bequeathed us a wise recommendation: "variety must be a law in the teaching of dry matter".
In the teaching-learning pairing of orthography, analysis, synthesis, problem solving, cognitive independence must dominate, without undermining the teacher-student and student-student interrelation; in short, methods that contribute to achieving that dynamism that tends to activity and an attraction to matter that content alone does not achieve.
Spelling, it is true, can be taught through general methods, but there are particular ones, specific to the subject, which allow organizing the learning activity of students in a more efficient way.
These methods must be combined. A single method will never be enough to achieve a better efficiency of the teaching work of the students.
The teaching method is constituted by a system of actions consciously structured by the teacher to organize and direct the student's cognitive and practical activity, in order to ensure the assimilation of knowledge and the development of habits and skills.
Sensory methods
Traditionally, the methods for the teaching of Spelling have been classified according to the participation of the sensory organs involved in the assimilation of the content:
- The sight and the hand: viso-motor. The sight, the ear and the hand: viso-audio-motor.
Viso-motor method
With the copy the agreement of the graphic image of the word can be reinforced by using two routes simultaneously: the visual and the muscular.
We do not underestimate the importance of the repetition and transcription of the characters that make up the words- as an indispensable condition to achieve the automation of a skill-; However, it is convenient to clarify that it is not only the repeated action of copying isolated words that allows one to acquire spelling skills. The ability to retain and reproduce the graphic image of words is acquired by the conjunction of many different factors in which these actions only occupy a place.
The copy exercises should not be reduced to the mechanization of the visomuscular act, since in all spelling exercises, as we will see in detail later, attention and memory processes must be present, as well as reflective and affective intellectual activity.
A copy based on the study of spelling vocabulary, knowledge of the meaning of words and the meaning of the text in which they are inserted, constitutes one of the most effective forms of didactic spelling.
Audiomotor method: Dictation
The systematic application of dictations encourages the development of auditory perception of words, and therefore phonetic differentiation, including tone, pauses, accents. Dictation also favors the association of sound and graphic images, which contributes to improving the muscular, auditory and visual memory of words.
The dictation process implies revision, self-correction, analysis, synthesis and reading comprehension; therefore these exercises, as already pointed out for the copy, must:
- prepare carefully (which is equivalent to keeping in mind the quality of the text to be dictated, its correspondence with the purposes pursued - exercising is not the same as checking - degree of complexity, etc.) be done with an appropriate procedure. be reviewed immediately. conclude with exercises corrective.
Dictation energizes the student's activity and forces him to practice three of the four basic language skills: listening, reading, and writing.
There are two large groups of dictations: preventive and corrective, whose function is to teach spelling, avoid possible errors or correct defects, widely used in the exercise and consolidation of correct language writing, and control, used to check the quality and solidity of the assimilation of the students' knowledge and skills.
Dictations designed as exercises to learn and practice spelling knowledge can take various forms.
This method, well used, guarantees the quality of the preventive work that must be carried out, appropriately employing the different types of dictation: visual, oral and visual, explanatory, without writing, selective, free, self-dictation, memory, among others.
Viso-audio-gnostic-motor method.
We have already discussed this method. Its advantage is that, unlike the previous ones, it incorporates the epistemological component. As appreciated, it is the way aimed at learning the structure of the word, preferably those not subject to rules.
This method is based on visual observation and its simultaneity with auditory, motor and articulation impressions; This requires the student to see, hear, understand and write the words.
Reproductive methods
They use them more frequently for learning the standards. Most students believe that by learning the rules by heart, they will be able to write the words without mistakes, this is an idea that the teacher should help to reject. Her knowledge, however, contributes to generalize the correct writing of words that enter a certain graphic system (morphological, analog, etc.) or to the use of punctuation marks or the placement of tildes.
It should be clear that the objective will never be the recitation of the rules, but the writing of the words and the use of signs according to the rules of the Academy, therefore the rule is not an end, but a means. It should be reached, preferably, by analyzing the particular to the general. The rules will not be many and especially didactic. First, those without exception, then those with few. The rules with many exceptions are of little use due to the infrequentity of the cases that appear.
Learning the spelling rule requires a lot of exercise, so that it is internalized. This method should not be magnified, but it should not be ignored either, since it constitutes an important didactic resource, conducive to analysis and synthesis, generalization and abstraction.
Linguistic analysis methods
They can be referred to the level of the phrase, the syntactic, the phonological or the morphological.
The spelling, the cacography, the delimitation of words.
Other methods:
Freelance work
The application of the independent work modality in the teaching of Spelling allows to organize the spelling content with respect to a specific objective, equip the student with the necessary skills to solve certain spelling problems, educate them on the need for improvement and guide them in the search of new information by itself. This method saves time in the acquisition and solidity of learning, optimizes the functions of the teacher and the student and directly addresses individual differences.
Heuristic or problem methods
They are based on providing solutions to different problem situations or to problems themselves, presented with a didactic purpose. They allow the consolidation and application of knowledge, concepts and skills. Through spelling problems you can expand the vocabulary and influence the fixation of the structure of words.
Spelling learning assessment
When the evaluation is carried out in an efficient way, the study and the detection work are stimulated, correction of the errors becomes more productive.
Through control, useful information is obtained and processed that enables decisions to be made regarding the development of the teaching-learning process to obtain better performance.
The evaluation of spelling activity turns out to be one of the main elements of its didactics, due to its relevant role in habit formation.
It encompasses the teacher's control as well as the student's self-control, and since it allows diagnosing problems, recognizing progress or setbacks at work, it must necessarily be systematic, varied and timely.
For these reasons, the diagnosis must be carried out at different times, in a continuous and comprehensive manner, including not only teaching achievement, but also the attitude towards knowledge. The pedagogical process is that educational process where the relationship between education, instruction, teaching and learning is revealed, aimed at the development of the student's personality for their preparation for life. Where it is necessary to identify the characteristics of the student, the family and the communities with which they interact and where they receive multiple influences. There are spontaneous or unscientific ways of doing this, but they must be rigorously integrated with what has been achieved by scientific methods. We should never wait to meet them "on the go".Scientific and early diagnosis allows us the true direction of the educational teaching process.
The educational orientation must contribute to such compensation leading to success in the child's development. The diagnosis provides the summary, the synthesis of the characteristics of the students and the group, in correspondence with the tasks of the age. Our proposal also includes a scale, but unlike the ones presented, it is structured in four qualitative levels. These levels refer to the stability and quality of the actions, as well as their degree of speed and automation.
Scale for the qualitative assessment of spelling competence
Scale for the qualitative assessment of spelling competence
These levels refer to the stability and quality of the actions, as well as their degree of speed and automation.
Counting and averaging errors, alone, does not allow an effective diagnosis of the spelling competence of our students; it is necessary to find ways that allow a more qualitative analysis of learning.
Evaluating the spelling based on the interpretation of errors, and the determination in weighted levels of the state of development of skills in a way that allows us to appreciate the stability and quality of the actions, as well as their degree of speed and automation, is one way viable to access more personalized orthographic teaching, which goes beyond traditional procedures based on eminently qualitative measurements.
Corrective work is derived from control, which requires time and effort on the part of the teacher and the student. The individualization of teaching is a peculiar feature of this work, which requires careful attention and interpretation of the results of the different measurements that are made.
The dissemination of these results becomes an insuperable means to encourage learning; For them, the so-called orthographic profiles are very useful, with which the orthographic growth or decrease of the study group or each student can be statistically recorded in a graphical way and much more striking than with other methods.
These spelling profiles not only allow us to report showing at a glance whether there are advances or setbacks in learning; they are also convenient to interpret and derive from them the necessary work.
The accent
Despite the theoretical difficulties involved in the identification of words, there is no doubt that they are fundamentally united in the language system. It has been and continues to be favorite topics of writers and linguists, the study of the origin, development and meaning of words, for its importance in the formation and expression of concepts, its evocative power and the thousand moods that are reflected in it.
The accent is four physical qualities of sound: tone, timbre, quantity and intensity. It also constitutes those qualities, elements of the accent of the word.
The characterizing and constant element of modern languages, for both the speaker and the listener is the intensive accent. (Ortega. 1991)
The intensive accent according to Dr. Evangelina Ortega is the greatest expiratory force with which one of the syllables is pronounced within a word. It is an acoustic-articulatory phenomenon. It is perceived when a word is pronounced.
While the student is not able to recognize this accent, it is difficult to learn to accentuate with the graphic accent that represents it in certain cases.
This accent determines the meaning of some words, for example army-army –exercised.
In the vast majority of the words of our language there is an accent of intensity, with the exception of the adverbs ending in mind they have two. The syllable that is pronounced with a greater amplitude of the vibratory wave, that is, the one that has an intensity accent, is characterized by greater articulatory energy, tension and opening of the vowel, loudness and perceptibility.
Words that have an intensity accent are tonic. The words are lacking in articulatory energy and are supported by the intensity accent of the word that precedes or follows, for example, Mom's house.
It is considered that in primary education, when working on the accent, prosodic and orthographic must be done from two points of view, since intensity is one of the elements that contributes to forming the phonetic accent.
Phonetic accent: It constitutes four elements of sound: tone, timbre, quantity and intensity, which are combined in a special way not only in each language, but in the various regions and localities of the country.
Prosodic accent: It is a reinforcement of the expiratory intensity that highlights one syllable from the others, to be considered as one of the safest springs when it comes to speaking with beauty and elegance.
Tomás Navarro in his manual of Spanish pronunciation, states: "The intensity is manifested in the language by successive movements of increase and decrease in correspondence with variations in energy with which the expiratory impulse develops."
The Spanish ear is obviously more sensitive to changes in the intensity accent than to other phonic elements.
The book Remedial Spelling and Accentuation by Reinaldo Acosta Medina, proposes that whoever intends to accentuate from a graphic point of view, must know how to read well and know how to distinguish homographic voices (the same writing) that differ in their meaning due to the place occupied by the tonic syllable.. (Medina, 1990)
Rafael Seco in 1995 in his Grammar Manual defines accentuation in the following way: “That greater intensity with which a syllable is pronounced in a word is called an accent and the tonic syllable is the one in which the accent is found. Non-stressed syllables are called unstressed. "
From the philosophical point of view accentuate a stressed syllable such as, acute, flat, esdrújulas and sobreesdrújulas. Sometimes we point to the stressed syllable by marking it with a sign (´): orthographic accent. The accent sign, the tilde is written sometimes and sometimes not.
According to Evangelina, in the book "Writing and Composition" the orthographic accent or tilde is a hairline that falls from right to left.
Accent is a prosodic and phonological feature whose purpose is to highlight a sound or a group of sound.
Taking into account the accentuation criterion given by the different authors, it is considered that accentuation is nothing more than putting an orthographic accent on the vowel of the syllable in which the greatest pronunciation force falls.
The following attributes can be pointed to spelling:
It is relatively independent of the oral language.
It has a normative or regulatory function (use of all the signs or graphic representations, whether they are letters, auxiliary signs or forms of the upper or lower case letters).
It can influence the meaning of words, intensity and intonation.
It is variable, correlational, historical and synchronous.
In order to guarantee success in learning spelling, it is not enough to memorize the rules, you will have to abound in examples and exercises, and dedicate the required time to the continuous revision of the student's work. Exercise must always be new and systematic.
General accentuation rules
Sharp or oxytone words:
Rule 1: It has an orthographic accent in the last syllable when it ends in any vowel, in n and s, if they are polysyllables, the cases that in n, s are grouped with the previous consonant are excepted: Canals, Isern.
Examples: shoe polish, coffee, sang, mom, violin.
Rule 2
Acute words are not spelled when they end in consonants other than n, s.
Examples: Alcohol, blue, clock, wall.
Rule 3
Accentuates sharp words to indicate no diphthong
Examples: root, corn, trunk.
Plain, serious or paroxitonic words
Rule 1:
Words ending in consonants other than n, s are emphasized on the penultimate syllable. Always accentuate biceps, forceps, triceps.
Example: syrup, sugar, imbecile, useless, host.
Rule 2
Emphasize the weak vowel (u, i) of plain words to undo the diphthong.
Examples: said, trust, spies, gather, listen.
Rule 3
Plain words ending in a vowel and consonants n, s, and not included in the previous rule are not accented with an orthographic accent.
Examples: sing, correspondence, study, child.
In accordance with the new rules of Prosody and Spelling approved by the language academy, the group (u, i) will be considered practically as diphthong and will not be accentuated in the case of being in sharp words or esdrújulas.
Examples: benzoin, casuistry.
Words esdrújulas (proparoxitonas): Words whose penultimate syllable is the tonic: intimate, esdrújulas, impetus.
Special graphic accentuation rules
Apart from these general rules, in certain special cases it is also mandatory to put accents. They are:
- Certain words in which a hiatus appears. Words with diacritical tilde. Interrogative and exclamatory words. Compound words. Latin words and phrases commonly used in Spanish, as well as certain foreign surnames.
The diacritical tilde
There are many words that are spelled the same way in our language and mean different things. Thus, I know, of knowing or being and its pronoun to distinguish some word from another with which it could be confused, we accentuate those like this, I know of knowing or being, so as not to confuse it with itself, pronoun: tea, plant, drink, not to confuse it with you, pronoun.
This spelling accent function is called a diacritical function.
Diacritical means differentiator. Thus, diacritical tilde is one whose function is exclusively differentiating between two words that without it would be written in the same way, which could lead to confusion or ambiguity. Here are some pairs of homonymous words whose meaning differs in writing thanks to the diacritical tilde:
The diacritical tilde
Methodological sequence for the presentation of an orthographic rule
- Presentation of the words with the same spelling situation. Observation and pronunciation of the words. Abstraction of the like from the orthographic point of view. Formulation of the rules by the students. Copy of the same and subsequent formulation.
To guarantee success in learning spelling, it is not enough to memorize the rules; examples and exercises will be plentiful, and the required time will be devoted to continual review of student work.
Working algorithm for the fulfillment of the proposal made
- Carry out the systematic revision of all the notebooks (monthly), developing the most frequent errors, where the student must describe the violated spelling rule. Convert the dictionary into a permanent working tool and carry out this action of searching for words that are difficult to understand in All the texts that are read in the independent works that are carried out.The dictations can be made with weekly or fortnightly frequency and each student must have a graph that can be bar or polygonal where they can compare their progress or decline, this is also done supported by the knowledge or notions of statistics that he receives in the Mathematics subject. In the meetings of parents offer spelling preparation, make known the main spelling rules that are being worked on,provide monthly technical words for each subject. The student workbooks will be delivered for observation and analysis, which must be signed periodically by the parents. It is very important the individual conversation with the students to specify the insufficiencies and establish commitments that allow them to reach new and higher goals.
In addition to these guidelines, it is important to know how to be a teacher. What to do to teach spelling?
Some suggestions are listed below.
Learn which spelling skills and abilities are precedent and which must be achieved at the level you teach.
Design your spelling class as a hands-on, non-informative activity.
Find out what problems hinder each student's learning and address them individually.
Try to motivate your students' learning by letting them know what programs they are getting and persuading them of the benefits of having good spelling.
Overcome selflessness by engaging exercise and narrating something interesting related to spelling.
Relate each new subject to the orthographic contents and linking them whenever possible with the rest of the components of the subject.
Always make sure that your students read, pronounce, copy, understand, associate, generalize and reinforce images. Control each student's development well; Be sure to pay attention to the laggards, the disadvantaged and impose tasks on them, taking care to grade the complexity according to the learning rhythm.
Get your students into the habit of rectifying exercises; avoid errors.
Demand more and more speed and precision in the execution of the exercises.
It doesn't matter more than one issue at a time; try to make the exercises fairly homogeneous; But when you think you have managed to automate a skill, check it out through various exercises.
Contents of the exercise system
Knowing how to accentuate is very important when you are writing, because the omission of a tilde can change the meaning of the text.
The elaboration of system contains 10 exercises, it is conceived to give treatment in the second period in units 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, in the complementary shift of Spanish Language. All are prepared taking into account the indicators to be measured and the III levels of performance, 4 of the I level, 3 of the II, 3 of the III.
Conclusions
- The study carried out in the different literatures on the object of research, the same allowed the author to expand and deepen the knowledge of the historical, theoretical, methodological evolution and the social importance of orthography. The theoretical-practical and methodological study of the educational reality in the subject matter of the research, allowed the author to propose an exercise system for the development of spelling skills with an emphasis on the accentuation of acute, plain and esdrújulas words, providing pedagogical sciences with a system for correct development of spelling habits in students and a greater command of the Mother Tongue.It was found that the elaborated exercise system made it possible to substantially improve the results of 4th D schoolchildren in spelling skills, with an emphasis on accentuation, demonstrating its scientific-pedagogical nature, enhancing the new educational model of the current primary school.
Bibliography
- ACOSTA MEDINA, REINALDO “Remedial Spelling. Accentuation. Editions Hnos. Loynaz ´´. Pinar del Río 1996. p.120.ÁLVAREZ FRANCÉS, FRANCISCO “The essential in spelling“ Spelling book ”Selected Library. Havana, 1943. p. 40.BALMASEDA NEYRA, OSVALDO “Teach and Learn Spelling ´´ Editorial Pueblo y Educación. 2003 p. 102.---–: “Reasons to study spelling at University for all. Spanish course, imp. Juventud Rebelde, Havana October 2000. CARLOS M. ÁLVAREZ DE ZAYAS: School in life, p.60.ENRIQUE JOSÉ VARONA. "Public education, in works on Education and Teaching", p. 111.EVANGELINA ORTEGA. In «Writing and Composition.´´ Editorial Pueblo y Educación. Havana city. 1991. p. 201.RUIZ VITELIO, JULIO and MIJARES, ELOINA. Practical Theoretical Spelling with a Linguistic Introduction. p.84.RODRÍGUEZ PÉREZ, LETICIA.Spanish for everyone. Juventud Rebelde Publishing House. June 2002. p.4.TALÍSINA, NF: Teaching Psychology, Ed. Progreso, Moscow, 1988.
