What is the difference between a dictation and a spelling test?

A spelling test and a dictation often look the same from the student's seat: someone reads, and you write. The difference is in what is being read and what is being measured. A spelling test reads a list of separate words. A dictation reads a passage, with sentences, punctuation and words that depend on each other. The what is dictation guide explains the word itself, and this page sets it against the spelling test.

A spelling test checks words, a dictation checks a passage

A dictation in the school sense is a test in which a teacher reads a passage aloud and the students write it down. Language classes use it this way too: a piece of writing is dictated to students learning a foreign language ¹. The passage is the unit, so the score reflects spelling, listening and the ability to hear where one word ends and the next begins.

A spelling test is built around words. It gives a list, reads each word, and the student writes it, sometimes in a sentence. Researchers measure spelling in both ways. In a 2016 study of Italian first graders, the children spelled words and pseudo-words to dictation, and spelled words spontaneously, as two separate tasks ². The dictated version was harder, and this held for low achievers and for children with spelling impairments too.

A dictation tests more than spelling

Because a passage has punctuation and grammar, a dictation can show more than a list can. The Hong Kong Education Bureau's guidance on dictation for primary English teachers says dictation helps learners develop phonological awareness and phonics skills, listening skills and writing skills ³. The same handbook says dictation is more than a testing device, and is a useful tool for teachers to understand how learning is progressing ⁴.

The scoring rules matter as much as the format. The same handbook says marks should not be deducted for repeated mistakes in a dictation, because the same misspelt word several times does not show the same ability as several different errors ⁵. A spelling test that marks every repeat as a new error will give a different picture from one that counts each spelling once.

The two tests measure partly different skills

The 2016 study of Italian first graders found a moderate link between the two tasks, which the authors read as showing that they are supported by partially different spelling processes ⁶.

That result is the most useful guide to the choice. A word list alone can miss how a child spells inside running text. A passage alone can hide which words a child does not know. The study is of Italian children, so an English classroom may show a different pattern. It is one study, not a final answer.

It depends on what you want to measure

• If you want to know whether a child knows a set list of words, a spelling test is the direct check. Use the list the child has studied.
• If you want to know how a child spells in real sentences, and whether they hear and punctuate them, use a dictation.
• If you are a homeschool parent or teacher following Charlotte Mason's method, the dictation is a prepared lesson with the passage studied first, and is for teaching more than scoring. See what dictation is in the Charlotte Mason method.
• If you are testing a language you are learning, a dictation of a passage is a common check, because it shows listening as well as spelling.
• If you are unsure, use both. The study above found that they tell you different things.

What to do

1. Decide what you want the result to show: word knowledge, spelling in context, or listening.
2. For a spelling test, read a list of words from the same material the child has studied, one word at a time.
3. For a dictation, choose a passage of a few sentences and read it one clause at a time, once each.
4. Score each spelling once, even when it repeats, so a single weakness is not counted many times.
5. Compare the two results over a term. A child who scores well on lists but poorly on passages has a different problem from one who struggles with both.

Both formats are sometimes confused with transcription, which is turning a recording into text. For that difference, see dictation vs transcription. For how the early writing exercises relate to dictation, see dictation vs copywork. A homophone, such as "their" and "there", shows the difference clearly: a word list can only check that each word is spelled, while a passage shows whether the right spelling was chosen in context. The dictation glossary entry and the dictation overview cover the wider subject.