If you are
crazy dedicated like me, you are already getting ready for the new school year! One thing I just finished was revising my Word Study (Spelling) words from last year. My third grade team and I tried out a new "program" last year that we really loved! It requires some work in the beginning, just like everything else we do, but it is totally worth it! Hang in there for a LONG post! Don't worry, if you make it to the end, there is something in it for you!
At
the beginning of the year, you will be establishing routines and assessing your
students. For the first 2-3 weeks you
will assess your students’ knowledge of high frequency words. I get my HFW lists from Beth Newingham at the
Scholastic website. http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/top_teaching/2010/10/my-november-top-ten-list-word-study-in-action You can of
course use any set of lists that you want.
Now this may sound complicated, but bear with me. There are a few
different ways you can assess your students.
First of all, copy all the HFW lists and put them into a binder or
folder for each student. We keep ours in
our P.I.R.A.T.E. Binder.
1.
Whole Group: (this is what I do, as it takes a lot less
time)
Based on students’ DRA scores when they come in
my classroom or other records I have, I start kiddos out on a list that I think
will be challenging for them. For
example, Tommy gets list A, Sally gets list B, and George gets list C. I do this for all kiddos. I then tell them their list number. I give the spelling assessment as a whole
class. I will say, “1A: neighborhood,
1B: picture, 1C: wear.” Students are
told to listen for their list only and to write down their words only. You may be saying, “She is nuts!”, but
believe me, it works and the kids love it because they really have to
listen. After I give about 20 words a
day, we grade the words together as a class or I take them home and grade
them. Any words kiddos got correct, they
will highlight on their High Frequency Word List. Words that are wrong, are left blank. These will be the words the kiddos have to
study for their test. They study five a
week, in order of their HFW list.
Small Groups: While kiddos are reading or working on
something else, call small groups of students that are on the same level over
to a table and give the words like you would a regular spelling test. After I give
about 20 words a day, we grade the words together as a class or I
take them home and grade them. Any words
kiddos got correct; they will highlight them on their High Frequency Word
List. Words that are wrong are left
blank. These will be the words the
kiddos have to study for their test.
They study five a week, in order of their HFW list. Repeat for the other groups.
1 Parent Volunteer:
If you are lucky enough to have a parent volunteer, you could give her a
small group of kiddos with the same list, or one kiddo at a time.
I DO NOT do all HFW lists at the beginning of
the school year or else we would never get started on our real lists. When I notice kiddos are running out of
words, I will give a little informal test during a conference or I will assign
them words based on the words they miss in their writing.
Once
kiddos have a sufficient amount of words, you will teach them the procedure for
the spelling tests.
Monday: Every
Monday, you will give a pretest using the pretest words for that unit. These
words can be found on the Teacher word lists.
Students will never see these beforehand. All kiddos will simply write the words on a
sheet of notebook paper. We grade these
together in class. I am watchful for the
couple of kiddos that have difficulty being honest. J If students miss one or none, they will Study
List A for the week. This is the
challenge list. If they miss two or
more, they get List B. You would be
surprised how many kiddos try really hard to get List A. The best thing is, they will fluctuate
between List A and B all year.
After this or sometimes
during morning work, kiddos are given their test back from the previous
week. Any words they missed, on HFW
list, automatically become part of this week’s High Frequency List. They will write this on their Word Study Unit
List where is says High Frequency Words.
If they need new HFW, they will choose them from the lists that they did
at the beginning of the year. Make sure
all words that are spelled correctly are highlighted now. They love this part!
We
also have a mini notebook where we write our five HFW for the week. This notebook is used during the test on
Fridays. I will explain why a little
later.
Still
with me?
Tuesday-Thursday: Word
Study Activities
These
are the days that we complete all kinds of word study work individually, with
partners, and in groups. Students have a
Word Study notebook where they keep any work or games.
Friday: Test day
Hand
out a Spelling Test to every child. Have
them write List A or B at the top. Now
you will say the words for each list.
Test
Words:
For example…
“1A:
happy He was happy when he saw his
puppy. Happy
1B:
saw I saw my dog in the yard. Saw”
Pause
“2A:
serious The expression on her face was
very serious. Serious
2B:
look Please look at me. Look”
Pause
I
say the words back to back with not much of a break between list A and B. The kiddos may struggle at the beginning, but
that is why you model, model, model and practice, practice, practice! This will save you a lot of heartache and a
sub will be able to come in and do this with no problem!
Applied
List: These are the five words that have the word
family or pattern that students do NOT get a head of time or get to study. Choose five words from the Teacher List of
the Applied Words. Everyone gets the
same five. When you grade these, only
grade the pattern for the week, not the entire word!
High
Frequency List: Your job is over. Now you are going to monitor your
students. Assign each student with a
Spelling Partner. This is where the mini
notebook comes in. At the beginning of
the week, students wrote their high frequency words on a page in the
notebook. Now they will switch their
notebooks with a partner and the partner will give them their five words. Students will write the word CORRECTLY in a
sentence. (so they have to know the meaning).
The bottom of the page was made so it can FOLD over. This way, kiddos can only see the High
Frequency Part and NOT the rest of the test.
Here
is what it would sound like with Jack and Jill.
Jack:
Your first word is “happy.”
Jill:
Your first word is “octopus.”
NOW
they stop and each write their word in a sentence. This saves A TON of time instead of Jack
waiting for Jill and doing all her words and then they trade. NO GOOD!
It wastes so much time. Again,
you have to model and practice, but once you do, you will be so proud of how
quickly they can do this!
Jack:
Number 2 “jump.”
Jill:
Number 2 “entertainment.”
They
would continue with all five words and then turn the paper in.
Now
you simply grade the tests and give them back on Monday.
If
you made it this far, I think you will LOVE this program! I know I do!
It makes my students much more self-sufficient and it really assesses
how they apply word patterns and differentiates for each child.
Enjoy!
So... do you want the words and test? Check it out at my TPT store.
Want to get this whole HUGE, year long unit for free? Just leave your email and a comment about something you liked about this post. I will be choosing 5 random people to give the unit away to for FREE!
