Correct spelling has all kinds of implications for both native and non-native speakers of English alike. Misspellings can reflect poorly on a student’s intelligence even though such judgements can oftentimes be unfair as in cases of dyslexia and other learning disabilities.
That being said, I believe that an emphasis on spelling in the early stages of second language acquisition is misplaced. Here are some reasons why.
Spellcheck tools make it easy to correct spelling
Today, every smartphone is equipped with the technology check spelling. Oftentimes if you are even close to spelling a desired word correctly, google keyboard with fix it for you. It also has the ability to guess which word you need to complete your thought, and that includes the spelling too.
20-30 years ago, your students may have suffered more from not being able to represent the English language in writing accurately; now if you allow students to turn in assignments with the help of Microsoft Word or a smartphone keyboard, you wouldn’t be able to distinguish the poor spellers from the spelling bee champs.
If technology can compensate for intermediate and advanced learners, is this really a skill that you want to focus intensely on in the early stages?
Students will rarely need to submit anything in handwriting in the modern world.
Teacher instincts might say that they won’t be able to fake it once they have to submit something on paper and that’s definitely true.
However, if you were honest with yourself, how often do you need to write handwritten notes in your daily life? In my own life, the only times I might need to write words by hand might be at the DMV or when I’m filling out a tax form for a new job.
Even then, if I hypothetically need to check my phone for the spelling of something, it wouldn’t be the end of the world even for a native speaker.
It runs counter to the natural approach of teaching a second language and the communicative method
The famous second language acquisition researcher Stephen Krashen came up with the relatively intuitive theory that second language acquisition should mirror first language acquisition we undergo as children.
It sounds good on the surface, and from my experience in the classroom, I believe that it holds up as a general principle.
Later on, the communicative method gained popularity which emphasizes the communicative nature of language with the end goal of students being able to interact, express ideas and make plans in their second language. After all, those are basically the main purposes of language.
The issue that an over emphasis on spelling helps the students achieve none of those things in the early stages of language acquisition.
An overemphasis on spelling doesn’t best address students’ needs
Moving away from the theoretical but in a similar vein, if you’re teaching a class of beginners in an ESL context, your students would benefit more from learning the vocabulary and phrases that they need to survive in an English speaking country.
To make an analogy, learning spelling in detail before one can introduce themselves in a second language is a lot like a young hockey player learning the details of all the penalties and things against the rules before they’ve mastered a basic skating stride.
As always, every class has different needs. Maybe you are teaching abroad and your class isn’t in dire need of survival language or maybe your class is more detail-oriented and focused than most. In that case, it might be better to do more phonetically informed practice with spelling.
Us teachers are usually quite good at deciphering spelling mistakes, and while we might pull our hair out when we see spelling mistakes, I think we can agree that we still want them to focus on playing the game.