Register

Young, Christina

Spelling Enrichment

 

 

          Each week your child will be given a pretest for the current week’s words.  This test will be taken inside your child’s pretest booklet.  Each week there will be between 14-16 words.  If your child gets only one or two wrong, he/she will qualify for the challenge words.  A new list of words will be devised.  They will be taken from the current topics we are studying and also from the students’ writing.  The list will be made collaboratively with the students that have qualified for the challenge words.

 

          It is your child’s choice whether or not he/she would like to participate in the challenge words.  They may qualify and then choose not to study the challenge words. If this is the case, they will take the regular spelling words during the post test.

 

          Spelling instruction is about fifteen minutes each day.  I will be teaching the students that had more than two wrong on the pretest.  The students that “tested out” will be working independently or with a partner studying the challenge words in a quiet area of the classroom.  I have created an extensive list of activities for the students to complete.  Each day, while I am teaching, the challenge group will choose an activity to work on to help learn the new words.
 
          Students will also be able to practice words during our Daily 5 time.  Word work is an important part of Daily 5.  Students will have available clay, letter stamps, chalk, board markers, wikki sticks, etc. to help them practice their words each week in the classroom.
 

          On Friday, both spelling groups will take a post test.  Before the test begins, each student that qualified for the challenge list must make the decision of which list he/she will take.  If your child studied the words, and feels confident, they should take the challenge words.  If they had a busy week, and didn’t give enough study time to the words, they should take the regular words.

 

 If your child consistently takes the challenge words, and scores well on the post test, they have the chance to earn a 4 on their report card for spelling.