[email protected]

Yes Yes!! a little background first...
I taught myself to read at 5. I began reading to my
daughter while she was in the womb.
By the time she was a year old she had 3 libraries,
English, Italian and Spanish. It was a huge thorn
in my side that she couldn't read. I got more and more
frustrated. Wasted more and more money on stuff like
Hooked on Phonics ,etc. Finally realized she did not want
to read. That was even harder to accept. But on her 10th
birthday she decided she did want to read and has been
going strong ever since. EXCEPT... Here she is reading all
sorts of books and comprehending and writing the best darn
book reports, etc but she has the worst spelling. I
couldn't understand how she could read so well and spell so
poorly. But one day recently I realized we work on her
spelling via phonics and with her accent she simply can't
hear half the vowels.
She was born in Massachusetts, on the South Shore. Not
only does she not hear vowels in some cases she doesn't
hear consonants either! For instance the word -better-.
She honestly hears -beDDer-. She drops letters at the ends
of words adds some on to others - it's SOooo frustrating -
for both of us. To make matters worse by the time she was
4 she was in a speech therapy class for almost 2 years,
being taught by a woman with an even worse accent than dd
already had! Now the stuff is ingrained.

What do we do? Her unbelievably horrid spelling silently
appalls me but recently I realized that it really
embarrasses her. Any suggestions would be much
appreciated.

ciao, Jacli

>Message: 17
> Date: Mon, 10 Dec 2001 15:05:51 EST
> From: RValvo7626@...
>Subject: Re: Digest Number 1678
>
>In a message dated 12/9/01 12:49:47 PM Mountain Standard
Time,
>[email protected] writes:
>
>
>> ......
>> My middle son didn't begin to really read until he was
10yo. He was
>one
>> of those kids that spoke with a kind of Boston accent
and phonics didn't
>> make any sense to him

Lynda

Do you really think that having the accent is the problem? The reason I ask
is that hubby and I were discussing this and he thinks that one would need
to look at other reasons.

Now, his point being that he is a Brockton, Mass native. He lived in Mass
until he was 10 and was a spelling bee winner, etc. Now, he had a very
thick "Boston" accent, baaa (bar), caaa (car), butta (butter), etc. He
doesn't think the "beDDer" is Boston at all and rather that with a true
Boston accent it would be beTTa. We called his sister to ask her (she has
a real "problem" <g> born in Mass and now a NC resident with a southern
accent covering up her Boston accent) what she thought and she said the same
thing he did. They don't "hear" their accents as being other than the
"right" way to pronounce the words. They "hear" the "r" in words like car
or bar even if we don't hear them saying them. Am I clear as mud as usual??

He had lived in CA for 15 years when I met him and you could tell right off
the top where he was from. Many years later, folks can still tell and that
is after living in CA for over 30 years. And even with this lingering
accent, he is the best speller in this house.

Lynda
----- Original Message -----
From: <cleopatra@...>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, December 21, 2001 10:10 AM
Subject: Re: [Unschooling-dotcom] Boston accent & reading & spelling


>
> Yes Yes!! a little background first...
> I taught myself to read at 5. I began reading to my
> daughter while she was in the womb.
> By the time she was a year old she had 3 libraries,
> English, Italian and Spanish. It was a huge thorn
> in my side that she couldn't read. I got more and more
> frustrated. Wasted more and more money on stuff like
> Hooked on Phonics ,etc. Finally realized she did not want
> to read. That was even harder to accept. But on her 10th
> birthday she decided she did want to read and has been
> going strong ever since. EXCEPT... Here she is reading all
> sorts of books and comprehending and writing the best darn
> book reports, etc but she has the worst spelling. I
> couldn't understand how she could read so well and spell so
> poorly. But one day recently I realized we work on her
> spelling via phonics and with her accent she simply can't
> hear half the vowels.
> She was born in Massachusetts, on the South Shore. Not
> only does she not hear vowels in some cases she doesn't
> hear consonants either! For instance the word -better-.
> She honestly hears -beDDer-. She drops letters at the ends
> of words adds some on to others - it's SOooo frustrating -
> for both of us. To make matters worse by the time she was
> 4 she was in a speech therapy class for almost 2 years,
> being taught by a woman with an even worse accent than dd
> already had! Now the stuff is ingrained.
>
> What do we do? Her unbelievably horrid spelling silently
> appalls me but recently I realized that it really
> embarrasses her. Any suggestions would be much
> appreciated.
>
> ciao, Jacli
>
> >Message: 17
> > Date: Mon, 10 Dec 2001 15:05:51 EST
> > From: RValvo7626@...
> >Subject: Re: Digest Number 1678
> >
> >In a message dated 12/9/01 12:49:47 PM Mountain Standard
> Time,
> >[email protected] writes:
> >
> >
> >> ......
> >> My middle son didn't begin to really read until he was
> 10yo. He was
> >one
> >> of those kids that spoke with a kind of Boston accent
> and phonics didn't
> >> make any sense to him
>
>
>
>
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