[Zee]

I have a student who is struggling with spelling, on weekly tests and in his writing. His mom expresses concern and asks for suggestions, but doesn't seem motivated to help much at home. I am looking for suggestions that I can use during the day and/or would be VERY easy for his mom to help with at home. Any ideas?

[Harleybabe]

On Monday, I send home the spelling list and at the bottom is a Mon-Friday checklist. They return the spelling checklist on Friday. They earn a sticker for each night they practice and parent initialed. The stickers go on a chart they keep in their desks. When they fill up a row, they get a candy prize. When they get the whole sticker chart fill up, they go to the prize box. This has really helped my students. Also, the parent may go to www.spellingcity.com to practice lists. At the beginning of the year, I sent home a letter informing parents of different ways to practice at home-write spelling words with pudding, use magnetic letters, letter tiles, wikki sticks, etc. I hope this helps.

[gyrlie1973]

Are they sight words or words with some kind of pattern (i.e. long "a" words)?

[Zee]

Both kinds of words. Often there is a pattern for that week's words, but sometimes there are sight words too. He is also struggling with spelling sight words in his writing.

[kshaw]

1. write your spelling words in shaving cream
2. write your spelling words w/ white crayon on white paper - use watercolor paints to see your words "magically" appear
3. spell words with magnetic letters
4. make words out of playdough
5. stamp the words with letter stamps
6. connect four (or any other short game) - before taking a turn, you must spell a spelling word. If you do not spell it correctly you lose your turn
7. rainbow write spelling words (write your word in red, trace over in orange, trace over in yellow. . .)
8. spell your words with Alphabits cereal

I also made the attached WS using ideas from PT and other sources. I will attach spelling task cards (that I found here on PT). You should be able to find a lot of great ideas from there.

My advice - You may want to consider using a modified list for this student and stick to a pattern (short vowels (CVC) then long vowels (CVCE). . . I don't know what grade you teach - this may not be appropriate for your student. Also, depending on the number of words you have, you could have this student only be responsible for the first 10 words.

[kshaw]

I hope these help as well. Like I said, I did not make these.

[kattlyn]

Last week one of the 2nd graders I work with was truly struggling - I made a table - their list was basically -ai and -ay words - So I had three columns -ai -ay and Other - this helped him categorize the words - I tried to remind him that -ay (usu.) will only be at END of word not in middle (snayl no - snail) This seemed to really help him - let him take home a gel pen to make writing 3x every night a little more fun too.