Word Study vs. Traditional Spelling

As I was working on my presentation for Vegas this summer, I got to thinking and talking with my literacy coach. She had a great couple of points that I wanted to share and chat about…even before Vegas 🙂

What does spelling look like in your room?

I can tell you right now that I am not going to be able to cover everything that we do in our room in one blog post. I’m not even quite sure how I’m going to fit it all into a 75 minute presentation. I do want to give the reasons why and tell you a little bit of how I think it directly impacts reading and writing in our classroom.

 Kathy Ganske is sort of the end all be all of Word Sorts. When I was working on my action research, I was actually able to sit down with her and talk to her about why this approach is more effective than giving every student in your class the same list of words.

Our literacy coach shares this chart with parents at the beginning of the year to compare and contrast what traditional spelling looks like vs. what word study looks like.

How do you know what sort which student is going to do?

We use the assessments from Word Journeys to put students in their groups.

Once groups are formed (I try not to have more than 2 groups…3 at the absolute most!), we start our sorts on Monday and they take a test on Friday.

This is an example of a sort.

They keep their sorts in these envelopes in their desks so they don’t lose all of the pieces. I slap a label on it and laminate it.

Throughout the week, students meet with the teacher in a small group, work together as partners, play games, and practice their words on whiteboards.

Once they graduate from just writing beginning sounds, they start writing actual words and using them in sentences. Words that students are spelling should be words that they are reading and words that they are writing.

I know that this post doesn’t probably even chip the tip of the iceberg, but I do hope it’s gotten you thinking about your spelling instruction in your room and considering word sorts.

Students do take a sort home and keep one at school. If you are coming to Vegas, I’d love to go more in depth with you and share how I structure my week with word sorts.

I’d love to hear your thoughts about word sorts…do you use them?

Do you think they have a direct impact on reading and writing?