Noah Webster (1758-1843) is best known for his "American Dictionary of the English Language", but is also famous for his American Spelling Book, a hugely popular textbook for young children in the 19th century. In fact, The American Spelling book is one of the best selling books of all time, with over 100 million copies sold. Known as Webster's "Blue Back Speller" due to its distinctive blue cover, this book not only teaches students how to read and spell, but also includes lessons on family values, ethics and government, which Webster found to be vital to a child's education, and which makes this speller especially valuable for modern life. This Apple Books edition is an exact replica of the original, and modern fonts have been used for ease of reading. The typesetting of this digital edition includes bolded main accents, which makes it easier for students to better visualize the accented syllable. This is a valuable improvement that will help modern learners quickly grasp the fundamentals of reading. Webster considered multisyllabic words easy for young students, and taught them right away. The use of this speller will therefore engage young people with reading complex words much sooner than they would with modern reading programs, therefore placing learners and readers of this book at an incredible advantage.
