Linguistic intuition or school-taught rules: Writing accurately and learning orthography in monolingual and bilingual children

Abstract

This article examines the results of an experimental study of how mono- and bilingual elementary school students learn to spell words with stress-tested root vowels, emphasizing the role of orthographic knowledge and linguistic intuition in the development of writing proficiency. The findings are based on a descriptive analysis of 48 mono- and bilingual first and second grade students divided into 4 groups, each consisting of 12 participants. The analysis yielded several important and non-trivial conclusions. The monolingual first graders showed a fairly high level of writing proficiency, and no correlation was observed between correct spelling of words and either correct stress placement or the choice of an appropriate check word. Among the first graders who were non-native speakers of Russian, the overall level of writing proficiency was lower, and a statistically significant correlation was found between correct spelling and the choice of a check word. The second graders (monolinguals and inophones) outperformed the first graders considerably, with no significant differences between the native and non-native speakers. The monolingual children displayed no correlation between correct spelling and the use of orthograms, while the inophones relied on the choice of a check word to spell without mistakes. Generally, monolingual students tend to read and write more frequently, both in the classroom and spontaneously, thus intuitively discovering the morphemic principle of Russian orthography. For bilingual students facing the constraint of limited speech input (insufficient understanding of “procedural” language rules), mastering orthograms is more essential to achieve writing proficiency. Therefore, bilingual students depend on school-taught verbalized (“declarative”) rules. In contrast, monolingual students use mainly their linguistic intuition to learn writing.