Melissa in St Louis Posted March 2, 2009 Share Posted March 2, 2009 What is the concensus on Rod and Staff Spelling? This would be for a 2nd grader who is generally a good speller. I am going with Rod and Staff English next year, and I'm thinking the Spelling might be a good fit, also. Thoughts? Thanks hive! Melissa in St Louis Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deeinfl Posted March 2, 2009 Share Posted March 2, 2009 It is rule based. It has exercises, but they are not busywork, they really make the children think about their answers. We are on week 24 of 2nd grade and I am about to order the 3rd grade one. We are really impressed with it. My son has done very well with it and I would like to continue with it for as long as my son could handle it. :) You can view samples at rodandstaffbooks.com I think you will not be disappointed. Blessings, Dee Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melissa in St Louis Posted March 2, 2009 Author Share Posted March 2, 2009 Glad you family is having success with it. I am torn between Rod and Staff and How to Teach Spelling. Rod and Staff sounds great! Anyone else have thoughts? Thanks so much! Melissa in St Louis Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ali in OR Posted March 2, 2009 Share Posted March 2, 2009 We love it. We switched from SWO last spring. We did SWO A,B,C and half of D. I found that the activities were designed more to keep a class busy than to reinforce the spelling. My good speller but not a puzzle lover dd was very frustrated by some activities like rearranging a scrambled word to make a list word. I much prefer R&S where the work actually explains rules, reinforces spelling patterns, etc. And it's a lot cheaper than SWO. I plan to stick with it. Incidentally, the 2nd grade book is the start of R&S spelling. I'm going to use it next year with my 1st grader (Dec. birthday, so older, stronger reader than average for a 1st grader.) For the grade 2 book, there are ruled lines to write on and lessons are 2 pages. The lesson 1 list is cap, ten, days, word, rain, big, hat, sick, fat, yes, cake, and pig. Lesson 33 at the end of the book has water, pony, into, ring, many, filling, carries, storm, river, zoo, hands, and upon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyingmommy Posted March 2, 2009 Share Posted March 2, 2009 My 2nd gr dd is a very phonetic speller. R&S 2 has made such an improvement in her spelling. We can see a real difference! And she doesn't complain a bit about the work. Jeannie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melissa in St Louis Posted March 2, 2009 Author Share Posted March 2, 2009 and DS can already correctly spell the words in the back of the 4th grade book....??? What do I order? We don't do cursive yet, so that is also a concern. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melissa in St Louis Posted March 3, 2009 Author Share Posted March 3, 2009 :bigear: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AllSmiles Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 and DS can already correctly spell the words in the back of the 4th grade book....??? What do I order? We don't do cursive yet, so that is also a concern. I just printed out the words for my child who wasn't reading cursive yet. We love Rod & Staff spelling, and I'm so glad that we switched from Spelling Workout. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kim in Appalachia Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 I've used SWR with my kids, but it is hard to keep up that program with so many kids to teach, and all at different levels. I have used the spelling after 3rd grade, and it was an easy switch from SWR. Even though the rules and markings look different my kids had no problem identifying what they knew and translating to the new program, KWIM? I think it is a very complete program. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melissa in St Louis Posted March 3, 2009 Author Share Posted March 3, 2009 if we have never formally done spelling before, yet I have an advanced speller who knows how to correctly spell up through 4th grade...what grade should I buy? Start at the beginning so we DO learn all the rules? Or challenge him a bit? Thanks! Melissa in St Louis Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ellie Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 if we have never formally done spelling before, yet I have an advanced speller who knows how to correctly spell up through 4th grade...what grade should I buy? Start at the beginning so we DO learn all the rules? Or challenge him a bit? Thanks! Melissa in St Louis I would go with the grade level your dc is in. The spelling words might not be so difficult, but the activities in each lesson are very challenging. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ali in OR Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 What are your goals for spelling? Do you think you have a future spelling bee competitor? Do you just want decent spelling for writing later on? There are skills taught in the books that go beyond spelling. They learn dictionary skills, how to read phonetic spelling and symbols for sounds, etc. The third grade book has the list in both print and cursive and the lesson is 2 pages long. In the third grade book, some of the lesson questions are like these from lesson 7: Which new words have the same short vowel sound that you hear in (picture of an apple) and (picture of a hat)? Which words that you wrote have this vowel sound spelled a? Which word has this vowel sound spelled au? The fourth grade book has lists in cursive. Lessons are about 3.5 pages long. The questions are more sophisticated (no pictures, questions use the symbols for writing the sound rather than the letter). A paragraph of writing is completed using list words. Dictionary skills include learning how words are separated into syllables. I would not be eager to push these activities to too young an age. The spelling is easy for my dd. She never misses words on the tests. But I think she is learning a lot about words from these activities. And it is okay with me that spelling is easy. We do not major in spelling here. I like that she can do it mostly independently. I would consider the 3rd grade book for a second grader and if it's easy, that's okay. I think reading comprehension level of the questions and the amount of writing increases significantly between the 3rd and 4th grade book. These factors, more than the difficulty of the words, would make me lean toward the younger book. If you didn't really care about these types of activities, I might consider something like Spelling Power where you just have lists of words. You can choose the level you need to work at and decide what activities you need to do the work on those words. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melissa in St Louis Posted March 3, 2009 Author Share Posted March 3, 2009 That is SO helpful! :D Yes, we have done spelling bees, and he LOVED them, so that is a goal at this point. However, with spelling bees you do get a huge list to study of possible words, so in prep we would be studying the list words anyway. Going at grade level for him sounds like the best choice. Thank you SO MUCH! (phew! Spelling figured out! Only a few more things left to go! :D) Melissa in St Louis Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sandalwood Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 ... The spelling is easy for my dd. She never misses words on the tests. But I think she is learning a lot about words from these activities. And it is okay with me that spelling is easy. We do not major in spelling here. I like that she can do it mostly independently. I would consider the 3rd grade book for a second grader and if it's easy, that's okay. I think reading comprehension level of the questions and the amount of writing increases significantly between the 3rd and 4th grade book. Thank you so much for this detailed post! I have been watching this thread and this explains it so well. We have the 5th grade Rod & Staff spelling book that we purchased used in a lot of books of ebay. We have not used it, mainly because I don't feel my child is ready for it yet. With your post, I am going to look at the 4th grade book online and look at the samples. I love how the 5th grade book looks and I was seriously considering it for next year. I think now I might back up to the 4th and start with that. Awesome review, thank you! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.