By Robyn Kendrick and Kyla Cook
Teaching Spelling Through Phonics: A Better Approach for Elementary Students
When our second graders take a weekly spelling test, we ask a simple question: are they truly learning the patterns that make words work, or are they merely memorizing a list until Friday and then forgetting it over the weekend? The traditional model—handing out 20 words on Monday, expecting students to memorize them by Friday, and then watching that knowledge fade—does not build lasting spelling or reading ability.
Research supports what classroom experience has shown: a strong foundation in phonemic awareness and systematic phonics instruction is essential for reading and spelling success. Phonics must be taught explicitly, in a clear sequence, and with consistent practice so students can map sounds to letters and letter groups. When instruction focuses on these skills rather than on rote memorization, students develop reliable strategies for both decoding (reading) and encoding (spelling).
How We Redefined the Spelling Test
Instead of expecting students to memorize a disconnected list of new words every week, we base spelling instruction on a finite set of sound-letter relationships. In our program we teach the 42 core sounds of English along with five primary phonetic skills and two decoding strategies. These building blocks appear repeatedly across words students encounter in elementary school.
We concentrate on teaching blends, digraphs, vowel patterns, syllable types, and decoding techniques so children can identify and reproduce letter patterns accurately. For example, when students learn s blends—such as sc, sk, sl, sm, sn, sp, st, and sw—they practice hearing and producing those sounds in many words. That practice lets a child who studies the blend and its sound patterns spell a word like “spot” and then correctly apply the same skill when presented with “stop” or “spare.”
Because instruction emphasizes how sounds map to letters, students are able to spell words they have never seen before. They listen to a word, segment it into its constituent sounds, and assign the correct letter patterns. This skill-based approach empowers students to spell beyond their memorized vocabulary and apply the same strategy across unfamiliar words.
Strengthening Reading, Writing, and Confidence
The benefits extend beyond spelling lists. As students learn to encode words—transforming sounds into written letters—they simultaneously improve decoding when they read. This two-way reinforcement raises overall literacy. Students who can generate correct letter patterns from sounds are more confident in their writing because they are no longer limited to simple words they happen to remember. Their word choices expand, their sentence complexity improves, and their written expression becomes richer.
We also see students tackle multisyllabic words with confidence. By breaking words into syllable chunks and matching sounds to the appropriate letters for each segment, learners make steady progress with longer words. The retention effect is greater because students rely on a reproducible strategy rather than one-off memorization.
Classroom Practice and Parent Communication
Implementing this shift required clear communication with families. Many parents were accustomed to helping children memorize weekly lists and initially expected the same routine. We explained how skill-based spelling instruction works: parents can support children by listening for sounds, encouraging segmenting, and helping apply taught spelling patterns—not by drilling lists.
Some parents have been pleasantly surprised. At conferences, a few asked if their child should be moved to a gifted classroom after noticing their child correctly spelling multisyllabic or unfamiliar words. We explained that the results come from systematic phonics instruction that enables students to generalize their skills.
The approach has also proven effective for students who speak English as an additional language. When non-native speakers learn to segment sounds and map them to letters, their ability to decode and encode English words improves quickly, and their vocabulary grows as they read and use more words in writing and speech.
Assessing Mastery
We consider students to have mastered spelling skills when they can encode efficiently—that is, when they can hear a word, break it into sounds, select appropriate letter patterns, and write the word without hesitation. Mastery shows up in both reading fluency and written work: students read smoothly because they decode accurately, and they write with more ambitious vocabulary because they can spell what they mean to say.
Shifting from list memorization to phonics-based spelling requires intentional curriculum design, explicit teaching, and consistent practice. The payoff is clear—students gain durable skills that transfer across contexts, improving literacy and confidence in measurable ways.
About the Authors
Robyn Kendrick and Kyla Cook are second-grade teachers at Stanton County Elementary School in Johnson, Kansas.
This article was originally published by The Learning Counsel, a research institute and news media hub focused on providing context for the shift in education to digital curriculum.