--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Hall, Mosiah collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 19 number: 3 published: 1916-01 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Mosiah Hall, "Waste in Spelling," *Improvement Era* 19, no. 3 (January 1916): 253–254.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1903unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera1903unse start_page: 253 end_page: 254 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1916-01) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1903unse publication_year: 1916 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1916, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Waste in Spelling Waste in Spelling BY MOSIAH HALL, STATE INSPECTOR OF HIGH SCHOOLS. For the first time in the history of education the eye of sci-ence is directed towards the problem of elementary education. Asa result of this investigation many old-time notions and customsare found to be inadequate, if not fallacious, and require to berevised or abandoned in view of the discoveries being made. Among the first subjects to feel the influence of the newlight is spelling. Twenty years ago Dr. Rice declared, from in-vestigations he had made, that classes devoting from forty-five tofifty minutes daily to spelling were no more efficient than thosethat gave but fifteen minutes to the subject. Educators at thattime laughed at Dr. Rice and called him a crank; they justifiedtheir opposition to him through belief in the old-time notion thatproficiency in any subject is directly proportional to the time de-voted to that subject. Recent investigations, however, have dem-onstrated not only that this old-time maxim under certain condi-tions may be fallacious, but also that Dr. Rice's contention is prac-tically true. Fifteen minutes daily is found to be sufficient timeto develop skill in spelling, and more time than this is apt to besheer waste of effort. If thirty minutes a day is squandered byany school in a fruitless spelling grind, this amounts to one-tenthof the entire time assigned to the elementary schools; if not morethan fifteen minutes a day is lost in the same futile manner by eachschool in the state (a supposition not difficult to believe), thenone-twentieth of the time used in the school is wasted on spellingalone. Approximately $2,000,000 is used each year in the statefor elementary instruction; one-twentieth of this amount is $100,-000—a rather large sum to sacrifice yearly to the false god, spell-ing. SOURCE OF SOME ERRORS The educational value of spelling is so slight that it is almostnegligible, and yet spelling has been regarded as of equal rankwith other elementary subjects ; but it adds nothing to the physicalor moral development of the child, and "satisfies no psychologicalneed or spiritual craving." The most that may be said of it isthat it adds sometimes to the "gaiety of nations," and has somereal economic value. The exaggerated importance of spelling is responsible chiefly 254 IMPROVEMENT ERA for the fallacies that have accompanied its teaching-. The greatestmistake has been the attempt to teach the child both his speakingand reading vocabulary, when, as a matter of fact, his writing-vocabulary is the only one that deserves attention. This has givenrise to an effort to teach the eight thousand words of the averagespelling books, as well as the bost difficult words met with dailythe various subjects being studied. As a result the child is com-pelled to devote an enormous amount of time to the spelling ofwords which he will never use in writing, to the neglect, conse-quently, of the more simple words which make up his writtenEnglish. SUGGESTED REMEDY From the foregoing the right mode of procedure is evident. 1. The vocabulary needed in ordinary English by the childin his written work should be discovered and made the backboneof the course in spelling. The spelling of the most commonlyused terms only in geography, history, etc., should be required inaddition. 2. Each individdal should be held personally responsible forthe special vocabulary needed by him in the vocation which heis to follow in life. 3. Every one should be taught to know perfectly well whenhe does not know how to spell some needed word and how to dis-cover quickly from the dictionary the required information.Guessing should never be tolerated. 4. The sentiment must be fostered that it is more of a creditthan a disgrace not to know how to spell certain peculiar unim-portant terms used as catch words. Investigation has shown that the ten words, the, and, of, to, I,a, in, that, you, and for with their repetitions, constitute fully one-fourth of all the words we write; that fifty words constitute one-half; three hundred words, three-fourths, and one thousand wordsmore than nine-tenths of all the words we use in writing. TheRussell Sage Foundation has just published a list of what it be-lieved to be the one thousand most commonly used words in Eng-lish composition. Can any valid reason be given why thesethousand words should not constitute the minimum requirementin the elementary grades ? Be patient with the hired man who gets drunk and abusesyour stock. It isn't the man that does the mischief; it is the stuffthat is in him. The man to blame is the one who sells him thepoison.—Farm Journal.