Teach your child how to spell

I've never had an eight year old in any of my classes who can spell. Yes, there have been a few who aren't far off, but not one who is really up to standard. This always amazes me.

Spelling is one of the easiest things you can help your child with.

http://db.tt/MLuQIQgp

This dropbox link will unload a worksheet I have been using for several years. It's simple to use.

1. Ask your child to think about all of their favourite words.
2. "Don't worry about your spellings, just write one of those words in each box, i'll be able to help you with your spellings if you do this"
3. Make it fun. When they get stuck, call out connected words to remind them. Look around the room- "Television, toys, sofa, curtains!". Get a laugh with this one- "Look at my clothes- shirt, trousers, socks, oops- underpants!"
4. Only spend five minutes doing this. Occasionally a child will love the challenge so much they'll keep on writing words for a full hour, but as is is the first step in a process, let them finish quickly if they want to.

Your job is to review and correct the spellings. Do this on your own, and make a list of misspelt words. Help your child to practice spelling them, to write sentences using them, and at the end of the week, test them and offer a fantastic day out as the reward.

(NB if you want me to upload more worksheets, help me to increase my Dropbox allowance by joining via my referral link http://db.tt/Mi0rvaf It's free to join, and you can host your own files there safely too. A great way to back up your family photos, perhaps?)


How it works

Children- and adults- have a set vocabulary. Every now and then we learn a new word, but otherwise we use the same list of words in our writing. Your child will only think of words they use in this task. If they try to write 'eliminate' it's one of their words and they need to learn it. If not, they'll write 'get rid of' instead, three words they can already write. Expanding vocabulary is something we'll look at in the future on Power Parents, but for now, help your child to be able to spell every word in their personal vocabulary. Do it yourself too- if you have always struggled to spell 'favourite', learn it today. The wonderful thing about spelling is that once you've learnt how to spell a word, and learnt what it means, you're never going to forget how to spell that word.

In school

So why are schools accepting bad spelling? We're focussed on content. The average eight year old will produce between ten and fifteen pages of writing a week, and whilst spelling mistakes are noted, pupils generally do not correct them- at least in any of the classes i've audited. This means that unless pupils pick up spellings naturally, spelling levels at the end of Y6 are often atrocious. Spelling tests do not work; children are so different nowadays that providing three different lists of spellings for three ability groups will always alienate a third of the class- those who work at home and thus already know the spellings they've been given, and those who will never practice spellings at home and so are turned off learning after a few weeks of getting 1/10.

The solution

If you follow this plan, your child will be a fantastic speller in just a few months, and be ready to develop their vocabulary to High School level years before anticipated. That's your solution that will give your child the confidence and enthusiasm to become great writers.

For schools, the solution is technological. I've had incredible success recently using my ipad and this software: http://pyromediaapps.com/this-weeks-words/
It's one you can use at home on your iphone, ipod touch, or ipad too. Every Monday you (or a Teaching Assistant in school) input spellings for each child from their previous week's writing. The pupils spend ten minutes playing three rounds of games connected to learning only words that they have shown they cannot spell. The success rate is brilliant- i've seen over 80% of inputted words being spelt correctly two weeks after using this app.