The Diagnostic Spelling Test - Morphology (DiST-m) assesses a person’s ability to apply morphological regularities in spelling. The DiSTm assesses the spelling of some of the most commonly used suffixes (e.g., past tense -ed) and some very consistent morphologically-based spelling rules. The test can be used with Primary School (from around Grade 3) and High School students to test which of these commonly occurring spellings they have acquired. It can help determine which morphological spellings to focus on in classroom teaching and intervention.
The DiSTm is a spelling to dictation test which consists of 28 morphologically complex nonwords (e.g., trocked – the past tense of the nonword trock). These items are read aloud by the tester and the speller tries to spell the words as accurately as possible. The test can be administered to a group or to individual students.
There are currently no published norms for this test. However, an error analysis allows the tester to understand which morphological regularities the speller has and hasn’t acquired.
DiSTm
Administering DiSTm
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