Word Sorts for "ible" and "able"

From all the research I've been reading, word sorts seem to be one of the best practices for having students do critical thinking to determine how some spelling patterns work, especially when adding suffixes.   I have had conversations with both parents and staff, who are frustrated that our Houghton Mifflin curriculum does not really teach any spelling skills.  There may be a list with CVVC as the pattern, but they don't give us any activities to teach the pattern.  One parent asked me how her 4th grader could learn how to spell better.  She wanted her son to be able to spell all of the words on his own, rather than have to go to the Franklin Speller when he identifies a word he isn't sure about.  Even though the Franklin Speller is wonderful because it is the second step for checking spelling right after learning patterns to spell words correctly, I told her this was one of the issues I was concerned about too.  Since she is also a teacher, I asked her if she had any other ideas.  She said she didn't except for the fact that in grades 1 and 2 students had word sorts every week. 

I will check with the teachers in those grades to find out where they got their resources, but I have also decided to change the middle category on our spelling tic-tac-toe activities to a Word Sort so that students need to do this every week and categorize the words in ways that make sense to the students (they will always have to do a tic-tac-toe down the middle).  This is what "Words Their Way" does, and I'm expecting to need parent help to teach students how to identify patterns in the words so they can successfully complete the word sort each week for their own list of spelling words (since the 3rd graders have 2 possible lists, as do the 4th graders).

One of our grammar activities this week was to explore the suffix "ible".  Once we figured out that "ible" means "able to, can do", we looked at a list of words that have "ible" at the end.  As students defined the words,  using their knowledge of part of the root word and the newly learned suffix, we discussed prefixes that  turned some of the words into an antonyms.  For example, legible means to be able to be read, and adding "il" to create illegible transforms the definition into not being able to be read.  Students identified a couple other prefixes that did the same thing:  "ir" and "im".  Click here to see the website that helped us create our lesson on the suffix "ible".

Since we were already doing a mini-lesson on the suffix "ible" during our grammar time, I created a spelling word sort so that students can take it a step farther and look at what the relationship is between base words, prefixes and suffixes.  The lesson is below, and students will get into groups of 5 this week to do the activity.

Spelling Word Sort Directions

1.  Sit with your team and Miss Shaw will give you a group of words to sort.

2.Discuss the possible patterns or rules with your group, and put these  

    words into categories based on the patterns.

3.  Make sure everyone is participating in your group.

4.  Each group will write the patterns or rules that you discover neatly

      on the paper.

5.  Write the words from your word sort underneath the appropriate rule or pattern.

6.  Each group will share the patterns they discovered with the class.

Suffixes “ible” and “able”:  What do they mean?  How do we know when to use “ible” and “able”?  Find the pattern.

intelligible

legible

audible

debatable

observable

notable

Suffixes “ible” and “able”:  What do they mean?  How do we know when to use “ible” and “able”?  Find the pattern.

visible

possible

edible

believable

achievable

excitable

Suffixes “ible” and “able”:  What do they mean?  How do we know when to use “ible” and “able”?  Find the pattern.

terrible

compatible

illegible

returnable

comfortable

breakable

Suffixes “ible” and “able”:  What do they mean?  How do we know when to use “ible” and “able”?  Find the pattern.

tangible

credible

responsible

manageable

acceptable

dependable

Suffixes “ible” and “able”:  What do they mean?  How do we know when to use “ible” and “able”?  Find the pattern.

feasible

permissible

horrible

valuable

desirable

imaginable

Our Classroom Blog

I created a classroom blog at the beginning of the year because I wasn't able to post digital photo albums or videos on my classroom website.  I also wanted a place where students could comment on what we were learning together and our celebrations.

At first, I didn't require students to write anything.  In fact, I had hoped to encourage them to participate by offering them extra credit for sharing thoughts that asked questions, made thoughtful comments or going into the topic even deeper.  When I evaluated this recently and saw that only a handful of students were participating, I began to require it for homework once a week. 

There are many great reasons to use this:  I can have easy access to the thoughts of my students on topics we're currently studying.  I can assess if they are actually answering the question and giving details to support their answers.  Spelling, grammar, and punctuation can also be assessed, in addition to me being able to hold them accountable for doing their homework. 

I've made 3 observations so far.  Students don't think about spelling, grammar and punctuation when writing on the blog for some reason.  We will have a discussion about this tomorrow as we look at our most recent blog entry.  Also, not all students are actually reading and answering the questions, which is something I also see on reading tests.  Finally, some students continuously are not doing their homework so I can contact parents right away about this, and you even have access to proof that it was done late because the time and date is stamped on each entry. 

Feel free to check out our classroom blog.  It has been a lot of fun, and tomorrow I'll be posting a Photo Story we made about our ABC book on Minnesota.

Miss Shaw's Blog

Education Minnesota Foundation Grant: Franklin Talking Children's Dictionary

Last month, I received a congratulatory letter telling me that my Continuous Progress team had been awarded a grant to purchase 28 Franklin Spellers for our CP students.  I chose to write this grant on behalf of my team back in December based on all the observations I had been making in my classroom:  students staring at a blank page, students asking their friends how to spell a word, and students asking me how to spell a word.  Also, the survey that I conducted at the beginning of the year indicated that some students would have more desire to write if they had a tool to help them with their spelling.  I wanted to have a tool where students could independently find out if they had spelled a word correctly, and if they didn't, it would help them find the correct spelling.  It is also a unique tool because of the sound function, which has made it very appealing to use in special education classrooms, but rarely has it been used on a large scale in the regular classroom.

28 Franklin Spellers means we could have one entire class use them at a time when working on a project, or they could be split among 5 classrooms (meaning most rooms would have 5 or 6 for their students to use when editing a rough draft).  I am so excited about the prospect of using these in the classroom, especially because it also has a thesaurus function to help students revise their writing.

Yesterday, the 39 grant recipients were recognized at the annual Education Minnesota Representative Convention, and then we received 2 hours of training.  The training was focused on identifying outcomes, indicators that showed if a method worked and methods used to evaluate those indicators.  I really felt like I got a great understanding of what my action research will look like as I continue it next year, and this is all a result of the action research I am doing as a result of our class.  Only next year, it will have an impact on 130 students rather than the 24 in my own classroom. 

I have a working plan, which I will attach at a later time.  For now, I will identify the 4 desired outcomes I came up with:

Outcome 1:  Students will change their attitudes about writing because they are confident spellers.
Outcome 2:  Students will independently spell words correctly with the use of a Franklin Speller.
Outcome 3:  Students will improve spelling skills.
Outcome 4:  Students will be excited about using the electronic spell checker to improve word choice in their writing.

The project will take place over the 2011-2012 school year, and the resources will be purchased this summer.  I am so excited to be continuing the work I've started this year in my classroom, and it will be great to have the entire team on board.

Prefixes Un, Re and Sounds for "J" and "S"

As always, there were two spelling lists:  one for the 3rd graders and one for the 4th graders.  The 3rd graders had a list that focused on the prefixes "un" and "re".  The 4th graders' list focused on using "dge" and "ge" to make the "j" sound and words that had "ce" to make the "s" sound. 

To try and meet the needs of all the students, I divided the students up into 4 groups:  2 3rd grade groups (one for "un" and one for "re") and 2 4th grade groups (one for the "j" sound and one for the "s" sound).  I told them to start by looking for words in their spelling lists, but they were also going to have 10 minutes to find as many words that followed the rule or pattern that their group was responsible for.  They could use anything in the classroom to help them find the words.  It was interesting to watch many students using the dictionary while other students walked around the room to see if any of the words posted on our walls matched the rule or pattern.

In addition to using the dictionary, it was interesting to observe the other strategies students used.  Some of them tried rhyming words to make more words like mice, ice, nice, rice and so on.  Some 3rd graders just started adding the prefixes to words they thought the definition made sense with.  For example, the "re" group had "relook", thinking it made sense when they put "look again" together. 

After 10 minutes, we had each group present their list.  The words had to be spelled correctly, they had to be words, and they had to be capitalized correctly.  If a student wanted to challenge a word they could.  That student would have to win the challenge by proving the other team wrong by using the dictionary.  If the challenge was successful, then the group would not get credit for that word.  They would have to spell it correctly or cross it off if it wasn't a word.  Then each group counted up the number of words they got correctly and wrote the number on the back of the poster.  These posters will be posted around the room, and students will be encouraged to add words when they find others that fit these rules, just as they do with the other spelling posters we have posted around the room. 

Today, one of my 3rd graders asked if she could add a word that fit one of the rules we did a couple months ago.  I was thrilled because she was finally understanding the value of having as many words at our fingertips as possible.

Here is an awesome website I found on prefixes, suffixes, root words, silent letters and spelling.

Word Hunt and Bananagrams

Although I certainly haven't been consistent, I have been trying to do as many spelling activities with my students each week that support their spelling lists for the week.  Since we have two lists because of the two different grade levels in my classroom, the lesson has to include both.  The lesson below is a review of a mini-lesson we had last week about changing verbs that end in "e" to the "ing" suffix version of the word.  It also incorporates Timothy Rasinski's Word Hunt into it, which I would like to use regularly with all of the patterns/rules we have posted around our room.  Here is the lesson we are doing today that utilizes the Double Bananagrams I recently bought for our classroom.  At some point, I'd just like to leave some of these letter tiles out on my back table so students can show me how they think a word is spelled when they ask me how to spell a word.  They can create 2 different versions, and decide which one looks correct.  Here it is:

Directions for Today’s Version of Bananagrams

·       Teammates will take turns being in charge of spelling a word. 

·       Turn all the letters upright so you can see them.

·       Choose one person to be the first one to spell the word.  Once that person has spelled the word the way he/she thinks it is spelled, the rest of the team will check it. 

·       If they agree, go on to the next step.  If they don’t agree that it’s spelled correctly, they will help the person spell it correctly.

·       When done spelling the word correctly, and the group agrees, the person doing the spelling shouts Wordo!

·       I will check the spelling of the word.  If it isn’t spelled correctly you will have until one team gets it spelled correctly to revise it so it’s correct. 

·       The first team to spell the word correctly gets a point.  The person in charge of that word must also spell it correctly aloud so the other team can hear the word.

·       You can also earn a point by going on a word hunt.  If a team discovers that any of the words fit the rule for verbs where you take away the “e” from the base word to create the verb with “ing” at the end, they should send someone over to the poster to spell it correctly. 

·       The first person to spell it correctly on the paper in the middle of the room, he/she will earn an extra point for their team.

Will spelling still be taught in 10 years?

I have heard someone say that spelling will not be taught in 10 years because we will all be relying on computers to spell our words correctly.  This assertion concerned me, so I posed it to one of our district technology specialists.  He said we would always need to teach spelling in the classroom, and he gave me an example from his own son's life.  He said that his sone was writing a paragraph where he was trying to write, "he divorced her".  Instead of that phrase, he actually wrote "he devoured her."  It was a funny example, but the point is rather serious.  Computers don't know what each of us is trying to say.  They just identify words and whether they are spelled correctly.  Computers do not have the capability of making sure our words make sense.  I was happy to hear that spelling will still need to be taught, and one of my goals for this project is to provide a toolbox of ideas for other teachers that they can use in their classrooms to ultimately teach spelling. 

Words, Words, Words...

From all the research I've been doing, I've discovered that the best way to teach students spelling is to have a multitude of words posted all around the room.  So every time we do a spelling activity, the words that we brainstorm together are posted on the walls for students to see.  If there is a rule or a pattern on the poster, students are encouraged to add more words that fit each rule when they come across them in their readings. 

Last week we did a mini-lesson on changing verbs that end in "e" to the form of the word that ends in "ing".  The rule was that we take away the "e" and add the "ing".  Some of the students' spelling words for the week fit the pattern so we looked at those first:  dancing, staring, and pleasing.  We identified the base word, and then the students changed that word into the form using "ing".  Then we brainstormed other verbs that end in "e" and added those to our list.  This was the 4th grade list, but the whole class was involved in the discussion.  The same held true when we examined the homophones the 3rd graders were being tested on.  We looked for clues in the words that would help us know the difference in some of the words.  For example, "hear" has the word "ear" so we can associate that with listening or hearing.  The word "there" has "here" in it, which is a place.  And the word "their" has the word "heir" in it, which is a person so we can associate people with this word.  At the end, we broke up into two groups.  The 3rd graders played Sparkle with their list, and the 4th graders played Sparkle with theirs.  I also typed up the word lists students created and posted them on the walls of the classroom so they had another resource to help them spell words correctly.

Sparkle has also been a regular game in our classroom lately since we've been studying the states and capitals of the different regions of the United States.  Here's how we play it.  I will say the state.  Then the first student gives the first letter of the capital (and they must say "capital" before the letter in order to get it right since capitalization counts).  We go around the circle until the capital has been spelled.  Instead of saying Sparkle, the final student says the name of the capital city, and then the next person sits down.  This has become a fun and quick way for all the students in the class to practice spelling the capital cities together for each region. 

Even with this emphasis on spelling the capitals correctly, I know there are a few 3rd graders who are not ready to spell these words correctly AND learn the names of the capitals, especially when there are typically 12 capitals to learn for each region.  They are already challenged by studying for the weekly spelling tests so, for these few students, I have them take a matching quiz.  Next week there are only 4 states in the Southwest region so I have told these students that they must memorize the spelling of these 4 capitals.

Every week I post a website where students can practice learning the capitals and the spelling of the capitals.  One game that relates directly to spelling is called Unscramble.  You can play it here:  Unscramble.

Students are also frequently reminded to use their books (reading, social studies, science, etc.) to help them spell words correctly. They are told that there is no reason for them to spell words incorrectly that are already spelled  in the book.  This is especially true of vocabulary words when students are asked to use them in a piece of writing.  If they don't practice using the resources they have before them now to make sure they are spelling words correctly, then they will constantly be guessing at the spelling of words they could have written correctly to begin with.  It seems so simple, but I constantly need to remind them so that this becomes a part of their routine when taking notes.

Lesson on Suffixes: "ness" and "less"

One of the activities that went with our story this week called Across the Wide Dark Sea had to do with teaching two suffixes:  "ness" and "less".  Not only was it a good opportunity to discuss what the suffixes meant, but it also allowed us to talk about the parts of speech of these words that were directly related to each suffix.

First, we discussed what the suffix "less" meant by looking at a couple sentences from the story. 

“And some began to ask why we had left our safe homes to go on this endless journey to an         unknown land.”

“After so many days at sea, we began to feel hopeless.”

“Yet the storms and sickness went on.”

“One big problem on the ship was dampness.”

The Native Americans showed kindness toward the settlers.

We looked at the base word, and students were asked what the base word of each word was.  They were also asked what part of speech the base word was, and we noticed that they were all adjectives.  We discovered that adding "ness" to the adjective changed the word into a noun.  The word became "a state of being sick, a state of being damp...".

Since we are learning how to take notes, I asked students what they noticed about punctuation that was used or not used with the sentences.  They noticed that the sentences that came right out of the book had qoutation marks around them so that they knew the sentences were not written in my own words.  They also said they knew I had written the last sentence in my own words since the parentheses were not there (they know that I don't like it when stories use the word "Indian" instead of "Native American").

3 tables of students were then asked to come up with 3 lists of words that had the suffix "less" at the end, and the other 3 tables were asked to identify 3 lists of words that had the suffix "ness" at the end.  I roamed around the room to remind students to make sure they were using a dictionary to see if the words they were writing were real words.  I typed up the word lists in alphabetical order so they could be hung at the front of the room and only included the words that were actually words.  Today I used those lists to play "Sparkle" with the students.

Playing "Sparkle" was not only fun but informative.  I could listen for patterns that students didn't know yet so that I can plan mini-lessons on those spelling patterns.  For example, for the words "craziness" and "happiness", all students spelled it with a "y" instead of an "i".  Now I know I need to do a mini-lesson on how we change the "y" to an "i" in words like this.  Then we can brainstorm more words that fit that spelling rule:  laziness, dizziness...

Play one of the Suffix Games to see how much you have learned about these suffixes.
When you feel good about being able to identify these base words and their suffixes, take a Suffix Quiz to see how well you identify words that have the suffixes we learned about in our lesson.

After reading each sentence, a student was asked to go to the Smart Board to underline the word with that suffix.  Then we discussed what that word meant (endless=without end and hopeless=without hope).  A few student volunteers were called on to give a couple different examples.  We also discussed what part of speech these words were, and we discovered that all of them were adjectives because they describe something. 

Then we went on to the next suffix of "ness" and did the same thing.  These were the sentences from the story we looked at:

Prevoke: Vocabulary, Prediction and Word Study Game

If you want a fun strategy that incorporates all of the above, this is the one for you.  Timothy Rasinski describes how to use it in his book Essential Strategies for Word Study (Rasinski, Zutell, 93).  I will introduce it to the class by planning lessons for our 6 differentiated reading groups.  Here's how it will look.

First, I have chosen 10 words from each story that all have at least one thing in common.  I'll tell you why towards the end.  The reading group leader will show the students the ten vocabulary words on a poster (in the order in which they appear in the story), in addition to the title of the story and the picture on the front of the book.  If there are any words students don't know the meaning of (or I think they will have problems with) this will be the time to discuss the meanings, as well. 

Then 2 groups of students will be given cards with the ten words on them.  They will sort them into any category they want as long as they have a good reason for sorting them that way.  The two groups will come back together and explain why they sorted the words in the way they did.  (Hopefully, they have started to put them together to form the beginning of the story.) 

We will then discuss how we can use these words to help them make their predictions for what the story is about.  If necessary, you can also tell them that this time the words on the poster are posted in the order in which they will see them in the book.   Students will discuss or record their predictions in the reading response section of the reading notebook for what the story will be about based on these clues.  We will remind them that we have tried to help them sequence the order of events by putting the words in the order in which they appear in the story (review what sequence events is--the order in which things happen).  Stop halfway through the story, and tell them they may update or amend their predictions if they need to.

After the story, have students compare and contrast their own predictions to the actual story.  Have them record if they were right or wrong about certain things and what they were.

If time, look at the ten words together.  Ask if anyone can identify what all ten words have in common (they are all verbs, and they all end in "ed").  Review what a verb is and ask if they know what the addition of the "ed" does to the verb (it means the action already happened in the past).  Tell them authors often write stories using past tense verbs. 

Then take a look at one particular word (even if one of the stories doesn't have this verb, have them discuss it anyway), and tell them the rule for adding "ed" to that word (for example, cried--when there is a "y" at the end of a verb, and you want to turn it into past tense, you replace the "y" with "ied").  Ask them for other examples of verbs that end in "y" (fry, try, pry, study, reply or whinny), and have them spell the words in past tense, using this new rule.

Recent Classroom Observations

Recently, I have noticed that my students have been looking at their own writing and circling mistakes on their own before they come back to ask me if they can use the Franklin Speller.  I am excited the majority of the class is doing this on a regular basis.  There are still a few students who ask me how to spell a word, and again I ask them how they think it's spelled.  99% of the time they are correct. 

Up until now, I have been discouraging students from telling their classmates how to spell words because I want each learner to grow to be independent in this area.  However, due to the social nature of human beings, I'm beginning to think that I should teach all of my students a couple tips to help those who ask them how to spell a word.  For example, they could simply ask, "How do you think you spell it?"  If that doesn't work, I could tell students about a strategy I use.  If a student has to go to the next step to get help, I think of a word that rhymes with the sound they are struggling with.  For example, if the word is "boat", I ask them if they know how to spell "coat" or "goat".  If they do, I ask them to spell one of the words.  Then I tell them the last three letters are spelled the same.  It seems like teaching my students strategies for teaching others would be a more effective solution than telling students not to talk about how to spell words at all.  It would also help the students who take on the teaching role by giving them confidence and encouraging them to develop their own thinking skills by coming up with new strategies for teaching spelling to someone else.  Who knows?  They may think of ideas that have never even crossed my mind, but help the student speller learn how to spell the word.

Homophones: How do you write them so you're using the right word in your writing?

Do you have a fun and effective that you use to teach homophones in your classroom?  The theme for our last spelling test was homophones.  This was certainly the test where students scored the lowest.  Next week, we will do an activity on homophones so that students can create visual/linguistic clues to remember what each word means.  Each team of four will be given 8 examples of commonly misspelled homophones (for example:  their and there).  For each word, students will need to draw a picture or write a word that gives us clues about the definition of each word.  For example, if a team gets their and there, they might draw a picture of 3 people for "their" and a picture of a place for "there".  For two and too, they might write two tally marks for "two" and write the word "also" next to "too." 

The Homophone Game will be used at the beginning of the lesson to introduce examples of how you can use illustrations to give clues about what each word means.

Teams will also be given words that they have to alphabetize.  One team may get words for the letters "a, b and c".  Then they will have to alphabetize them before writing their clues.  In this way, we can post these around the room alphabetically so that students can easily find the correct word they want to use in their writing.  Each team will then present their list of words and the clues to the class before the posters are hung around the room. 

(This activity was adapted from Rebecca Sipe in her book They Still Can't Spell?, but it was also amended to meet the needs of my students.)
A Complete List of Homophones

Another List of Homophones

Homophones and Homonyms

Homophone and Homonym Games

More Homophone Games

Video on Homophones

Teaching Spelling in Context

Constance Weaver, Rebecca Sipe and Kylene Beers all agree on one thing.  It is best to teach students spelling in context.  Over the years, I have heard many people suggest using student writing as exaamples for teaching spelling.  However, I would never want to embarrass one of my students in front of the class by doing this. 

So what are some other strategies for teaching students spelling in context?  After taking the specialized literacy class at a week long Responsive Classroom workshop a couple years ago, I learned that using the Morning Message is a great way to engage students in dialogue by looking for spelling errors I may have made in the message.  I also know that other experts say that teachers should always model proper spelling and grammar so students know what this looks like. 

As I was pondering this question, I found some spelling links on the Responsive Classroom website.  The one that would benefit students most is one called Interactive Spelling Bee.  Students can choose their grade level, and if they discover that their grade level is too easy or difficult, they can go to another grade level to meet their needs.  The computer reads the paragraph aloud to the student, and the student has to type in the missing words correctly.  If they get all of the words spelled correctly, then they move on to level 2.  The fact that this website allows differentiation by grade level and reads the paragraph aloud for students who aren't reading at grade level makes this a wonderful website to visit so students can practice their spelling skills.

Do you have other ideas?  Please share if you do.  I'm just beginning my exploration of this topic and would appreciate hearing how others have done this successfully in their classrooms.

Teaching Rules--Silent Consonants

I have often been told that English is the most difficult language to learn.  Being a native English speaker, this is difficult for me to understand.  However, when you look at it through the eyes of a 9 or 10 year-old, I can see what people mean.  There are so many rules, and even if a student knows a rule, there are exceptions to every rule.  There are homophones, homographs, prefixes, suffixes and root words.  And there are a lot of words that you just have to memorize because they don't have any rules to help you. 

Even so, it is important to teach students as many rules as possible to help them learn patterns so they can be successful spellers.  This week I will be teaching about silent consonants.  To do this, I will create six different groups of cards with six different silent consonant patterns. 

kn (silent k)        st (silent t)       mb (silent b)    lk (silent l)     wr (silent w)
knight                      listen                        thumb                        talk                    wrong             
knit                         soften                       lamb                          calf                    wrinkle             knock                     whistle                     climb                          walk                  wrestle                      knoll                       often                        comb                          half                   wrist                

ght (silent gh)
thought
drought
right
night

Each person at a table will get one of the words in the pattern.  Students will be told to identify the pattern or rule in their group.  Each group will then compose a sentence that explains the common pattern of the words.  The group will write this complete sentence on a poster, and write their sample words I gave them on the poster underneath the sentence.  Each group will also add other words to the poster that fit the rule. 

Students will then go around to the different posters to examine the rules.  They will have about 2  minutes at each poster/table, and while they are there, they need to add as many words they can think of that fit the rule too (each team will have a different color marker so we can tell which team added what words).  Everyone will be encouraged to participate. 

*This "Card Sorts" activity was adapted from Rebecca Bowers Sipe's book, They Still Can't Spell?

Here is a fun electronic game students can play to practice this skill:  Silent Invaders

Franklin Children's Dictionary & Spell Corrector

A few years ago, I was frustrated with figuring out how to get students to spell words correctly in their writing on their own.  Telling students to look words up in their Quick Word books or the dictionary just wasn't feasible for students who didn't know how to spell the first 2 or 3 letters of the word. Plus, the person that usually ended up correcting their spelling was a parent.  I spoke about my concern with the special educaiton teacher at our school, and she introduced me to the Franklin Children's Dictionary and Spell Checker.  She said she used it with great success with the students with whom she was working and gave me a catalog so I could order a couple of them for my own classes.  They immediately became a big hit with my four classes of 5th grade English, and sometimes it would take a week or two before all the students had access to this incredible tool.  As a result, a couple students purchased their own and would bring them to school to share them with all of the classes.  Only having students for an hour a day at my previous school, just having a few of these did make it difficult to finish writing projects in a timely manner.

Although there are many great aspects about this electronic device, what appealed to me most was that it had a sound function.  So any student can press the speak button, and it will speak not only each word it thinks you may have intended to spell, but it will also speak the definition of the word.  This is especially helpful for my struggling students who may not be able to read the definition on their own and need the auditory piece to support the visuals.  It also helps students know if they are spelling the word they intended to spell.  For example, often times a student will write "were" when they actually meant "where".  The Speller will say "were", and I can ask the student if that is the word he/she really wanted to use in a piece of writing.

The video below will give you more information about the Franklin Children's Dictionary and Spell Corrector, but for some reason it doesn't highlight the sound function.  Also, Franklin has recently updated this device to include something to help students with their handwriting.    The most important parts about this technological tool is that students are excited to use it to correct their spelling in their writing, and it gives them the confidence to be able to spell the words correctly on their own without having someone correct their words for them. 

It's important to note that I don't allow students to use the Franklin Speller until they have written a first draft of something.  Otherwise, they would become more focused on the Franklin Speller than they are on recording their thoughts.  I want them to focus on the content, and I tell them they can always go back and fix the spelling later.  Once a first draft has been completed, students are asked to circle words that look wrong so that they can double check the spelling of those words.  Then I ask parents to circle words that are spelled wrong, but I also ask them not to correct the spelling for them.  That way students can correct these words on their own by using the Franklin Speller.  As a last resort, I will circle words that appear to be spelled wrong.  Because I only have 4 of these devices in my classroom, students usually have to wait in line to use it.  It's my dream to have one Franklin Speller for every 4 students in my new classroom (and those of my colleagues).  See the video below, or pick one up for yourself, and you will understand why.

What causes students to stare at a blank page?

As I have engaged in the Edina Public Schools Writing Cohort for the past two years, I know there are various reasons why students don't like to write.  Some students don't know what to write about while others have a difficult time with the physical act of writing.  In the past, I have offered suggestions to students and parents to write about topics that they love.  We have created heart maps and writing history brochures so students have an array of topics to choose from.  I have also encouraged struggling writers to record their thoughts with a tape recorder before writing them down so that they are able to have a starting point for retrieving the content that they have going through their minds. 

But up until this year, I never considered the idea that the inability to spell could be a major stumbling block for many of our students.  How do I know this to be the case?  I asked them.  After watching a small handful of students stare at a blank page for the first couple weeks in my new classroom, I wondered if it was developmental.  Could it just be that a 3rd grader wasn't prepared for higher expectations?  It was possible.  However, I wasn't just seeing this with my 3rd graders.  I was observing it with a couple of my 4th graders too.  So I spoke to each of these students individuallly to try to understand why it was so challenging to get their thoughts down on paper.  Each one said they didn't know how to spell the words that they wanted to write, and they worried that they would get in trouble for not spelling the words correctly.  I assured them that my main concern was that they were able to get their thoughts down on paper.  The thinking behind it was most important to me, rather than correct grammar and spelling.  Those things can always be fixed, I told them, but the content was the one thing that mattered most. 

I have noticed that the blank pages exist less often now.  However, there are times when I will ask a student to read me what he/she has written, that child has a difficult time reading it because they don't know what words they were trying to spell in their writing.  I've also noticed that some students don't take the time to think about how to spell a word correctly, and they want a quick answer from me.  My reply is always, "How do you think you spell it?"  95% of the time, the student will spell the word correctly for me.  This tells me that not only do students need to be encouraged to take their time to think about how to spell a word, but they also need to be told they are capable of doing it themselves.  Building confidence in a student is essential to his/her success as a learner, and it's my job to explore the best ways to do this.

This is just the beginning of my investigations, and if anyone has ideas or thoughts they'd like to share, please do.  My main goal in creating this blog is to become a better teacher of spelling for all of my students, and I strongly believe that collaboration is one of the best ways to learn.  So please...if you have a thought to share, no matter how brief or lengthy, join me as a fellow spelling sleuth as I try to determine strategies that will best meet the needs of my varied learners.