Questions about Spelling Workout

[robbie]

I am new to home-schooling. I just started using the recommendations in the Well Trained Mind. I bought FLL and Writing with Ease work book level 2.

I also purchased the Spelling Workout program that was recommended.

It seems to me that Spelling Workout contradicts the FLL method.

FLL on the one hand asked the child to do perfect copy work, with no misspelled words, but on the other hand, Spelling Workout gives the child misspelled words to correct in several exercises every week.

My ds is using Spelling Workout B.

I would appreciate any experience or wisdom anyone might have.

Blessings!

Robbie

[Chocolate Lover]

I have used SWO with DS8 from the year he was 6 and we are now in the second half of SWO-D. My DS has worked diligently on SWO and it shows. I feel it is a great reinforcement of phonics with the rules written as the tip. It has primarily been a struggle with the three line writing lines, as he has beautiful print with HWT double line paper. As far as the actual spelling acquired as a skill, it has worked very well. It is logical and methodical in its' progress. Additionally, DS loves to do work he can do by himself, feels proud of himself for it.:D I do feel the editing that you point out in SWO is a strength of the program. It helps DC to detect when a word isn't spelled right. I do that all the time, hardly ever use SpellCheck.

 

You may find many on this board don't like SWO, but we love it!

Edited November 16, 2008 by Chocolate Lover
Needed more words.

[G5052]

There has been some research indicating that you don't truly know how to spell a word until you can recognize when it is misspelled, so that's why Spelling Workout and some language arts programs have you proofread writing with errors in it. We've used Spelling Workout for some five years now, and I've always had them do that part because they do seem to benefit from it. I also use Daily Paragraph Editing from Evan-Moor which has both mispelled words and grammar errors because I have seen significant progress there too. My 6th actually proofs my writing now.

 

That said, some families do skip the proofing part. I read somewhere that children with dylexia should NOT be working with misspelled words because it hampers their ability to learn to spell.

 

I'll note though that I'm in the "wait a bit" spelling camp. We held off on spelling until they finished phonics because I wanted to pick my battles (i.e. phonics is hard enough on it's own), and I looked at spelling as "polishing" the phonics skills and applying them.

[mcconnellboys]

I agree. I don't do the pre-testing in Spelling Workout, because I want him to practice the words and learn to spell them first. But we always do the editing work at the end of the week. We do editing in other programs we use, too. I find it very beneficial. There are these type questions on all standardized tests, too.