heartofdakota.com

We are beginning Bigger tomorrow. My daughter is 11 and has moderate dyslexia. So, spelling is a very weak area. However, even with the exceptionally bad spelling, she has always loved to have pencil and paper and just write whatever her heart desires.....notes to people, anything that comes to her mind. I have been having her do copywork, which gives her practice with punctuation, etc. I was looking over the spelling lists and dictation passages. Honestly, I really believe she would fly through at least half of the dictation passages. On the other hand, she would benefit from learning many of the words from the spelling lists. So, I'm not sure where to start her. Can the lists and dictation passages be used together? Looking through the dictation passages, it appears that most of them include words that would not be too difficult for her to learn. Some of the spelling lists appear to have even more difficult words than the passages, according to the extent that I know my daughter's strengths and weaknesses in spelling. To me, it looks like she is all over the board in the spelling lists, but consistently through at least half of the dictation. I know she could handle the capital letters and punctuation. It's the level of spelling words that has me confused, so I don't know where is best to place her. I will appreciate any suggestions.

My daughter, who did VERY poorly with the spelling lists (she routinely missed half or more of the words on the final spelling test day), has been thriving so far with dictation. Perhaps this supports what you are saying about the dictation words being easier than many of the words in the spelling lists. However, I do think that dictation has given her the tools to find for herself which words will probably give her trouble and to really pay attention to spelling, at least that day's dictation. She enjoys dictation much more than she did the lists, and I see slow but continuous progress in her ability to spell. Doing the "easy" words in the dictation give her confidence in what she can spell easily, and she can now narrow in on the harder words. There are usually 2 or 3 words in the dictation that she doesn't know how to spell. I see her on her markerboard practicing these over and over until she calls me to say she's ready. She usually gets it right and is happy to be able to move on to the next dictation the next day. I wouldn't think of doing the spelling lists with her now even though there are many words on those lists that she would probably still get wrong. She will get all those words on her dictation eventually. Dictation has been working very well for my oldest, and I am beginning to see fruit in my struggling speller too. She does dictation every day, so if she learns 2-3 words a day she will be learning at least as many words as she would with the spelling lists.

All that to say, if I were you, I would start her on dictation, choosing a somewhat easy place (perhaps with 1 or 2 "hard" words) to give her confidence and success. If she is getting them all right with little challenge after two weeks you could skip her ahead.

farmfamily mom - My thoughts were to go with dictation, but I was concerned when I saw the spelling lists and all the words that I know Angie would have trouble spelling. I thought if I went with dictation, she would be missing something. Yes, I'm sure those words from the lists will pop up somewhere. I think, too, that the spelling would stick with her more if she was writing sentences, rather than just practicing words. I guess, unless I hear otherwise from Carrie or Julie, tomorrow we will begin dictation.

I don't quite remember but there's a guideline for where to place in dictation - at a place where they will pass it most of the time. Is it in the guide?

I would place her in dictation wherever she fits. The hard words will come along eventually there too.

Melissa, I'm not home to check the guide, but I will look for that. I know that many of the beginning passages would be quite easy. I'm really excited about our first day tomorrow.