After spelling homework struggles for their son Freddy (then 6) over the word “because”, Auckland musicians Steph Brown and Fen Ikner tried something different: they turned it into a Ramones-style punk song.
Then their three-year-old Charlie, who was still learning the alphabet at the time, started wandering around the house spelling it perfectly.
“It was of absolutely no use to him at the time. He was still learning his letters,” Steph said.
The North Shore couple — best known for their Silver Scroll-winning band Lips and who also perform and record with some of the biggest names in music globally — eventually turned the idea into a project called Spellodies after discovering the songs worked better than flashcards.
The group focuses on the nightmare words young kids can’t simply sound out — words like “people”, “friend” and “school” that ignore the normal rules of phonics.
