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please help me decide R&S spelling or AAS??? esp if you have used both....


Leanna76
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Hi! Please pass along any thoughts or advice. My DD is going into second grade. We used AAS level one last year and it's...ok. The tiles became somewhat annoying...getting them out and organizing them every day. But, I love the thinking behind it...teaching spelling phonetically. Does R&S spelling do this as well? Which program do you prefer and why?

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I think you're going to get a resounding result for AAS...but I preferred R&S for 2nd grade. It was a lot cheaper, two days a week of one workbook page and then test on the 3rd day. I believe R&S has a phonics program that goes along with it, but we just used the spelling.

 

DD did AAS 1 and 2 prior to R&S. She didn't like the tiles with AAS, so she either used a lap size dry erase board for her to write them, or she recited the words orally. She preferred to do the page in R&S and be done.

 

Both are great and get good reviews. I would choose based on the type of learner you have.

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The tiles drove my kiddos crazy. DS7 tried out R&S grade 2 this summer.

 

He loves it, is doing a lesson a day, and is improving his spelling. The things they do with the words make them NOTICE how things are spelled (they don't just rewrite lists). We'll do Grade 3 at normal speed in fall.

 

You should look at the levels.

 

Emily

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R&S teaches the phonics, syllabication, etc. The grade 2 book is a bit more random because they assume you're using grade 2 phonics (which looks very thorough). Grade 3 gets into more phonics, and grade 4 is quite heavy with it.

 

I used AAS1-3, and it was good but too much. We're using R&S now and are seeing good results.

 

I also enter the words into Spelling City for extra practice.

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I did the R and Staff Grammar. I got it free and it make me want to jump off a cliff and never knew they had a separate spelling...

 

:tongue_smilie:

 

 

Just looked at it:

It does look a bit random. It seems ok. The cursive in there would stress MY kids out as we are using a different kind of font. One of them is not using cursive yet. I think another workbook for MY kids would make them scream. MY kids are too kinesthetic and need the stupid AAS tiles...Grumble grumble. Notice I am focusing on the word MY because at this point this curriculum would not work for them. Perhaps in the future. Thanks for alerting me about this option.

Edited by happycc
just looked at it ---rod and staff spelling
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Hi! Please pass along any thoughts or advice. My DD is going into second grade. We used AAS level one last year and it's...ok. The tiles became somewhat annoying...getting them out and organizing them every day. But, I love the thinking behind it...teaching spelling phonetically. Does R&S spelling do this as well? Which program do you prefer and why?

 

I haven't used both, but if you want to make AAS work, you do have options. You can use the magnets so you don't have to get them out & set them up each day (they stay set up), or you can just use the tiles for demonstrations (or not at all). You can use underlining when you write to show 2 or more letters working together as a phonogram, or color on a white board, etc...

 

Just another option for you! Merry :-)

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The spelling list is all cursive in R&S Spelling 4, BUT... My plan, if I need to, is to just print up the list on my computer and paste it over the page. Easy peasy. The actual work instructions are printed still.

 

Though I'm hoping to not have to do that, because I do want him to have practice reading cursive, even if he isn't using that font.

 

The 3rd grade book has both print and cursive lists, so he's already seeing it in cursive.

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when I look at the r&s spelling sample pages I'm lost...I have no idea what's going on

 

Each "lesson" is done over the course of a week. In the 3rd grade book, there is a Part A done one day, Part B done another day, then Part C done another day. Then you have your test. We actually do Part B and C on the same day and do it all in 3 days, but my son is good with that right now. I think that will change in the grade 4 book, since Part C becomes more extensive.

 

Anyway, they just work with the words in the workbook. It's pretty simple, yet they learn a lot. Like they'll write all the spelling words that use "ou" to spell the /ow/ sound. Or they'll divide all of the 2 syllable words into syllables to see how those work. Or they'll take all their spelling words ending with "ing" and write the base word and the spelling word, noticing whether the middle letter is doubled or not (and learning why or why not).

 

It's very simple, yet very effective. :)

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Can I ask you to first evaluate the type of learner that you have?

 

FYI, you will find that almost all spelling workbooks/books have cursive beginning at some point. You can teach cursive or at least to read cursive (I advocate teaching cursive for so many reasons, but not the point).

 

First, what type of learner ....

 

http://www.schoolfamily.com/school-family-articles/article/826-what-is-your-childs-learning-style

http://www.homeschool.com/articles/ablaze5/default.asp

 

Remember that early spelling is meant to be considered as part of reading. You might want to pair the two together.

 

(look at Spalding.)

 

ETA: I found that link ... http://www.dorbooks.com/spellingpathways.html

Edited by ChrissySC
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I'm considering R&S for next year -- do they use diacritical marks any in their Spelling program?

 

Yes, in grade 4, it gets pretty heavy in that (much like their Phonics grade 2). In grade 3, they mention them a little bit... Like in this week's lesson, they said to say the word "saw", then they told the child that the /ô/ said the /aw/ sound they were hearing in "saw". Then they used that /ô/ in the next couple exercises to have the child find the words with that sound spelled "a" and the words spelled "o", like "also" and "along", respectively.

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