Why I'm Making My Kids Practice Their Spelling Over Summer Break

Somehow, I have children who are old enough to read and write.

I don't know how that time came, but it's here and it's up to me and them to make sure that they practice so that they're current on what they need to know when school starts again.

This year, I found out it isn't in the school curriculum to teach the kids spelling or give them spelling tests.

Spelling Tests at School

It's such a weird concept to me because that's what we did, we took spelling tests, but when I asked some of my teacher friends if it's normal or what they thought about that in correlation to learning to read, they said that spelling actually isn't very important.

I disagree, but I'm also a writer and I cringe when I read my children's papers (Can you believe that grade school kids have to write real reports? I feel like that was a Jr. High thing.) and their spelling is incorrect.

When I asked the teacher, she said that she isn't concerned with the spelling, she's more concerned with structure and content of the papers. Again, I was baffled. Maybe it's because I learned a different way. Maybe it's because I believe that if you know how to spell a word, you'll also know how to read it. Pronouncing it out loud, however, is a different concept. I mean, c'mon! Quinoa is actually pronounced- keen-wa? What's up with that?

Summer Homework

Anywho, I'm getting off topic. 

This year, I decided to have my kids do some reading/writing homework at home. 

It probably seems mean, but those are the two subjects that my kids have had a difficult time with. Every other subject they do well in- especially math. They can add and subtract in their head so much better than I can. I guess that common core stuff isn't too bad, after all. 

I ordered several different workbooks with sight and spelling words for them to try each day. My youngest is going into Kindergarten, this year, so we're going to play some games where he traces lines or reads me his ABCs, we're even going to start him with a few sight words, too because the school expects him to know a ton of things before he even begins.

Summer Goal

My goal isn't to overwhelm them, but to incorporate some easy learning opportunities into their morning with hopes that they'll retain what they learned in school and help them learn the things that they didn't in class because of distractions or lack of opportunity. 

Spelling

Spelling is my biggest concern. I know that my kids will have access to spell check, which was one of the reasons the teacher gave me for not having weekly spelling tests, but I would like for them to know on their own.

To me, misspelling words is very embarrassing and makes me feel like a dummy. I don't want my kids to feel like that and I also don't want my future to be filled with misspelled words in books and novels because spell check missed them and no one took the time to correct them.  (Now I'm worried that this post is littered with misspellings and I'm not practicing what I'm preaching. AHHH!!!"

So, to help my children, I ordered a spelling book, but it hasn't come in, yet, so when I gave my son his spelling test, he numbered them on his own (Great problem solving!) and wrote the words that I gave him.

I'm glad that he did this on his own, but there really wasn't a rhyme or reason (is that the correct saying?) to how he wrote them out, so I came up with a printable.

For anyone who wants to use this, the first column is for the spelling words you give your child. I only chose to do ten because I didn't want to overwhelm my kids, because after all, it's still summer break. 

The next columns are for corrections, in case he/she gets his/her word wrong.

You can print the printable out using this link- Spelling Test/Correction Sheet.

I plan to give the same words ever day for a week and then swap them out for new words, unless my child is still having a difficult time remembering how to spell that word.

Hopefully, I won't have to print out this sheet every day, once that spelling book gets here. However, if it doesn't come with work sheets, I guess my printer is going to get some use. 

Conclusion

I know that it's summer time and homework seems excessive. I would have HATED having to do work over the summer.

However, I know my kids could use the extra help.

I only plan to work with them for 30 minutes a day and then have them read for another 30 minutes a day, so it's not like we're going to be using up the whole day to do this. 

They can sleep in or wake up as early as they'd like, but after eating breakfast, they'll know that they'll have to work on their homework. If they don't, they also know that they won't be able to have any television, tablet, or game system time.