You have been standing over your child for an hour now, trying to explain to him that "zhi-shi" is written through "and", and your child still sculpts mistakes with enviable persistence in exercises aimed at consolidating this simple rule. Let's skip the moment with what an unkind word you remember your child's teacher, who could not explain to him in the Russian language lesson all the nuances of the spelling of these combinations, or was able, but the child did not understand anything. We only sympathize with you. After all, ahead of you is still, at a minimum, working out the rules about “cha-cha” and “choo-cha” (which are always through “a” and through “y”), and strength and patience for a difficult struggle with the complete absence of your student literacy is gone. A familiar picture?

Each of you, of course, knows the expression "innate literacy". Most likely, many know him since school. You glanced with envy at your desk mate who possessed this skill, and if (alas and ah!) you couldn’t boast of it yourself, you crammed all the rules without exception from the Russian language textbook with resentment and persistence. But there were still mistakes in dictations, tests and exercises. To be honest, on this subject, you, as they say, were interrupted from "C grade" to "C grade". And you understand your child like no one else. But you can't do anything about it. It is not given to him, like you, to master all the nuances of the correct grammar, you admit to yourself with horror.

Realizing this, you are ready to give up and not torment your child anymore with the twenty-fifth spelling of the same word in a row. You have been living for so many years, after all, with gaps in knowledge and a complete lack of literate writing skills, and you live no worse than others (you reassure yourself). So, maybe you should leave your mediocrity alone? And not torturing yourself or him? Let's make a reservation right away that, indeed, no one has ever died from illiteracy. As practice shows, several other skills are still needed for life. Unless, of course, your profession is not directly related to writing texts and paperwork. So remembering all these tedious rules of the Russian language, it seems, is useless. So, torturing your child with useless cramming is almost barbaric.

And, meanwhile, the possession of the skills of competent written and oral speech is a very important feature of the modern educated person. And it is in your power not to leave your child illiterate for life and even (attention!) in parallel with him to make up for what passed you by at school. So, in this article we will tell you why and why it is necessary to send schoolchildren to literacy courses, and for parents themselves to run at a gallop to enroll in intensive Russian language courses for adults, if they themselves sometimes forget about all sorts of "zhi" and " cha".

Innate Literacy

Unfortunately, innate literacy is not given to everyone. Only a few have the ability to write intuitively without errors, even without knowing the spelling rules. And what about the rest to master the skills of competent writing? As a rule, the degree of assimilation of all the rules of the Russian language depends on the school where the child studies and on the teacher who teaches him this subject. An important role is also played by the individual inclinations, perseverance and abilities of the student himself, as well as the characteristics of his nervous system and memory.

You can exhale if, after the first year of school, the teacher happily informs you that your child has a good memory and attention. It is they who will help the student in the process of reading to memorize and subsequently accurately reproduce all the words. But the child who needs an individual approach and the use of special teaching methods to master strong writing skills will face great difficulties at school. We do not think that we will surprise anyone if we say that there is no need to expect any special approach to each specific student in an ordinary school. The fate of such children is to walk in the eternal "losers" in the Russian language.

How does a Russian lesson usually go? The teacher explained the rule, forced the children to do strengthening exercises. And sent home to do homework. It’s good if the child has time to really get a foothold in the head. And if not? Then the burden of responsibility falls on the shoulders of the parents. Mom (and usually it's always mom) has a difficult task to convey to the child what the teacher could not do and what does not want to fit in the child's head. Cramming, "stuffing" your hands during a dozen exercises, swearing, slapping ... everyone has their own methods. The result can be one - the child comes to the lesson, where the insidious teacher prepared another dictation, designed to reveal how much the children have learned the rules. And then another child is waiting, it’s good if it’s a “troika”, otherwise it’s also a “deuce”. Another "pair" in the piggy bank, but the knowledge has not been consolidated. The hour of truth comes at the exam.

IN Lately Parents are increasingly trying to shift their duties and the duties of school teachers onto the shoulders of tutors. However, not everyone can financially afford such a way to put knowledge into the head of their child. And then, trips to tutors are postponed, as a rule, for the period of study already in the senior classes. It seems like you need to act soon, and graduation is already on the nose. It's time to bring in the heavy artillery in the form of private tutors. In the meantime - all by yourself, by yourself. "Deuces" from teachers on dictations as a teaching method, and cuffs in the evening from parents as a punishment.

Meanwhile, for those who do not know, there have long been special literacy courses. And for schoolchildren of different ages and even for adults.

Literacy for children

To date, there are even special courses of the Russian language and speech development for schoolchildren. lower grades. Here, the students of the very first two classes will be explained, as they say, on the fingers the basics of future literacy, which will be useful to them in the future. Here, an experienced linguist-psychologist will find his own individual approach to each student.

For older schoolchildren, there are literacy courses where the entire course of the Russian language is practiced. high school, as well as the most difficult cases in spelling and punctuation. Each training center offers its own unique training system. All methods are aimed at developing strong spelling skills.

Experienced teachers help schoolchildren not only to master the practice of the Russian language, but also to overcome uncertainty, fear of written work, exams in the Russian language or the Unified state exam(USE), the results of which are not only included in the school certificate, but are also taken into account when entering universities.

As sad as it is to admit, often school preparation clearly not enough to successfully complete all USE assignments. To achieve success, it is necessary to master the material at the highest level, that is, to know everything theoretical basis the Russian language, to master the practice of literate writing, and also to have the skill of completing tasks in a test form. We are not talking about all the other nuances.

Unfortunately, in ordinary schools, very few hours are allocated for Russian language classes in high school, which are clearly not enough to cover all aspects of preparing for the Unified State Examination.

Meanwhile, many Russian language courses aimed at improving the literacy of schoolchildren, in terms of the content of the programs and the sequence of the material, correspond to the program in the Russian language. secondary school. At the same time, according to experts, the methods of Russian language courses to improve literacy are a combination of the best traditional methods of teaching spelling and the latest achievements in didactics and psychology of perception. The student learns all the rules and masters the algorithm for their application through special exercises. Education takes place in an interesting form for schoolchildren, not similar to that used by teachers in the classroom.

Teachers assure that the very first successes that your child makes by attending special Russian language courses will immediately affect school studies. At the end of the course, there is a test to show the progress made.

As a rule, all courses are offered to each student individual program corresponding to his personal capabilities and goals. In order to choose the right curriculum, teachers need to assess the level of preparedness and intellectual potential of the student. For this purpose, when registering for courses, in most cases, free testing is carried out.

Russian language for adults

Many of us have long graduated from schools and universities, seem to have had a good training, but still make mistakes when writing texts. Unfortunately, not all of us can boast that we remember all the spelling rules and fully possess all the skills of competent writing. Hence the unfortunate curiosities in the form of spelling errors in serious documents. This is absolutely unacceptable in a business environment and can completely undermine the respect of partners and customers.

For those parents who themselves are not strong in the Russian language and who have gaps in knowledge that interfere in life, we can advise a course of intensive development of the Russian language for adults. Specialists will help you not only to fill in the gaps, but also to improve literacy, to develop literate writing skills. It's never too late to do it, and it's never a shame.

The cost of these courses is quite affordable. So, the price of one lesson in small groups for one academic hour (40 minutes) starts from 200 rubles.

The courses themselves (30-36 academic hours) for children and adults cost from 7,000 rubles. up to 13 900 rubles. depending on the number of people in the group and the level of training.

Individual sessions in a group of 2-3 people, will cost more than 30,000 rubles. (for the same 30 - 36 academic hours).

And although, as we all know, innate literacy is an innate skill, it turns out that there have long been courses that promise to instill this skill at any conscious age.

Unique technique, which we found on the Internet, promises to reduce the number of errors in written works up to 70 times the original level. It is especially emphasized that the unique learning technology is patented as an invention in Russia and abroad and has no analogues.

There is, however, a limitation in the form of age. Schoolchildren are welcome here, starting from the seventh grade and with the exception of those who suffer from dyslexia and from "congenital illiteracy". Yes, it turns out there is. Therefore, before telling a child who, for what day in a row, cannot understand that "zhi-shi" is written through "and", that he is mediocre and stuff like that, and weigh another slap on the back of the head, think about it, maybe illiteracy Your child has a completely logical explanation in the form of such an unusual disorder.

congenital illiteracy

So, back to the term that we voiced above, but did not explain what it means. Dyslexia is a selective impairment of the ability to master the skill of reading while maintaining general ability to learning. This type of specific learning disorder is neurological in nature and manifests itself in repetitive errors of a persistent nature. Dyslexia is characterized by the inability to quickly and correctly recognize words, decode, and master spelling skills.

At the same time, writing disorders have an independent name in Russian speech therapy - dysgraphia. This is the inability (or difficulty) to master writing in the normal development of the intellect. In most cases, dyslexia and dysgraphia are observed in children at the same time, although in some they can occur separately. There is also the concept of "dysorphography". This is when a child fails to apply spelling rules when writing words.

As experts say, dyslexia is quite difficult to diagnose. Its main symptoms: slow reading, by syllables or by letters, guessing, with errors in the form of substitutions or permutations of letters. At the same time, the very understanding of the meaning of what is read is violated in varying degrees.

There are a number of problems that every dyslexic faces in one way or another. The most common of them:

Disorientation in space, disorganization;

Difficulties with the perception of information;

Difficulties in recognizing words, not understanding what has just been read;

clumsiness or lack of coordination;

Attention deficit disorder, sometimes accompanied by hyperactivity.

At the same time, signs of a lag in mental development these children are excluded. I must say that a person with symptoms of dyslexia or dysgraphia is absolutely adequate, he is just special and perceives the surrounding reality differently than other people. It is surprising that in many other areas of activity, a child with dyslexia and dysgraphia can show amazing abilities. He can excel in sports, painting, music, mathematics or physics.

Doctors note that dysgraphia and dyslexia come in several forms and varying degrees of severity. Parents should pay special attention if the child makes the following characteristic mistakes when writing the text: skips letters and syllables, swaps them, reads the text from right to left or even upside down. In this case, the likelihood that the child has dyslexia or dysgraphia is quite high. It's a good idea to start by taking your child to a speech therapist. Regular sessions with this doctor will help the child cope with these disorders.

It is important to remember that dyslexia does not come and go with age. Dyslexics are born. Either a person has this disorder, or he doesn't. However, in no case should you give up and let everything take its course.

An important point is the behavior of parents and teachers during classes with such children. These diagnoses are not a reason for teaching a child at home. He can easily study in a regular school. However, the main task of the teacher and family members is the psychological support of dysgraphic children. The child must know that he will not be punished or scolded for mistakes made when writing or reading. As practice shows, relieving stress during learning, when the child is sure that he is not in danger of punishment, leads to a decrease in the number of mistakes themselves.

If your child has been diagnosed with dysgraphia, do not panic. It is worth remembering that you and your child are not alone. There are thousands of people with this problem. Read the relevant forums and sites dedicated to this issue.

The most important thing to remember is that this is not a disease, but idiosyncrasy Your child and in your power to somehow help him. Having identified the causes of errors in the student, they can and should be dealt with. This should be done in collaboration with a speech therapist. In this case, special exercises will help.

Experts say that with competent corrective work, the vast majority of mistakes in dysgraphic children and dyslexic children disappear altogether.

There are people who always (well, almost always) write correctly, but at the same time do not remember any rules at all, do not look for test words for unstressed vowels or unpronounceable consonants, do not memorize lists of exceptions. Such a phenomenon in everyday life is often called "innate literacy" - as if these people were born with the ability to write correctly. Of course, this is not true: it is impossible to be born with the knowledge of the spelling and punctuation rules of a certain century (or even decade). What's the matter? Apparently, the point here is a good visual memory: an “innately” literate person remembers words like pictures. In principle, there is nothing impossible in this. This was shown by observations on people with separated hemispheres: normally (in right-handed people), only the left hemisphere can process language information. But it turned out that people can sometimes recognize some very common words without the help of the left hemisphere - which means they remember them like pictures. Generally speaking, not only people, but also monkeys can remember a word like a picture: among the Kanzi bonobos, who taught the Yerkish intermediary language, consisting of keys with abstract images (lexigrams), some keys were written as such images words. And Kanzi remembered them.

Have you ever seen what an “innately” literate person does when he cannot remember exactly how a particular word is spelled? He writes both possible options on a piece of paper - and then one of them with disgust covers up, thickly, thickly, so that it becomes completely invisible. Keyword here - disgust: indeed, an incorrectly spelled word causes a lot of negative emotions in an "innately" literate person. He writes about this: "for many literate people, the very sight of an illiterate text is painful, like the creak of foam." But writing to such a person is very easy: while it’s pleasant, it means everything is correct, and if suddenly the hand mistakenly displays the wrong letter (or the finger misses the key), the subcortical structures of the brain responsible for emotions will immediately give a signal: “fu, what a disgusting !”, and it will be possible to quickly fix everything (the main thing, it’s clear what for: something that does not cause negative emotions).

It is generally believed that "innate" literacy can be acquired by reading a lot. In most cases, this really helps, but not always: if you read too quickly, guessing words according to a general, approximate contour, you won’t see “innate” literacy - the differences in the contours of a word written correctly and a word written with an error in one letter. What to do, especially now, when almost the main indicator of the success of reading in many cases is its speed? It seems to me that exercises aimed at detailing the picture could help here: take a list of “dictionary” words, with unchecked vowels and consonants, and write out from it, for example, all words that have vowels in alphabetical order. Or all words that have the letter "and" in the second syllable. Or all words in which all consonants are “voiced” (that is, those that usually denote ringing sounds). Or, whatever, as long as appearance words became as detailed as possible. It is impossible to write "dog" with "a" after "s" if you wrote it out as a word that has "o" in it. By the way, the habit of “detailing a picture” also helps in life: such a person will not buy a fake product, whose name differs from the real one by a whole letter.

And most importantly, what should never be done is to write phonetic transcription. Especially whole words. Especially in the line - because in this case the appearance of the word with "wrong" (from the point of view of spelling) letters becomes familiar, becomes familiar and ceases to cause unambiguous negative emotions. And then, having met with the word, every time you will have to painfully choose which of the two equally familiar pictures is correct. Remember all the rules and exceptions - and so on for almost every letter in a word. Terrible prospect, isn't it? So, if you don't want to suffer, learn by looking at the right words.

Some people write as easily as they breathe. Others make many mistakes in writing. The help of computer programs to some extent helps out those who are not very literate. But programs are not perfect and can make mistakes too. Perhaps because they were created by illiterate people?

Words with a lot of "o" sound, such as "milk", "good", "powder" will be spelled correctly by most northerners and "okay" regions of Russia. Why? It’s just that since childhood, people have heard and remembered the sound of words, so writing is given to them easily and without problems.

Hearing words is often displayed in their spelling. If in any locality it is customary to say, for example, “flyers”, instead of “flyed”, then the majority will write as they hear. The same is true for verb endings. There are regions where it is customary to pronounce words by cutting off their endings, for example, "he is talking" instead of "he is talking."

Becoming schoolchildren, children sincerely do not understand why it is necessary to write differently than everyone around says. After all, their parents taught them to speak that way, which means that they should write the same way. In each case, when people's everyday speech is very different from the literary language, difficulties arise in teaching children to write correctly.

The diligence and diligence of the student is of great importance.

If a child is restless and constantly distracted by any little thing, it is difficult for him to concentrate on one thing. The purposefulness of a person, the perseverance of his character also plays a role. In addition to the environment of people speaking literary language and daily reading works of art it is imperative that you yourself study the rules of grammar and do not forget about them when writing texts. This is a guarantee that human literacy will be high.

Any person who is well versed in his highly specific issue can be called a competent specialist. This applies to people of different professions - doctors and teachers, engineers and programmers. The fact that a person is a competent specialist in tailoring, for example, does not mean at all that he knows the spelling rules well. Just like knowing these rules does not make a person an excellent cook or astronaut. And a scientist who professionally studies linguistics may not understand proper nutrition at all.

The point is that every person genetic level the direction of activity is laid in which he can best reveal his talents, manifest himself as a person. Therefore, some people perceive certain information easier and faster, while others are interested in knowledge of a completely different kind.

To confirm the correctness of the genetic theory, scientists made a unique discovery. It's about about the gene that is responsible for the literacy of a particular person. This gene is present in absolutely everyone, its influence extends to the level of literacy in any language, it manifests itself in each person in his own way.

The literacy gene is inherently unstable. As a rule, he is not all active. It happens that a person has activated that part of the gene that is responsible for literacy in a language other than his own. And no matter how much a person makes efforts to master the literacy of his native Chinese, for example, his successes are not great. And all because the human gene has the ability to have excellent literacy in the Italian language.

Let's start with the fact that innate literacy does not exist in principle, it is a myth. It's all about the wrong terminology. It would be more correct to say "linguistic flair". It perfectly helps to write everyday texts without errors. It can be developed in a child from childhood; specific requirements have been developed for this. Adults are taught too, and they call it "innate literacy courses." But this is a different service sector, these are charlatans.

Linguistic flair

Sometimes this phenomenon is called even more beautifully: the linguistic type of intelligence. There are many people who have it. They often say about themselves that they never learned any rules of the Russian language, because they do not need it. They read a lot and thus remember what words look like. Often, in order to decide which spelling of the word is correct, it is enough for them to write both options. They will immediately see which one is correct. Visual memory works - a great helper if you are dealing with simple and routine texts.

But if it occurs complex text, then no linguistic instinct will save. Without knowledge of the rules and subtleties of the language, nothing will work, miracles do not happen. There is only work.

On the features of Russian spelling

The Russian language is one of the most difficult languages ​​from a grammatical point of view. The reason for this is three completely different principles of spelling:

1. The main morphological principle is the same spelling of the main part of the word (morpheme). It is thanks to this principle that we were forced from school to check the correctness of an unstressed vowel with a single-root word, where this vowel is stressed. For example, a naughty is a prank, a young one is youth, a pig is pigs, etc.
2. The phonetic principle is the most confusing for modern man. On the one hand, he says that you need to write as you hear. Then, according to the logic of things, instead of “city”, you need to write “gorat”, or “beautiful” instead of “beautiful”. But no, this was only in ancient Russian texts. Only remnants have survived in our language. For example, semolina with one "n" from semolina with a double "n". Or a crystal with one “l” and crystallization with two “l” from a crystal with again a double “l” ... Regarding the rules and exceptions according to the phonetic principle, the best answer to the question “why” will be only one: “because”. No system, in a word.
3. Historical principle with a group of words and expressions, the spelling of which has developed historically. There are "single words" like sand or master without any related historical words. Or a rule from the category “do not believe our ears,” according to which “zhi” and “shi” must be written through “and”. The rule came from the Old Slavonic soft pronunciation of words with these letters. And again, no system.
4. Everyone who writes in Russian needs to know more than just a huge number of rules and exceptions. We must remember when and which of them is applied, and which of the three existing principles should be followed in each case. Unfortunately, the instinct of innate literacy is no help to us here.

When "linguistic intelligence" can hurt

If visual memory is silent, intuition can easily tell wrong decision. This situation often occurs if a person with a linguistic instinct comes across an unusual word. He does not know the rules, it is easier for him to trust the "inner voice".

Innate literacy is in many ways similar to innate knowledge of rules. traffic. There are drivers who are well versed on the roads, understanding the prohibitions, permits and better ways maneuvers. But there are difficult road forks or situations that can only be resolved with the help of strict rules.

Shock at total dictation

People with "innate literacy" often fall into a state of shock after the total dictation they have written.

Total dictation is a great project dedicated to literate writing in Russian. This is an annual writing test in which volunteers take dictation.

Total dictation is never simple. Therefore, many participants are immensely surprised when their visual habits do not help to master a modern literary text in Russian. The usual “I always wrote without errors” does not work in this case.

What to do with commas: punctuation literacy

It is even more difficult with punctuation, commas and other punctuation marks in Russian do not always coincide with pauses and intonations of oral speech. “Feeling a comma” is simply impossible; you need to know its semantic role and the rules for using it.

Punctuation literacy can only be learned by disassembling and forming persistent punctuation skills in the process of writing. One direct speech in Russian is worth something with the rules for its design. So with quotes, commas and other signs there is no other way.

Quackery and magic courses

If you are invited to courses in innate literacy for schoolchildren or adults, you are looking at pure charlatans.

First, we agreed that there is intuitive literacy acquired in childhood. Innate literacy does not exist in fact, this is a consequence of incorrect terminology.

Secondly, even if we admit the possibility of the existence of an innate phenomenon, then nothing innate can be taught. Like, for example, one cannot be taught to sing a great soprano, because this is an innate property of the voice.

Charlatans don't care about that. “Ultra-modern top-class mega-course” is the only way their wonderful courses are called. “Neurolinguistics, the unconscious level and the launch of a program in the brain” are the favorite expressions and arguments of the organizers of this kind of service. Unfortunately, they find their consumers, the demand for "innate literacy courses for schoolchildren" still exists.

What really works

The phenomenon of innate literacy has been well studied, so the factors of its formation have long been identified:

• The ethnicity of the family in which the child grows up. This refers to the dialect spoken by the parents. Among southerners, for example, intuitive literacy is less common: their phonetics differs from classical spelling.
• The famous Russian teacher Ushinsky always objected to the study foreign language in early childhood. The argument was that when using a second (non-Russian) language in everyday conversations, innate literacy was less common. “Bilingualism” in the family also interfered.
• The language environment for the child: the more diverse and competent the speech of the parents, the more connections and patterns are formed in the child's brain. This also includes reading aloud to a child - a great and affordable tool for educating a language instinct.

• Of course, independent reading. It is important that the books and texts in them are of high quality.
• Letter, letter and more letter. Even simple rewriting of the text. In this case, the most powerful kinetic one is added to the visual memorization mechanisms.

Linguistic flair will not grow in an empty place. Imaginative thinking, tenacious children's memory and the ability to visual perception will be useful here. In a word, the child needs to be taken seriously. From a very young age, we observe the following rules, which can be generally referred to as the “method of innate literacy”:

• We are not too lazy to talk with the child, we follow the speech.
• We read aloud to the child as much as he asks (and even more).
• We filter books, select only valuable sources from an artistic and stylistic point of view.
• We do not stop reading aloud, even if the child has learned to read on his own ( the most important rule).
• We teach and say poems, ask to retell the read books.
• We initiate independent writing by hand: postcards for the holidays, wall newspapers, thick beautiful notebooks in the form of diaries, etc. - if only the child writes.

We work separately with children who already have a sense of language. They usually don't want to learn the rules and see no benefit in them. These children usually have problems with punctuation. best method for schoolchildren with innate literacy - from example to rule (at school they teach vice versa). You need to parse several similar phrases with conclusions and a rule that will appear by itself, according to logic.

And we do not stop ourselves, the Russian language needs to be studied all my life. This is such a language...

As a scientific expression, the wording "innate literacy" is incorrect. In fact, what kind of innateness can we talk about if a child at birth has nothing more than the ability to develop speech? He not only does not speak, but may not master speech at all if he is not brought up in a certain way. social environment(remember the real Mowgli - children raised by animals).

Literacy is acquired. And the expression “innate literacy” reflects surprise and admiration for people who, without making any visible effort, write correctly. They have a kind of intuition that tells them that this is the right thing to do. Ask such a person why it is right, he will not be able to explain rationally. He will only say: “I feel this way”, “this is beautiful”, “this sounds better”.

Therefore, innate literacy is more correctly called the “sense of language”.

A little bit about yourself

People with a good sense of language are not uncommon. I can say that, since more or less consistent school memories, I have not experienced problems with literacy. Dictations, presentations only "excellent", while I did not use the rules. At a break before the Russian language lesson, I read the necessary rule, hammering it into short memory in order to answer in the lesson, and then it safely flew out of my head.

If there was any doubt about how to write a word, I wrote down the spelling options on a draft. You look at them, and it is immediately clear that this spelling is correct.

It would seem that here it is, innate literacy! But my mother says that my literacy was not always as good as I remember. In the first or second grade of the school there were both mistakes and insulting typos. Syllables changed places, letters were skipped. By the way, oh primary school I don't have consistent and clear memories. Only a few are remembered simple rules: “zhi-shi” and “cha-scha”, how to check the endings “-tsya” and “-tsya”, “not” is written separately with verbs.

But I remember my first teacher well. We loved her. Nadezhda Vasilievna was young, just from the institute, and our class was her first. She treated us very responsibly, tried to ensure that every child in the class had time. On the classroom hours she read interesting children's books to us, I vividly remember "Dunno on the Moon" and my impression of the weightlessness scene (the beginning of the book).

When we were accepted as pioneers, Nadezhda Vasilievna suggested publishing a newspaper. It was called "Pioneer Voice". At first things went sluggishly, but then I was put in charge of the newspaper. Mom says what it was common decision- her and the teacher. The newspaper was a piece of Whatman paper, on which it was necessary to write in a beautiful handwriting and without errors. I remember that at first I wrote with a pencil, and then I traced with a pen. Six months later she gave up the pencil, and began to write immediately cleanly and without errors.

In my subjective opinion, it was the work on the wall newspaper that finally shaped my sense of language. It cannot be said that in early age I read a lot, a little more than I should, but not too much. I began to read a lot and systematically from about 10 years old. At the same time, at the age of 3, I could recite “Moydodyr” by heart. Relatives recall how in early childhood I “tortured” them with requests to read, and I could listen to the same thing several times.

This is a subjective experience. Let's try to figure out what is natural and what is accidental.

What does innate literacy depend on?

Psychologists and educators agree that the sense of language does not depend on any special innate qualities, although some properties of memory and information analysis can provide advantages.

The child learns the language first by imitation, then the parts are put together in a system, he begins to use the language, with time more and more perfectly.

The researchers note that at an early stage, the ethnicity of the family plays an important role. And although now dialects are increasingly being squeezed out under the influence of the media, the dialect of the inhabitants of the northern, central regions of Russia, the Volga region is still different from the southerners. It is more difficult for southerners to develop an intuition for literacy, because the phonetics of their dialects differ more from the standard spelling.

It has also been observed that in bilingual families, especially when native language(not Russian) is used as a language of everyday communication, the phenomenon of "innate literacy" is rare. By the way, the wonderful Russian teacher Konstantin Ushinsky was against it for this very reason.

This means that the first influence on the sense of language is exerted by the language environment in which the child grows up. The more competent, correct, richer the speech of the parents, the more good children's literature is read to the child, the more "linguistic" information is processed by his brain. Processes, therefore, establishes connections and patterns.

Sooner or later the child begins to read. In the process of reading, the so-called "image of the word" appears and is fixed - the child associates the sound complex already familiar to him with the graphic spelling of the word. If a child is endowed with a good visual memory, the spelling of words willy-nilly be deposited in memory. At the same time, an important condition is high-quality, well-structured, highly artistic texts, and, of course, they must be free of typos.

The phonetic reading channel is the main one, but not the only one. Quite a large part of the rules of the language is based on morphological and other principles. Often repeated, they are involuntarily recognized by the child as certain patterns. So language models can be mastered intuitively.

And the sense of language is fixed by writing. It is no coincidence that simple text copying tasks are so common in elementary school. Kinetic (motor) is added to the visual image through writing. It is through the kinetic image that a person evaluates the correspondence of the written word to a certain standard that is fixed in the mind.

This is how it turns out that a person knows not the rules, but the logic of spelling, and feels this logic as a “sense of language”. The exact scientific definition of this concept would be:

A sense of language is a phenomenon of intuitive language proficiency, manifested in the understanding and use of idiomatic, lexical, stylistic and other constructions even before the purposeful mastery of the language in teaching. It is a generalization at the level of primary generalization without prior conscious isolation of the elements included in this generalization. It is formed as a result of spontaneous mastery of speech and basic cognitive operations. Provides control and evaluation of the correctness and familiarity of language constructs.

Cit. Quoted from: Gohlerner M. M., Weiger G. V. The psychological mechanism of feeling the language // Questions of Psychology. 1982, No. 6, pp. 137-142.

How to develop a child's sense of language?

Unconsciously, a sense of language is developed in a person with dominant figurative thinking, a tenacious memory, and a good perception of visual information.

But this does not mean that a sense of language is not available to children with other psychophysiological characteristics. It will come with a little effort.

Listening, reading and developing memory

We have already spoken about the importance of what the child hears and what he reads. At an early age, before the child begins to read on his own, it is necessary:

1. Watch your speech, talk a lot with the child.
2. Teach your child to read, read to him as much as he asks.
3. Do not read everything in a row, select the most valuable works in artistic and stylistic terms.
4. When the child begins to read a little, spell the words with him.
5. If a child has started reading independently before school, do not interrupt the tradition of reading aloud.
6. Pay special attention to the development of memory. Memorize poems, play memory games, ask him to retell a book he has read.

We write

Success will come faster if the child is interested in writing correctly and beautifully. To do this, you can use the following methods:

1. Start a tradition of issuing a family congratulatory newspaper for birthdays, major holidays. Let the child be responsible for writing the text.
2. It is very useful to sign postcards for the holidays to all relatives and friends. Let it not be accepted now, try it, and you will be surprised how happy the recipients of postcards will be. And the child will gain invaluable experience.
3. Try writing a chronicle with your child. Tell and show how books were written in antiquity, before the invention of the printing press. Buy a very beautiful thick notebook or decorate a regular one. Other details you can think of yourself. You can record events at home and at school, news, impressions from books and films in the annals. At first, write the text on a draft so that the child rewrites it clean. Over time, discard the draft. You can also rewrite some real ancient chronicle, for example, The Tale of Bygone Years.

If the child makes mistakes when copying the text, require him to spell the words as they are written (goat, tooth). It is necessary that the child pronounce letters that are not pronounced, highlight weak beats.

Additional rewriting exercises should be introduced when the child has already learned to write well enough (not earlier than the 2nd grade of the school).

Difficulties

“Innate literacy” has its downside.

If a child writes without thinking about the rules, he does not have a need to learn them. A sense of the language does not guarantee excellent writing of Russian language tests, because they test knowledge of the rules. It does not guarantee "five" in the lessons - when the teacher asks why it is written this way and not otherwise, the child cannot give the right rule.

In addition, Russian language teachers know that children with great language skills often have problems with punctuation. And the reason is the same - I don’t want to learn the rules, because there is no benefit from this.

If you put pressure on a child, force him to cram in spite of common sense, knowledge will not be solid. He may begin to complain that the rules only confuse him, that he begins to doubt the correct spelling.

With such a child, you need to study according to the method - from example to rule (at school they usually do the opposite). Write down a few suitable phrases with him, ask him to reason - what they have in common, what conclusion can be drawn from this. Then the rule will arise by itself, without difficulty, in the process of observing the facts of the language. This approach does not contradict the child's intuition and does not require much time.

Test your sense of language. Think of the word you are unsure about spelling. Write down the spellings on a piece of paper. Look at them - do you have a feeling that any of them are correct?