Regie Routman has some great ideas that she shares in Writing Essentials. The topic that stood out the most to me in chapters 7-9 was spelling. According to Routman, “Students who struggle mightily with spelling or worry unnecessarily about perfect spelling do not write fluently or easily.” (p. 161) But in the age of spell check, I feel like spelling has been pushed to the side in many schools.
In my school, the fifth grade teachers decided to forego their usual spelling program this year because they felt they could use their class time in a more productive way. I grew up always having a spelling test at the end of each week, so I was curious to see how my teacher would integrate spelling into her literacy teaching.
I think that even without using a specific spelling program, teachers can help their students become better spellers and Routman gave some great tips on how to do this. Her first tip is to create a learning environment that encourages students to be good spellers. This includes having spelling references available, opportunities to write, talk, and read about words, and time to write everyday. (p. 162) She also says that teachers need to value spelling approximations. When students learn how to spell by rote memorization, they are not necessarily learning how letters and sounds work. But students who are given the opportunity to use invented spelling can gain a better understanding of the spelling system and are likely to write more since they are focused on spelling every word correctly. (p. 162)
Routman cautions not to let invented spellings go too far though. She says that while it is okay for students to misspell unfamiliar words, they should be expected to spell frequently used words. Many spelling errors in a paper can make it difficult for a reader to concentrate on what the author is trying to say. So a final tip from Routman is to tell our students why correct spelling is important. Unless students understand the importance of spelling, they are unlikely to give it the attention it deserves. (p. 164)
Routman’s views on spelling were especially interesting to me since it is a topic that has been discussed at my school recently. How does your teacher approach spelling instruction? Do you think weekly spelling tests are important? What else did you find interesting in Writing Essentials?
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ReplyDeleteIn my 5th grade classroom, and across the other three 5th grade language arts classrooms, eliminating the "word study" (spelling year-long unit) was considered. The teacher's guide carries in it word study lists, activities, spelling concepts and supplementary lesson ideas, pre-made tests, etc- the whole works is in that book. The thought of eliminating the program was for a reason just as you said- to save time for other instruction.
ReplyDeleteAs I see it, spelling is being "weeded out" by technological advances. I certainly don't agree with what I'm seeing. I consider myself to be a great speller, and a problem solver when it comes to unfamiliar words. I credit this to my weekly spelling tests and word lists throughout my years of elementary school. I hope when my fifth graders turn 23 they can claim their spelling skills as highly as I can mine.
My MT stresses to my students that in their journal writings "spelling doesn't count"; "don't worry about the spelling." When we write poems, we type up the final copy and use that handy red underlining tool to determine spelling corrections. I see this as a problem too. It's like letting every math computation go through a calculator- you don't LEARN it, you don't DISCOVER it, you don't CARE about it. I hope our standards of spelling and learning how to spell do not continue to digress.
Back to "word study." Our 5th grade language arts teachers conferenced and made the decision to keep the program; only to use it to a minimum. On Mondays, word lists are passed out for students to study for Friday's test. On Wednesday, the intern teaches a concept from the unit (there's usually 1-3 concepts, we are to teach one-For instance, today I taught the concept that long vowel sounds are usually spelled with two vowels, while short vowel sounds are usually spelled with one vowel). Homework is given out after the concept lesson. Homework is due Thursday, and the spelling test is Friday. This Friday our kids will have their first spelling test, and I'm anxious to see how well they do. From seeing their previous work, many aren't strong spellers- but I'm not underestimating any one of them. One student today insisted on the correct spelling of ukelele, but my CT didn't believe him on it. :-)
Was "word study" the spelling program in your school? What does the spelling program look like in others' schools?
Last year at I was in a fourth grade classroom and the students would have spelling lists that they would have to memorize and regurgitate for their weekly test. The word lists had no correlation or context with what was going on with the class and after the spelling test was over the pressure to know how to spell the words correctly was over.
ReplyDeleteThis year, I'm in a fifth grade classroom in the same school that Aimee is at and my students do not have spelling tests. Instead, the teacher is approaching spelling in a different way. I remember her putting a importance on the skill of spelling competency because it's way of communication and the "spellcheck" feature will not always be available to use in class and the future writing. To still integrate spelling into their language arts curriculum, she has ideas to do lessons on prefixes, suffixes and other methods to aid students in spelling out words. We are also doing Daily Oral Language (D.O.L) exercises that go over conventions and frequently misspelled words. It seems like smaller strides at the moment, but I feel that this approach to spelling is something that will have students understand spelling words instead of memorizing a list.
I like the spelling curriculum in Writing Essentials where the framework of the spelling program requires "writing for authentic purpose and audiences, developing spelling consciousness, word study investigation, and on going assessment and evaluation" (p.161) I feel that the lists that were given out in my fourth grade class were missing a large part of these components with having a spelling tests every week. In my fifth grade class this year I feel we are on a better path to help students "..learn...discover, and care about spelling", as Kara mentioned.
I think being able to spell correctly is important; especially because it is directly linked to reading competency. "Competent spellers are almost always competent readers" (p. 161) Students that have a ease of spelling also have an ease in writing because they don't have to focus on figuring out how to spell a word and can rather focus on their writing thoughts. However, I don't think having students rewrite a list of personally irrelevant words is the best way to produce good spellers and feel that time can be used for spelling competency in a different approach.
This topic couldn’t have come at a better time for me. Over the past few days, my MT and I have been giving out the spelling inventory assessment in order to see the strengths and weaknesses of our students. This test has been very helpful as we now know which direction to take for instruction. In fact, I feel that any spelling test would give a teacher good feedback to show how the students are doing. I had the chance to talk with my MT about why spelling instruction is so important. One of the things we talked about was how they waste so much time trying to find proper spelling during writing period. Even though we constantly tell students, “don’t worry about spelling right now….we will edit later”, they still manage to sit at their desk and just stare at their papers if they don’t know how to spell a word. In both of our opinions, they are wasting spelling time with their writing time.
ReplyDeleteIn our class, there is a designated time to practice spelling which is in word study period. They have it about 4 times a week. Students have tasks such as arrange the list of words in ABC order, write a sentence with each word in it, write the definition of each word, write each word 5 times, write a story using each word, determine if each word is a noun, verb, adjective, etc. They are given a new list of words each week. In ‘Writing Essentials’, I like the part that talks about ‘word study and investigation’. I feel like our classroom indeed investigates words and it seems like a good strategy to help kids with their spelling. The book also says, “Competent spellers are almost always competent readers. They also write more and do it better and more easily.” This may be perhaps my favorite quote of the whole chapter. Since my MT and I just got done talking about how spelling almost always interferes with our students’ writing competency. It is a stumbling block for them and it is hindering them from becoming better writers which is why spelling instruction is so important.
Another part of our book mentioned how students should have opportunities to read words. I was a little bit concerned after reading this. My students do spend a lot of time reading words. But, I couldn’t help to think that our classroom walls are kind of bare, with a little amount of literacy being displayed. We don’t even have the typical border of ABC’s. I think it would be beneficial to have more words on our walls like a word wall or something. Maybe even a list of most common misspelled words. One thing I might try during writing time is to write on the white board or Promethean board what I think will be common words used….the ones that may be difficult to spell. For example, if students are asked to write about their favorite restaurant, I will automatically put up the word restaurant as well as other common words they may end up needing help with such as waitress or delicious. And every time a student asks how to spell a word not on the list, I will add it to the list just in case someone needs the same word later on. Does anyone else have any ideas on how to make a classroom more of a spelling environment? What are some ways that you all have seen your teachers create a spelling environment?