Spelling is Eazzee

I decided to do my annotated bibliography on the effect of print on orthography. If you don’t know what orthography means, it’s ok. I didn’t either. So, after another Google search I found that it means “The conventional spelling system of a language.” Basically, orthography is a fancy way of saying spelling.

As I sat and pondered how I would find the books I needed for the annotated bibliography, I literally went to Google and searched “how to find books in the library”. (Judge me if you wish, I judged myself) Surprisingly, I found a great site that explained the Dewey decimal system. Good thing I discovered from a trusty librarian that the BYU library uses the Library of Congress classification…

So, after another, yes another, Google search for “Library of Congress classification”, I found THIS!

I figured that I should understand how the organizational system of the library works in order for me to actually find the books I need. After I read through and got a semi-solid basis of understanding, I went the BYU library website. 

I began my search using their online catalogue. 

First I just tried searching:

It didn’t give me what I really needed..

I then searched:

There were a lot of results, none of which seemed would be relevant to what I needed. 

Next I tried: 

It brought up 3 books, one of which I ended up checking out. But I still needed more.

After much more thinking a brainstorming, I decided I would just look for the “effect of print on orthography” and use the Google Books search. 

This was definitely the best route to go. I found the majority of the rest of my books through that search. I just copied and pasted the title of the book into the BYU online catalogue, got my reference number and which floor it was on, and I was golden! I was also able to browse around one of the sections I went to and found 2 more books that fit perfectly with my topic.

It probably took me about 30 minutes to do my entire internet searching, and then another 30 minutes to find all my books and browse around, including walking up and down the stairs of the library.

I could only imagine how much longer it would have taken if I didn’t have the internet to search for these books. 

Here they are!

Joshi, R. Malatesha; Aaron, P. G. Handbook of Orthography and Literacy. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. 2006. This handbook focuses on literary acquisition with the influence of orthography in a variety of languages and writing systems. It mentions how print effects the acquisition of language differently for different languages. The book briefly discusses for example how Chinese children recognize print early on in their childhood and typically does influence positively on their recognition of the Chinese characters. There is also a comparison of Indian Tamil children with American children in their language acquisition. When print is presented and used in their education, both Tamil and American children seem to excel better at spelling as they grow older. The handbook does point out that print does influence orthography since in print it is important to use correct spelling.

Berninger, Virginia Wise. The Varieties of Orthographic Knowledge Vol. I. Kluwer Academic Publisher. 1995. This book deals with the every aspect of the study of orthography in reading and writing, including developmental, theoretical, methodological, and definitional. Essentially, the book intensively breaks down how orthography knowledge is useful. In one section of the book it focuses on the recognition and orthographic knowledge due to processes. The author describes how a child who is reading disabled may encounter difficulty acquiring orthographic regularity even after repeated print exposure does not prove that print negatively effects word recognition. The book mentions that phonological recoding of print is the very basis of reading but recoding does become less important to the connection necessary for spelling.

Graddol, David; Leith, Dick; Swann, Joan. English: history, diversity, and change. Routledge. 1996. This book explores the history of English from the period of Old English to present day. The book focuses on grammar, spelling, even the visual aspect of English. The section that focuses on the spelling does make the point that when printing arrived, it helped consolidate and establish fixed patterns in the spelling for English, although it did not start perfectly without a hitch. It mentions that Caxton, the first person to print books in English, is credited to have standardized English spelling but this was already done by scriveners’ guilds. All in all, printing did have a huge impact on standardizing English spelling.

Sebba, Mark. Spelling and society: the culture and politics of orthography around the world. Cambridge University Press. 2007. This book focuses on the importance orthography has on the world. It focuses very much on the impact spelling has upon society, whether by creating social meaning or creating norms. It mentions how high respect has been given to those who excel at spelling. The book mentions spelling bees and the importance of the study of orthography because it effects society more drastically then people may think.

Wood, Clare; Connelly, Vincent. Contemporary Perspectives on Reading and Spelling. Routledge. 2009. This book focuses more on the psychological debates and aspects of orthography and spelling. There is a chapter in the book that emphasizes more on whether or not how reading instruction influences how print is interpreted. It studies the accuracy and speed of recognition from reading text in comparison to the type of instruction received. For example, children who received phonics instruction traded off speed for accuracy. Those without explicit phonics instruction read significantly faster but their accuracy was lower. The book was able to present information regarding the influence of how children are taught to read to reading print text very well with no bias of any kind. It shows through the use of studies that the instruction of how to read does affect the reading of print text.