About the author

I am a mum of 4 living in Geneva, Switzerland. (Needless to say, most families here start life with at least 2 languages.) My eldest daughter was sailing through the spell lists she brought home from school every week. Whatever word lists she was given to learn, no matter how varied, she could master them quickly. However, it was different with my second daughter. Frustration started to build with the spelling lists she brought home. Learning to write words was one thing, but remembering how to write them the following week – when also faced with a new list – was an impossible task for her. My second daughter was then diagnosed with dyslexia and short-term verbal memory challenges.

I’ve learned a lot over 3 years. Over 5 years of research. No matter what learning challenge a child may have, the same learning still has to be done. But carried out at a much slower pace, with a lot of repetition, logical structure and ‘anchors’. All these elements are essential for success. The exercises in the many books I acquired to assist her – over 10 different authors and not to mention the numerous internet websites – were neither repetitive nor structured so as to enable my daughter to recall how to spell the words correctly after a short time, let alone the long term. She saw a lake of words, all jumbled up and swimming around in it. I was recommended to concentrate on the 300 most used words in English. We spent one year learning these words, but with a 50% success rate. Retention still tapered off with time. I needed something different. I knew there had to be a better way forward.

My daughter was doing well in her maths and was able to follow the logical steps in solving maths problems. It was then I started researching “ A logical approach to spelling”. I couldn`t find one definitive book to aid me, but I put various puzzle pieces together and discovered that there was a beautiful way to learn to spell in English. We just need a good logical structure. Like in Maths, you learn the rule/method, understand the “why” and you then apply. This is exactly what this book is about.

Jurina Dean