The Words He Needs

When W was in school last year in third grade, sporadically he'd come home with a list of words to study for a spelling test. The teacher gave the same list to the whole class. The words were either based on a content-area theme-- wide-ranging words with no common spelling thread (e.g. "Jamestown," "settlers," "colonial"...)-- and/or far too easy for him. I gasped when he'd bring home actual first-grade-level high-frequency words that my own students were working on at the time: "what," "then," "with," "little"... As he said himself, many of the tests were "so easy because I've known how to spell those words since first grade." I have no doubt that some of his classmates needed to solidify words like "what" and "then," and those students should of course get the words they need to work on. But so should every kid. W mastered those long ago. Fair is everybody getting what they need. For W, the spelling words he was given last year were inappropriate, and unfair. One of my big frustrations with the school was that as a general rule they didn't differentiate. Differentiation is meeting students at their individual levels, giving each student what they need, the right amount of support and challenge-- not pretending that one size fits all. There are some ways I wish his school had supported him more, and there are many ways I wish they had challenged him more. Spelling instruction is one of the latter.

Spelling was one of the more straightforward, concrete ways I changed his educational experience this year in homeschool by making it an appropriate challenge for him-- by giving him words he actually needs to study and learn. He has said that he likes having harder words this year.

This is how we do word study, using some resources from a program called Words their Way:

Finding his Level

In the beginning of the year I gave him a spelling inventory-- a test. Like most skills, there are stages of spelling ability. There is a pretty established sequence of skills that students should get systematic instruction in as they progress in word knowledge. I asked him to spell a bunch of different words that sampled a variety of word features on the spectrum of beginning to advanced ability: short vowels, digraphs (th, sh, ch), consonant blends (bl, str, sp, cl, tr...), vowel combinations (oa, ie, ai, silent e, igh...), words with suffixes or prefixes added, complex consonants (like kn, tch, dge), words with Greek and Latin elements. Then was the fun part: looking not just at how many words he got right, but at the categories of word features that he either had mastered or still needed to work on. (For example, with a word like "frightened," there were several aspects of that word that he could have gotten right or wrong, including the "fr" blend, the "igh" in the middle, and the suffix "-ed.") When I tallied it all up, the results affirmed my belief: W was well along on the progression of spelling skills. There were certain word features he got right every time. The sweet spot was the categories of word features where he was sometimes correct, but not consistently. For him this happened with features like: harder suffixes like "-ate," and some prefixes and suffixes like "-ance," and when to use "-sion" vs. "-tion." This was where his spelling instruction (and spelling lists) needed to start, where he deserved to have teaching and have the opportunity to grow as a speller. So with these Words their Way tools to help me, I determined that he was toward the end of a certain stage in his spelling knowledge (the "syllables and affixes" stage) and I bought a book of word lists to help students focus on words with those sorts of word features, and we've been progressing from there and into the next stage ever since.

Noticing and Sorting
Each week I give W a list of words from a book that has intentionally curated words that help students hone in on word patterns and spelling rules for the stage he's at. The words all share a feature of some sort. He cuts them apart, spreads them out, and I ask what he notices about the words. A recent list he worked with had all words with either "ie" or "ei" in them. He has to sort the words according to a system he thinks of, and eventually according to certain categories based on their spelling. These were the groupings for the ie/ei word list: "ei" sounding like long a, "ei" sounding like long e, "ei" after c sounding like long e, words with "ie" sounding like long e, and finally an "oddball" group. The oddballs are words that have the same features as the rest of the words in the list but don't fit the rule. It's important to recognize the oddballs for what they are, and to be able to just memorize that these are different. ("Mischief" was the oddball in this particular spelling list because it has "ie" and yet in that word it sounds like short i, which is unusual.) Then he needs to try to articulate a generalization, or spelling rule, to remember which words are spelled in which ways and why. In this ie/ei word list, the generalization included something like: "i before e except after c, and except when sounding like a as in neighbor and weigh" (though most generalizations are not a rhyming jingle like that).

Some lists focus more on meaning. As students get older, they need the tools to be able to make an educated guess at what an unfamiliar word means. Being able to identify the base word within a word, or recognize the meaning of a prefix or suffix or Greek root can be really helpful. One list he had was homophones (sound the same but spelled differently, like "medal" and "metal," "their" and "they're" and "there"); one list he had was homographs (spelled the same but used/pronounced differently, like the noun "desert" and the verb "desert"); he's had lists with prefixes and suffixes like bi-/tri-/uni-, -less/-ness/-ful, mis-/dis-/pre-. We have lots of neat little conversations when examining, sorting, generalizing, and getting to know words this way.

Defining
During the week we try to do a couple different activities using the current list of words he's working with and to extend his understanding of that spelling rule. He might try to use the words in a sentence. He sometimes does a word hunt, trying to find in books or magazines other words to add to his list that fit one of the categories he's working with (finding more words with "cei" in them, or more words with "i" before "e"). If he finds words that should fit but don't fit the rule, we talk about that and make note of that as another oddball. One thing I've done regularly is had him look up in a dictionary a few of his spelling words each week. (One could argue that his generation won't need to know how to use a dictionary because they can just Google a word they don't know, but I wasn't ready to accept that yet. And I felt like it is still handy in life to have a working ability with the concept of alphabetical order.) I found he definitely needed practice in using the guide words at the top of each dictionary page to become more efficient and fluid looking up a word. And those are just the skills in getting to the word; after he finds it there are the multiple definitions and parts of speech and funny little marks to get used to and discuss. So I've liked how use of the dictionary has tackled some knowledge and skills we might not have gotten into otherwise.

Test

At the end of the week I give him a spelling test. W actually likes tests. I think he likes the chance to prove what he knows, and he loves the feeling of being right (and hates the feeling of being wrong...). It's one of the few times when he gets a concrete "grade" with homeschool and he likes it; if he gets all the words right, instead of saying he got 100%, he likes to write "A+." Every so often, he does a cumulative review test that samples words from all of the patterned lists he's worked with so far, and that provides a nice reflection on all he's learned.

Spelling, or word study, is something we only spend fifteen or twenty minutes on a few times a week. It's a tiny part of the gamut that is language arts, and a tiny part of our week. But it's one little way that I feel I am giving him what he needs and deserves as a student. It's not really differentiation or personalization when I'm only planning for one kid. It's easy for me to do in homeschool. I know it's not easy in a classroom. One teacher if she is doing her job well, (and if the school system has the right priorities and is pushing for this) is supposed to differentiate for a classroom of 20+ kids. Even if we are only considering the subject of spelling, this is hard work and can feel overwhelming. There's getting to know each kid and finding their level, splitting them into similar-ability groupings, creating the structures within a classroom so they can all get instruction and appropriate practice work at their own spelling level, then every week doing the lesson planning to give them new word lists and to keep all this going. A lot of things have to be in place to make it work, and even then it's not perfect. And yet it's really important. I am thankful that this year this kid is getting the words he needs.