ABSTRACT
Young children's difficulties with reading have been extensively investigated and, as regards writing, so have their problems with spelling. Teachers entered an activity-centered classroom where children viewed themselves and their classmates as individuals who had thoughts and ideas worth communicating to others, and who knew writing was a powerful aid in this communication. Scientific concepts grow down through spontaneous concepts; spontaneous concepts grow upward through scientific concepts. The only skill taught to as many children was the spelling of the verb ending -ing, and it is worth stopping to look at the pattern of learning here for later contrast with the more difficult punctuation tasks. With possessive apostrophes, the number of errors is much greater, both absolutely and proportionally. These errors are largely what we call overgeneralizations towards formal similarities of sounds that have different meanings: to plurals like parade's and thing's and to verbs like like's and live's.
