I have found this technique to be extremely effective with my young spellers who have not developed full phonemic awareness.  It helps them train their ears to hear each part of a word and eventually be able to represent each sound with a written letter. 

1. Draw a rectangle with three boxes.
2. Say a familiar word composed of three sounds such as cat, sun, dog, pan. It is helpful to show children pictures of these objects. (I cut short vowel pictures from an old phonics workbook and laminated them).
3. The child says the word, stretching out the sounds.
4. The child pushes a chip into each box as he says the sound. It is important to note that the boxes represent sounds (phonemes) not letters. The words cake and duck have four letters but only three sounds and would be segmented into three sound boxes.
5. After the child masters words with three phonemes, he may progress to four-phoneme words such as truck, crash, and nest.
6. Once children can push chips to represent sounds, they can push letter cards into boxes and eventually they can write letters in the boxes as they are attempting to spell words they are writing (Elkonin, 1973; Cunningham, 2000).

The practice of inventing spelling leads children to consciously try to hear the sounds in words so they can match letters to the sounds. Invented spelling is an excellent way to further develop phonemic awareness (Gentry, 2000). Research shows that invented spelling can have a positive effect on helping children develop as spellers and writers but also as readers. Spelling ability fosters word recognition by enabling a letter-sound association storage of words in memory (Gentry, 1997).

“Each invented spelling is a permanent record of an individual’s journey to spelling competence. If we collect these snapshots, these invented spellings, and analyze them, we can put together a remarkable album that shows milestones along the way. Since the journey unfolds developmentally in patterns that are predictable and systematic, we can chart the journey with precision and accuracy.” (Gentry, 2000)

Caution: Be sure that parents understand what invented spelling is and that you do not have a “spell it any way you want” attitude. Explain that when children invent spell, they are teaching themselves about phonics and that invented spellings are a wonderful diagnostic tool for discovering a child’s developmental spelling stage. Encourage students to use everything they know about sounds, letters, patterns, and meaning to “stretch out” the word and make a best attempt at spelling it. (Routman, 2000)

Read more on invented spelling.

Have students circle several words from a rough draft that may be misspelled. Ask them to “have a go” at spelling the words again. Encourage them to visualize the word, spell it like it sounds, or spell it by analogy to a spelling pattern they already know.  This is a common spelling strategy used by good spellers.  Good spellers will write a word several ways to see which one “looks right.”

This is an effective study technique for practicing new words. I put a 3-column sheet (download below) on the back of my students’ weekly spelling homework assignment and ask them to write their words in the first column.

Download Form

Later in the week students use these sheets to complete the Look-Say-Cover Flip Folder review activity.

     These photos show flip folders that came with my spelling series one year.  Before these were available to me, I made my own out of file folders.  Follow this link and scroll down for directions to make your own flip folders.

Help students develop memory devices to help them remember spellings of words. This research-supported technique works especially well with second language learners and special needs students. Share common ones or ones you have made up. Here are a few to get you started:

• all right – Two words. Associate with all wrong.
• friend – Friends till the end.
• hear – I hear with my ear.
• there – Is it here or there?
• potatoes – Potatoes have eyes and toes.
• separate – There is a rat in separate.
• together – to + get + her
• arithmetic – A rat in Tom’s house might eat Tom’s ice cream.
• family – Father and Mother, I love you.

Click here for more good mnemonic devices.

Good spellers have a variety of strategies that they use automatically when they are writing a word they don’t know how to spell. We can teach the strategies used by proficient spellers to all of our students. Consider posting a chart labeled “What Good Spellers Do” in the classroom. Add one or two strategies at a time. Model the use of these strategies during shared, interactive, and modeled writing lessons. (Fountas and Pinnell, 1998)

Good spellers:

• Look for patterns
• Look for word parts
• Try several ways to write a word
• Write sounds in words
• Write a vowel in each word and in each syllable
• Think about words that sound the same
• Think about words that look the same
• Check to see if words look right
• Think about what words mean
• Practice words
• Use a dictionary to check
• Use a computer spell check
• Look for words in the classroom

Send home the Spelling Survival Sheet and parent letter  Have parents complete the sheet with CORRECT spellings of names, places, etc. that their child may use frequently in their writing. Include the Survival Sheet in the child’s writing folder for future reference.

To help make my spelling workshop more manageable, I assign my students spelling partners.  They keep the same spelling partner for one entire grading period.  On Wednesdays the partners work together to study their individual spelling lists by playing buddy review games.  On Thursdays they exchange word lists and administer partner quizzes over their individual word lists.  See partner quizzes for more information.

Supplementing word study with cooperative activities such as board games, team study, spelling buddies, etc. has been linked to motivating students and has been identified as an effective spelling strategy (J. Richard Gentry, 2001).  Any board game can be used to review spelling words. Have partners exchange spelling lists. Partner A dictates a word to Partner B. If partner B successfully spells the word (I have my students write the words on individual dry erase boards), s/he advances to the next spot on the gameboard. Another variation is Spelling Tic-Tac-Toe. If the student spells the word correctly, s/he puts an “X” or “O” on the board.

Download FREE Board Games

(This board game created by Dr. Jeff Ertzberger)

Purpose: To help teachers pinpoint spelling words in students’ writing.

1. Keep a green pen on you at all times, with the goal of using it to help writers, not punish them.
2. If you spot a developmentally appropriate, high-frequency word misspelled in a student’s piece of writing, write it correctly in green at the bottom of the page. Look for words in journals, response logs, writing workshop pieces, etc.   I manage this by collecting just two of my students’ writer’s notebooks daily and searching for misspelled words.
3. Have students place words on their individualized spelling lists – green means “go add this one.” I prefer to add these words myself to the spelling assessment sheet I keep for each child in my assessment notebook. With this sheet I am able to find patterns in a child’s misspellings, and it gives me valuable information when I am doing report cards or sharing spelling progress with parents. These sheets are then added to students’ portfolios at the end of each grading period.