How do you teach spelling?

[Renthead Mommy]

I do not spell well. I never have. Because of it, I question everything I write, often simple words that I'm sure I've spelled correctly, but they just don't always look correct. Spell check is my friend. I was just never taught to spell. All I remember of spelling lessons in school is fill in the blank type things and copying words 5 times over. That didn't really do it for me. Nothing about spelling comes natural to me.

My son is 6 1/2. So far spelling seems to be more natural to him. He hasn't had any problems. However most of the words he's had so far are fairly simple and staight forward. Currently he is going to the school down the street for the second half of 1st grade. He is given 12 words a week. He says they don't 'do' spelling at school other than the test, but I think they must be using the words during something and just not calling it 'spelling'.

He enjoys a spelling 'test' of sorts, so every day we review the words. I basically give him a test. I say them and he either writes them or does them orally. Any he has problems with he then writes 4 times. On Friday he takes his school test.

At the start of our year, we were using Spelling Workout. On the weeks he does not have school issued spelling words (short school weeks, etc) we do the Spelling Workout to finish up the book. I like it fine, however it, like what I had growing up, is basically fill in the blank with the word. Again we do the daily review/'test' and a test at the end of the week.

While he always does well with his words, I feel like right now he's just lucking out because they are simpler words. I just don't feel like I'm teaching him how to spell them as much as he's just getting these and I'm worried about what will happen when the words get more difficult.

Should there be more to a spelling program than fill in the blank and copy the words X number of times? Should I considering getting the Teacher's Book for Spelling Workout B for next year? Does it contain more actual teaching in it? Or is it simply the answers to the fill ins and such? What do you do to actually 'teach' spelling?

[Lovedtodeath]

Well, I use a program that teaches the phonetic rules to spelling and includes studied dictation. A good example of phonetic spelling is All About Spelling. A good example of studied dictation is Simply Spelling and Spelling Wisdom.

When I was in school, we wrote our spelling words in sentences and copied the words 10 times each everyday until the test. That was it! I would rather err on the side of caution and have my spelling entail a little more than that, because some students end up needing more.

[Karin]

My eldest was in ps from k-2 and is a natural speller, so I don't teach her spelling.

My second one is very visual spatial and has a hard time with spelling. We have tried many methods, but what has worked best is rote copying of her spelling words. Writing them in the context of sentences failed miserably for learning to spell. She has figured out, on her own, to say words so that she can remember how to spell them (My brain is freezing on the term for this, but someone might say "sep air ate" to remember that there are 2 a's in separate).

I'm just figuring out the best way to teach ds now, so will check back. He just zoomed ahead in reading a few months ago, and wants to spell everything phonetically, which I don't like because that's what my 10 yo vs dd did, and it made her spelling even worse (or so it seemed to me.)

As for a method, we have Spelling Power, except for grade 4 (the grade level my eldest was in when we started spelling at home) for which we have A Beka because I bought that my very first year before I figured out what works best for us. We've tried Spelling Workout for my younger two, but I found it useless for spelling, although it helped ds learn to follow written directions.

[WendyK]

Based on my own unscientific observation, some people are natural spellers and others are not. Some people just seem to have a knack for it. Those who do not, have to work a lot harder at being good spellers. I am a natural speller. I never had to work hard at spelling. My sister, on the other hand, was never good at spelling. (Otherwise we both did equally well in school.) Once my sister had a job working with a doctor. She had to really focus on making sure she spelled words correctly on notes she took that went into patient's records. She put the pedal to the metal and everyday after work she worked on learning to memorize the words she most often encountered in her job that she spelled incorrectly. She was able to become quite good at it. There was nothing natural, nor easy about the process though. It involved a lot of memorization. She carried around lists of drugs and medical terms in her pocket to help her.

I have no idea why this is. I was like my father in terms of spelling and my mother wasn't a good speller. Maybe it is genetic. :)

All that said, I personally have no use for spelling rules. Maybe spelling rules help those who aren't natural spellers?

[nukeswife]

We love All About Spelling (http://www.allaboutspelling.com/fawkesacademy), it's a multisensory phonics approach that teaches the kids the different phonograms for the letters and uses letter tiles to make it more fun and hands on. My kids hated the workbook spelling curriculums we tried. AAS has been so much more fun for all of us and my kids are doing really well with it. My dd is 7 and is a late bloomer when it comes to reading and I've noticed that her reading is getting better since we started AAS.

[Kuovonne]

I think that there are a lot of ways to teach spelling, just as children learn in different ways and at different rates. I also think that it is hard to gauge how well a spelling program works for a child until the child actually does writing outside of spelling lessons.

I use a blend of phonetic rules, copywork, studied dictation, and spaced repetition (overteaching) to teach my daughter spelling. It is working well for us, but I can't tell for sure since DD doesn't do much writing outside of spelling. I started spelling with Spell to Write and Read before switching to this method. I use a combination of words from SWR and Spelling Plus.

[ElizabethB]

In fact, I was a very poor speller. I would miss, on average, 5 to 6 words per page. However, I could identify misspelled words if given a list and ironically scored high on spelling on the IOWA tests every year.

I got a bit of phonics in K and then whole word methods in 1st grade. I was a good reader but a poor speller.

After I started tutoring with phonics and learning the sound-spelling rules that govern English, I learned how to spell! I now only misspell about 1 word every page or two, on average.

The rules were very helpful for me. I would recommend a rule based spelling program instead of random lists of words. A lot of people here like AAS, and the samples I've seen are good.

I have all the rules and sound spelling correspondences I learned from teaching spelling in my free online spelling lessons (http://www.thephonicspage.org/On%20Spelling/spellinglessonsl.html).

This thread has some good links to online lists of spelling rules:

http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=77560