Why can't I teach spellings?!

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I must just not have found the best method for my DD yet.

Would love some of your input please?

DD is 5. Just started year 1 and we now have weekly spellings.

DD reads amazingly and her phonics knowledge is perfect.

But we had spellings a few times in reception and I never felt any that didn't follow phonics truly went in.

What is your top technique for getting the exception words to stick? We've got a few that I can tell will be hard for her (replied, repeat etc)

Low pressure repetition over time, simple as that.
Reading them aloud, writing them when practicing handwriting, spotting them in general life (be creative - tv ads, magazines, cereal boxes if they're there!)
It may take a few years yet before she can imagine words without seeing them written down, but otherwise perhaps just gently include spelling & reading in everyday life.

Repetition, flash cards, writing them down over and over, see how many times you can write the word in a minute...

For DS2 it's bouncing on the trampoline. He reads them, writes them down, spells them in fridge magnets and once I think he's 'got' them I stick him on the trampoline and make him bounce as he shouts them out to me while I garden. Sounds madness but the physical movement seems to help embed them.

Also, the trampoline trick works with times tables, too. He has to know all of his times tables by the end of Y4 according to his school and we've started doing tables on there in the same way and he's retaining them much more.

Our school uses write, cover, repeat technique. You can probably download a worksheet for this from the internet.

I found another great technique also online.
Get her to copy the word in pencil. Then go over it 2 or 3 times in different colour pens and say each letter as she writes over it. At end of each word say it out loud. As it involves 2 senses it's supposed to work better.

I find numonics (I think that's the word) help me. So things like 'big elephants can always understand small elephants' 'never eat chips eat salad sandwiches and remain young' etc. Also little sentences to remember tricky bits of words 'there's a rat in separate' 'a piece of pie' 'accommodate two mothers and two children'. I find it hard to visualise longer words tbh, stuff like this helps (I can do because!)

You could look at the words and make up some numonics for them. Even if she doesn't remember the numonics thinking about the letter order might help. Or make up something to remember tricky bits, which bits is she getting wrong? I'd also second speed writing, how many times in a minute etc

Peas repeat on me could work? If she can spell pea!

Look cover write check, multiple times a week. Learn the phonics sounds that they use at school and focus on one at a time. E.g. looking at the ou sound in reading and writing for a week. Then for exception words, read it as it "should be" first, then put a big star round the parts that aren't spelled the same way they sound.

We had foam letters at bathtime. They fished for the letters they needed, then spelt the word on the side of the bath.

We used mnemonics and funny rhymes or jokey ways - for example ‘friend’ was ‘ayeee I found my friend’ (I E I found my friend) and we broke down words non phonetically so people became Pee-ople. I used this as a child myself, and still use it.

mnemonics!

Things like 'oh you lucky duck' for would/could/should
'l go home today' for light/fight/right/eight
'Sally Alice is dancing' for said
Because and necessary have already been mentioned.

We also made up little phrases to remember trickier words for instance restaurant we thought about a waiter having a rest and then a guest saying "aye, you" and then ranting at the waiter. Rest a u rant

When my daughter got to year 6 we tried to focus on one word a day, and during that day it was written in a white board at home, I asked her to write it/spell it/say it aloud as much as possible and just hoped it eventually stuck. This could be something that can be done at any age and I'm not sure why it took until y6 to come up with that idea!

It's worth printing off the year 1/2 word list and sticking a few copies around the house. One next to her bed, one on the fridge etc.

Laminate a few copies. Have one in the bathroom, one as a place mat for meals. The more she sees them daily the more they will stick.

Don't forget she has two years to learn these words as they continue learning them in year 2 and that's the same for yr3 and 4 and then 5 and 6.

I was told they expect them to know 60% by the end of year 1, 3 and 5 and almost all by the end of year 2, 4, 6 as they've been exposed to those words for 2 years by then.

It's also never to early to introduce a dictionary to your child. There are ones aimed at small kids which more words they are likely to come across daily.

There are lots of resources online to help parents, or speak to the teacher and see if they have any handouts they can give you.

My Son is given creative exercises to help him learn. The one that helps him most is to write in a pyramid. E.g.

R
RE
REP
REPE
REPEA
REPEAT

Try making them into a little song - difficult to demonstrate in writing! - but something simple like R -E-P to the E -A - T repeat, repeat repeat. My DD4 can spell 'respect' thanks to Aretha being played a lot on the radio recently

Loads of great ideas on this thread. Or could also show her the word with one letter missing then two, etc. Or give her the cards with the word spelt correctly on one and incorrectly on the others. Five different tasks through the week which get gradually more difficult can work well.

Betty, I love that! Do you have any other ones?

Repetition and sight.

Remember that you just need to provide the time and space to practise, school will teach them daily.

My dd liked writing it on easel white board. She would copy out each spelling ten times. We would then test. She found having it writen large in front of her helped. We would do this once then revisit over week so stayed in head. Best thing to do is find your childs prefered learning style, some children like if put to songs, or saying out loud, some like doing to movement, or clapping and saying out, they can then do in head, some like rhymes, some need it visually. My dd is very visual so i wrote on paper in different shapes, got her to write out and had up in house. I was a teacher and children loved having the spellings put up around classroom and then got them to run to the right one. It allowed them to visulise the word.

School teach look cover write check but it didn't work for my kids so they write out each word 10 times every night. Works for them.

Repetition.

Thank you so much. I really appreciate the replies.

Today we just read the words (they all seemed familiar to her already so that was a good first step) and then she wrote each down once copying.

She also had some maths to do today so I kept the spellings low key but did explain what a spelling test is and that we'll look and write the words each day to help her learn them.

I have her an example of singing the spelling but she straight away said that muddled her brain, so that's one method off the table.

Going to sit and do some flash cards now and put them on the wall by her little table so she sees them all week. I love the "one letter missing" and trampoline ideas. Will give them all a try. Xxx