Generally, my students are great writers. Most are very inventive and enjoy writing stories or writing about previous experiences they may have had. After collecting my writing samples, I still see this passion for writing. Their spelling however, leaves me wanting a little more. My third grade students are definitely in stage three of the stages of spelling development. They show Within-Word Pattern Spelling. The description of this stage includes that many students make small spelling mistakes such as form for from. This is something that I often see in my students writing. They often confuse their "theres" (using the wrong there/their/they're in different contexts) and frequently forget the 'e' in -ed ending words. They commonly miss just small things in their spelling, such as one student writing 'ower' instead of 'owner' or 'drumer' for 'drummer.'
Despite common mistakes like these, I know my students are in the process of learning more about correct spelling and are in the right stage for their spelling development for their age and grade. However, I do think they could use more help in this department. By using a literacy center, my students can continue to work on spelling. My students are very used to centers, as they participate in literacy centers every morning. None of them have ever really been about spelling though. Having a center devoted solely to spelling might be helpful to my third graders.
Because differentiating the different "theres" is something that is difficult for my students, I would consider putting together a sort of game in which the students would be given a picture and a sentence that ties to the picture with a missing there/their/they're. An example would be a picture of a family by their house. The sentence could read "The Smith family loves ______ new house." Student would have to work together or on their own to decide which there/their/they're is the correct one to put in the sentence. I would be sure to have dictionaries for the students to use so that they could look of the definitions of the different "theres" in order to place the correct one on the blank.
Obviously, this is just one idea that could work as a spelling literacy center. So many different things could be done to help my students with their spelling and I think utilizing the centers to help them do that is a great idea that I plan to share with my mentor teacher.
When I examine my student's writing piece I took from class this week, I found that my student falls under the "Letter Name-Alphabetic Spelling". The reason I chose to classify my student's writing under this stage, is because the student understands the sounds of consonants like the word "turtle" beginning with the letter t, having an r within it, and also have the t sound towards the end. Unfortunately, my student is not able to use vowels in words as liberally as she is able to conjure what consonant sounds are appropriate for words. Nonetheless, she is understanding that consonant blends are often found in words, and can some times be confusing.
ReplyDeleteAs a whole, my class is quite capable of spelling words although they are often too stubborn to take the time to sound out words and try to spell them appropriately. They often rely on their teacher or other classroom aids to tell them exactly how to write a word, without use the phonetic skills they have acquired thus far.
I think a literacy center activity that would be beneficial to my students is one that I remember when I look back upon my time in first grade. My teacher gave us a lined sheet of paper and set us free for ten minutes to write down as many words as we knew. I loved this activity because it forced me to recall exactly what words I absolutely knew how to spell. If there were words I was unsure about, I simply left them off of the sheet and did not try to spell them. I thought that this activity not only compelled me to want to learn and allowed me to see my successes, but also made me learn that rhyming is important and easier than I may suspect. I don't think it was until I completed this activity that I understood that in order to effectively rhyme, I can start at the beginning of the alphabet and see what words fit.
I think my students need practice in spelling, but also a structured time that is silent, and makes my students write on their own. Having additional help in the classroom is nice, but in some cases it can take away from the students actually completing their work independently. I know that the activity I discussed above is not necessarily just for learning centers, but I think it is important to do this as a whole class as well to hopefully act as an encouragement for students to challenge their own abilities.
After examining my writing sample and working with some of my students during writing time, I would have to agree with Emily that most of my third grade students are also at stage three within the stages of spelling development. Most commonly I see my students omit vowels and/or mix up er ar ir and ur. For example, when spelling the word every one of my students may choose to spell it evary or evury. Also similar to Emily, my students mix up their “theres,” as well as two to and too.
ReplyDeleteOne of the things that concerns me when it comes to my students writing and spelling is my students’ motivation. Although some of my students are extremely driven and complete their morning writing journal entry every morning, some of them fail to do so. Given that they are all completely capable of completing the task, I can only assume that the reason they do not is because they are not motivated to do so. I know writing is not the most interesting thing for most people, but I feel like my students would benefit from an intriguing lesson that interests them that centers around writing. For example, given how interested all of my students are in video games, I think they would enjoy doing some type writing/spelling interactive game on the computer. Additionally, I think they would probably enjoy writing more if they were allowed to write a story using their imagination as opposed to always writing about a past experience.