Spelling You See?

[busymama7]

I have 2 kids with probable dyslexia who have missed a lot of foundational work over the last couple years due to my illness. They are doing pretty well with reading but spelling needs some work. We are using the good and the beautiful but at level 4 it passed him so far up in spelling that we can't continue with their system.  The other child is in level 2 and the spelling is ok for her but I would still like to add another program on top.  

I am looking at spelling you see and curious about if people have liked it.  

Edited October 17 by busymama7

[Rosie_0801]

I don't know about this one, but Apples and Pears was created for dyslexics.

[HomeAgain]

Spelling You See has the disadvantage of being "age appropriate", with large boxes and work space for the beginning and moving the lines closer together by age level.  If you're okay with that, then it's a good program that uses color coding to chunk rules.

If you're not okay with that, I would recommend All About Spelling (has lots of moving pieces), Reading And Spelling Through Literature (skip the reading portion), or Apples & Pears.

 

[busymama7]

1 hour ago, HomeAgain said:

Spelling You See has the disadvantage of being "age appropriate", with large boxes and work space for the beginning and moving the lines closer together by age level.  If you're okay with that, then it's a good program that uses color coding to chunk rules.

If you're not okay with that, I would recommend All About Spelling (has lots of moving pieces), Reading And Spelling Through Literature (skip the reading portion), or Apples & Pears.

 

Ah I hadn't considered that. My 10 year old is struggling with handwriting so I'm not sure if that would work for her.  But maybe since she's so far behind in spelling too 🤦‍♀️. I have used all about spelling and want to cry even thinking about it.   Can't do it.  I like the philosophy behind spelling you see being integrated and not just a list.  

I forgot about Apples and Pears. I will look at that.  They could use all the reading reenforcement too so I will also look at the other which I hadn't heard of.  

[AnneGG]

We just tried Spelling You See. My 4th grader was so excited to give it a try and loved the idea of color coding and copywork. Realistically, the color coding was tedious and copying nearly the same thing everyday was a bit dull for him. I didn’t really see any improvement in spelling. It just wasn’t a good fit here, but I can see why it’s well loved by many. I would try the samples first (rainbow resource has a preview you can print.)

[forty-two]

I've really liked SYS.  All my kids have had auditory processing issues (which made learning to read hard, and spelling a nightmare), and I did a lot of things to get them remediated.  SYS was what I used to teach them to pay attention to the (visual) insides of words (my oldest did not/could not), and I used the SYS marking system with all dictation we did, in WWE and any other program (it was our method of studied dictation). 

My two girls did Level C around age 10 (so "behind" the usual age/grade), and my ds is doing Level E this year (age 13, also "behind").  Placement with my oldest was a bit complicated, as her reading level was beyond the highest SYS level, but her spelling level was Level B as was her writing stamina.  She liked the idea of animals, and it seemed within reach, spelling-wise, so we went with it, and it worked well.  I did the same thing placing my ds - a combo of interest level and spelling level and writing stamina.  (My middle just did the second half of my oldest's Level C, but she liked animals and it was a good fit spelling-wise.) 

All the kids enjoyed/enjoy it.  With my oldest, it took 5-6 weeks before something clicked and she started doing well at dictations; it's taken a similar amount of time for things to gel with my other kids, too, but there was a more gradual improvement instead of a switch flipping.  (The grading is very positive and encouraging - just count the number of correctly spelled words you managed in 10 minutes of dictation.)  I made a sound-spelling chart, that we color-coded with the SYS markings, that they were encouraged to use during dictations (and any spelling, including spelling "in the wild").  WRT to older kids using earlier levels, my girls just wrote in half the vertical space and it worked fine. 

I also, in direct violation of the SYS recommendation, had my kids use cursive instead of print.  It negated the visual memory aspect of SYS, but instead allowed them to practice cursive and forced them to write by syllable instead of by letter/phoneme.  (Learning cursive was an integral part of our spelling remediation; I did a whole second cursive spell-to-write pass through the phonics book.  In general I found that cursive required them to use their weaker auditory processing skills, instead of allowing them to use their stronger visual memory skills, which was exactly what they needed, especially my oldest.  But eventually my middle has needed some targeted visual memory work wrt spelling that my oldest didn't need.)

I've mostly just done one level to cement the marking system, which we then use everywhere (also to introduce dictation and increase writing stamina).  I don't think it would have been enough alone for us - we had lots of remediating to do - but it did great at what it did, and covered an important piece of the puzzle for us.  Plus it's super open-and-go, doesn't take a lot of time, and is a pretty relaxing and encouraging experience for my kids - its been a great program for us.

Edited Tuesday at 01:38 AM by forty-two

[Lori D.]

Apples and Pears -- and here's the "where to start" info 
All About Spelling -- based on Orton-Gillingham methods; uses letter tiles, so reduces the handwriting issue

Once you get solid with the phonetics from one of the above programs (or other similar program), you could switch over somewhere around 5th/6th/ grade to something like Sequential Spelling or Megawords if is preferred.

Edited Tuesday at 04:38 AM by Lori D.