Treating Spelling Words like Math Facts

My daughter spent last summer mastering the multiplication and division facts. I was so impressed with the simplicity of the program we used.  You can read about it here.

I remember watching her confidence soar while her ability level in math grew.  She could finally understand fractions.  The key to her understanding was math fact mastery.

Spelling... that was a different story.  My sweet girl worked so hard trying to memorize spelling words, but they just would not stick.  Sometimes she did well on a spelling test.  Sometimes she did not. Either way the spelling test did not help her with word retention.  She could not reproduce a spelling word while writing.  It didn't matter what spelling program she used.  She still struggled.  Sometimes even the simplest of words like "what" and "said" caused her anxiety.  She was so focused on the spelling of words, that her thoughts: her beautiful, profound thoughts, stayed inside her instead of on paper where the world could enjoy them. 


I know that spelling and writing are two separate skills.  I had treated them as such for years.  Experts say to allow inventive spelling while children are writing.  You can fix the spelling later.  Experts say to allow children to dictate their thoughts while the parent or teacher act as a scribe.  These are great modifications that I have used in the classroom and with my own children.  But I wanted more for my daughter. 

And then I had a thought,

"What if I treated spelling words like math facts?"

It was such a strange idea.  Spelling is a different skill than math.

But what if instead of numbers grouped together, I taught Elli to group letters together.  Addends and factors became phonograms and spelling rules.  3 x 2 = 6 because it is three groups of two or two groups of three.  The word said = s plus the AI phonogram plus d. 

But still, this was just conceptual.  My daughter had always understood the WHY behind math facts. 

What she needed was consistent practice and gradual introduction of new words. 

Students spend hours practicing math facts.  They use flash cards, written tests, picture stories: whatever works to internalize them.  They need math fact mastery to go on to higher level math.  You can't reduce fractions without an understanding of factors and division.  Math fact memory is necessary.

My daughter after she completed Automatic Spelling Level 1

All my life I've been told that some students are just poor spellers, and it is a good thing that spell check exists.  This is true, but I was not ready to give up.  My daughter was starting to be embarrassed by her struggles.  I thought that she might be able to master the spelling of common words in the same way she learned the multiplication facts:  by learning just a small number at a time and by practicing previous words over and over again.

So I collected words: commonly misspelled words, Dulch words, Fry words, words that used certain phonograms, words that had to be changed before adding a suffix.  Words, words, words.  I showed her what rules each of these words followed.  I pointed out phonograms within the words.  I created a spelling program. 

And she practiced.  And practiced.  And practiced.  And slowly she learned how to spell.  She can write without the hindrance of a spelling block. She can add any suffix to a word and spell it correctly.  She drops Es, changes y to i, and doubles final consonants without batting an eye.




It worked so well for her that I thought it might help other students.  I was right.  More than fifty students have tried this program.  Fifty children who might struggle with spelling otherwise.  Fifty children, some who for the first time believe that they are capable of learning to spell.  Some of these students ask to do spelling as their first subject. They are seeing results.  Your child could, too.


You can purchase Automatic Spelling here.