That
Contact: Peter Bowers PO Box 295 Wolfe Island, ON, Canada K0H 2Y0
Phone: (613) 385-2084
Email: wordworkskingston@gmail.com
(Scientific Word Investigation)
“Word Scientists” look for the deepest word structures that make sense of the greatest number of words.
Click HERE for background on SWI.
Marcia Henry on WordWorks:
Marcia Henry is past president of The International Dyslexia Association
and former director of the Center for Educational Research on Dyslexia at San Jose State University
sign + al → signal
re + sign → resign
de + sign + ate → designate
sign + ate/ + ure → signature
do + es → does
do + ne → done
do + ing → doing
go + es → goes
go + ne → gone
go + ing → going
Making sense of how words work by investigating morphology, etymology and phonology.
English base <sign> from Latin root signum
"mark, token, indication, symbol”
Applying the Principle of Backwards Design from UbD to Structured Word Inquiry
enduring understandings of how the written word works.
"This article by Pete Bowers makes some interesting connections between UbD, Real Spelling and the development of critical thinking skills in students."
Bill and Ochan Powell - Education Across Frontiers
Resources for Spelling-Out and Writing-Out Word Structure with Word Sums
REVISED (May 25, 2018)
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Click here for information on spelling-out word sums including a free pdf guide for teachers who want to use this process for learning, instruction and assessment.
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Spelling-Out Word Structure: Targeting Central Concepts, Assessment & Instruction
See a new article and video addressing these ideas all building on a practical lesson growing from a Grade 1 student’s question, “Why is their an <h> in school? You don’t hear it.”
Click here for a video of an on-line Skype session addressing this topic with Grade 2 teachers and an article addressing how this topic links to the UbD.
Must See Links
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A New Hub for Research Related to SWI: Jeff Bowers’ Blog
More importantly, Jeff does a great job of explaining the context of this research in his blog posts. I highly recommend exploring this page often, and adding your comments to the discussion!
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Scientific Word Investigations in the Classroom & Beyond
Click here for a video of Nueva pre-school teacher Carolee Fucigna as they create a morphological web on the base <rain>. See how straight froward it is to investigate morphological families with readers and non-readers.
Click here for a post from Rebecca Loveless on “Word Bag Excitement” that offers teachers a sense of this excellent activity for studying word families modeled on Lyn Anderson’s work. This is a great reference for jumping in. Rebecca’s site has many more posts to explore too.
Click here for Mary Beth Steven’s brilliant recent post “Outer Beauty Attracts, but Inner Beauty Captivates.” This is a wonderful way to compare studying real “word families” compared to words that simply rhyme. Explore her whole blog!
Click here for an inspiring post, “Comprehending Spelling” from Sue Hegland’s excellent blog, “Learning About Spelling”. This is a short, accessible and eloquent case for why we should do the obvious -- teach our written word works.
Tools for making matrices
Free trial versions of matrix making software for morphological analysis available for download
Click here for a “User’s Guide” for working with this computer tool including links to tutorial films, complementary resources and links to related research.
Video introducing the new “Mini Matrix Maker”
Watch this video to see how teachers and students can easily create matrices from word sums on Mac or PC computers with Neil Ramsden’s “Mini Matrix Maker”.
See an introduction to WordWorks and Structured Word Inquiry
(including videos) here
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On-Line Resources Supporting Structured Word Inquiry
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✦Latdict (Investigate twin bases!)
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Classroom Blogs
Key Links
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Related Websites
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✦Beyond the Word (Lyn Anderson, AUS)
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✦LEX (Gina Cooke)
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✦Language Innerviews (Scott Mills)
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✦Word Torque (Fiona Hamilton, Bangkok)
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✦Learning About Spelling (Sue Hegland)
<s> → /s/
E.g., sign, signal, assign
<s> → /z/
E.g., design, resign,
does, goes
Explore Lyn Anderson’s excellent blog with illustrations and resources about structured word inquiry for all ages at this link .
Lyn has been developing her understanding and practice in this area for over a decade. Her lessons and ideas for morphological instruction from the start are just exceptional.
Structured Word Inquiry at
The Nueva School
Click HERE to see the page on the Nueva School website describing how Structured Word Inquiry has transformed the instruction at this top US private school. It includes a video illustrating how this work is integrated across the grades.
WordWorks Literacy Centre
Spelling it like it is!
Nothing motivates like understanding
Free, weekly open-ended on-line SWI sessions with Pete
(Mondays 5pm EST, Tuesday Mornings Australia)
Click HERE for a description of all my on-line courses.
New article on SWI and the Research & Extensive Interview
Structured Word Inquiry (SWI) Teaches Grapheme-Phoneme Correspondences More Explicitly Than Phonics Does: An open letter to Jennifer Buckingham and the reading research community
At right is a screen shot of this new 15-min video I made to clarify the qualitative difference between the teaching of grapheme-phoneme correspondences in Phonics and SWI.
I was motivated to write that article and create this video in response a peer-reviewed article by Buckingham (2020) in which she made the dramatic and false claim that SWI cannot make “any claim that SWI teaches GPCs [grapheme-phoneme-correspondences]”
I use that article and video not only to clarify how SWI makes sense of grapheme-phoneme correspondences, but also provides an overview of key conventions of English orthography that drive SWI practice, but are absent typical instruction. I also go into the theory and research related to SWI.
Interview on SWI with Education Podcast ‘Pedagogy Non-Grata” 
I was recently invited to do an interview to discuss the theory, practice and research of SWI on this podcast. The host was new to SWI which provided a rich opportunity to respond to the kinds of questions novices to this work typically have. See Part 1 HERE and Part 2 HERE. I recommend that you follow the links to videos of the interview as it is much more effective to describe orthographic conventions while looking the linguistic tools we use in SWI. Part 2 is divided into two videos -- the last one emphasizes the research.
This Newsletter points to the new article I published addressing misunderstandings and misrepresentations about SWI in the research (See more including abstract above.)
I point to rich new resources from Lyn Anderson and Ann Whiting (Caught in the Spell of Words) for teachers/tutors working with SWI.
I also point to resources related to learning with the newly available Tool Box 2 that I highlighted in the previous WW Newsletter #100.
WordWorks Newsletters & Resources
WW Newsletter #101: The return of the Real Spelling Tool Box 2 and more!
Click HERE for this Newsletter.
Click HERE for an inspiring story from a tutor that illustrates the fact that far from inhibiting the learning of grapheme-phoneme correspondences, studying these conventions within the context of morphology is a necessary condition for making sense of how grapheme-phoneme correspondences work.
Revised <sign> Lesson in “Teaching How the Written Word Works”
Books printed after May 2013 already include the revised lesson. You know you have the revised version if you see on <ify> suffix on the <sign> lesson on page 8. Even if you have the revised version, I recommend you download this pdf to gain from the explanation that helped me understand why this revision was needed.
Click THIS LINK for details.
I began offering this free weekly session at the beginning of the COVID pandemic in an effort to ensure teachers and parents had a place to pose questions about SWI whether or not they could afford to attend more formal on-line courses.
The response has been so rewarding (and fun) that I’ve only missed a handful Mondays since the first session on March 23rd, 2020. I plan to continue indefinitely even once we are past the pandemic.
There is no sign up, just a regular date and time to join. Most weeks we simply address questions people bring. Some weeks we have a special guest, or planned investigation to share. Every week has novices and experts who come to share their questions/experience, or just listen in.
Click THIIS LINK for a document reflecting on learning from the first session that is filled with links to free resources to build understanding of scientific word investigation.
Monday, June 28–Friday, July 2, 2021
Click HERE for information and to register. Attend 3-day intro, 3-day advanced or 5-day full course (overlapping on Wednesday). Like last year this course is co-led by Rebecca Loveless of the Nueva School with multiple Nueva teacher presenters, including a presentation by Carolee Fucigna, the former pre-school teacher on Wednesday.
Click the link above for more information and to register.
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❖Salute to William Van Cleave
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❖Details and registration links for on-line SWI Study Opportunities Including new ‘Working with SWI Tools’ course and 8th Annual SWI Institute
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❖New videos of a 2-part interview on theory, practice and research re SWI with Pete
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❖New paper, “Structured Word Inquiry: A Critical Literacy Framework for Educators”
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❖WordWorks Newsletter #99 using a Greta Thunberg speech grabs attention of environmentally focused company ‘Sofar Ocean’
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❖Real Speller’s posts on investigations growing from emails with questions from teachers diving into SWI
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๏Making sense of the English spelling system by studying how the words “dine” “diner” and “dinner” are related (Real Speller’s post growing from one of my on-line courses)
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๏Revisiting “the two-step word sum” to make sense of the spelling of the words, “courageous,” “noticeable,” and “agreed”.
Some responses to my on-line courses...
A parent of a Gr 1 student who was frustrated, identified for literacy issues and not reliably naming letters when we started.
(Note this Mom both studied in my on-line course and I have been tutoring with them on-line.)
I want you to know that the work you have done with Xxxx is truly priceless to myself and my husband! Xxxx is reading - not perfectly, not everything - but he is confident and willing to try with words he doesn’t know, and it is absolutely amazing to me to see this wonderful progress.
From a tutor getting started in SWI...
I just had to share this with you. This was my very first SWI session with a student I have been tutoring for 2 1/2 years. She has ADHD and language learning LDs. We have struggled along in OG with very limited success and a great deal of apathy and disinterest from my student.
I have NEVER seen her as engaged as she was today. Formulating arguments for why <cyanide> and <icicle> shared meaning with the base <cycle>, trying to come up with words in the word family herself before I could put my cards down, trying to come up with the word sum for <nonrecyclable>. Not once did she ask "can we play the game now?" or "aren't we done yet?" It was amazing!!
I'm still on a high an hour later when I used to walk away from our tutoring sessions exhausted and frustrated. 😁
From a middle school teacher...
Since my last course with you in October-November, I have been diving into SWI with my tutoring students and my struggling readers in my 6th grade classroom, all learning together. I cannot explain eloquently enough how much my students have grown and how much I am still discovering.
My Tier 2 readers took a 2nd grade class science words, studied them in partner-pairs and invited all second graders to a SWI show and tell day. My kids were teaching 2nd graders baseboards, affixes and the history of their words—it was a lovely sight!
WW Newsletter #102
Click HERE to download from Real Spellers.
Includes links to register for upcoming workshops including
new ‘Working with Tools of SWI’ and 8th Annual SWI Nueva Institute