Spelling in the early years…and in the later years too

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  • April 1, 2013 at 11:10 pm
    tld
    Participant

    I believe Charlotte Mason recommended spelling instruction beginning the end of 3rd grade through 9th grade. And her primary means was via dicatation. I believe some of the reason for this is the thinking that they need to learn to read and write well first so they aren’t thinking so much about the mechanics of writing and can focus on picturing the words first.

    I like the idea of my kids learning spelling rules and I was heavily contemplating doing All About Spelling next year with my 1st grader. We’ll be finishing All About Reading level 1 this year, and after completion of that level, the company recommends starting All About Spelling. I like the ideas of the two programs complementing each other, but I know it’s not CM-like, and so that’s why I’m questioning it.

    If we don’t to AAS, there won’t be a writing componant to his phonics/reading instruction. Is that a big deal if he seems to be progessing in his reading without it?

    I’ve heard a couple people say that they suspect kids are too young in 1st and 2nd grade to really remember spelling rules. Does anyone have experience with this one way or the other?

    On the long-term, do any of you teach spelling all the way through 9th grade, and does it look different in the older years?

    All thoughts on this are welcome as I try to figure out the route I will take with spelling instruction.

    April 2, 2013 at 6:11 am
    MamaSnow
    Participant

    We did about a level-and-a-half of AAS when my dd was in first grade. Initially I thought it was helpful for her, but about midway through level 2 we were both getting bored with it and decided to drop it. (She was starting to complain the words in it were “too easy” and she wanted to learn “harder words”) She is still on the young side for full-blown CM style dictation (7.5 yo 2nd grader), but we are still doing a couple of very quick, informal things to help with spelling in the meantime:

    – When she does her copywork, I have encouraged her to try to look at and visualize each word as a whole word, and then try and write it from memory rather than copying letter-by-letter. THis is called transcription, and was also recommended by CM as a transition between copywork and dictation.

    – Occasionally I will ask her if there are any words that were tricky for her, or hard to remember. Then we’ll do a quick spot lesson on that word, talk a little bit about the sounds, if there are any special phonograms to take note of, do a little bit of word building to make other words containing that sound (we kept the AAS letter tiles for this purpose). I have the book “the ABC’s and all their Tricks” to help as a reference with this, but any phonics book arranged by sounds could be used. This is working very well for us. It is cheap, efficient, and tailored to her needs rather than working through a program that covers many things she had already figured out intuitively.

    I plan to do this for the remainder of this year, and then transition to full dictation next year.

    HTH some,

    Jen

    April 2, 2013 at 12:59 pm
    HollyS
    Participant

    We plan on doing dictation for spelling through high school (I believe Spelling Wisdom goes through 12th grade).  My feelings are that the younger grades should be focused on phonics and spelling saved for later.  Classical HSers generally start spelling at 1st grade since spelling rules are different than phonics rules.  So far my older two have been natural spellers and dictation has been a great fit (I tried R&S Spelling with my oldest and it didn’t seem to be a good use of time for us).  If I had a child who struggled with spelling (or though spelling rules were important to learn), I’d consider adding it.  One of my DC struggles with writing, so we added a writing program, even if it isn’t necessarily CM.  In short, I think you should go with whatever you feel will be best for your DC.  If you think they need a spelling program, give it a try!  I think the CM methods should be a suggestion only…I like to give each method a good try, but if it doesn’t work, I move on to what does work for my DC and me.

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