Spelling nightmare, how to help DD?

[LeMousquetaireAnonyme]

Hi,
DD1 (6.8) is in year 2 and is top set for everything except spelling where she is bottom. She does study spelling everyday. I thought little and often was better. (I might be wrong?)
She just doesn't get it, she even invents letters.
I tried to make her read the words several time, write the words severals time and a combination of the 2, I did orally when I tell her a word and she has to spell it, form the words with magnetic letters...
It works for simple words like pool, ball... but table is spelt tab and happy= hpi. Even if she did it OK the night before .

Not sure how to help her? any idea? shall I try a spelling bee type of training? (how do you do it?)
She is not asked to write independent text yet so just recopy the words from the question to answer, hence the top marks, but it will pose problems soon as sometime I can't even guess what word the teacher was trying to make them write. She claims she doesn't remember either.
I guess it is a lack of interest and concentration and I am not sure how to solve that.
Anyone is in the same boat? How do you help your child?
TIA

My DD, nearly 8yo, only really started to grasp spellings when her reading took off. Last year it took a lot of effort and practise to get the weekly spellings right, whereas now she seems to be developing a sense of what "looks right", I'm sure a lot of that is down to her more confident and prolific reading. Could you encourage her to read more rather than too much spelling practise if that doesn't really seem to work?

I found mine was better a speaking it...I would get her to learn through repetition. And then she got much better....once she could SAY the spellings hen it was easy to get her to write them.

I also pinned them up in the kitchen where she could see them and they would remind me to test her now and then.

We go with the little and often approach with ds2. I pin his spellings on the fridge and randomly call out words for him to spell out verbally through the week. Seems to cause less stress than trying to work through a list of twenty spellings!

Ds1 used to get a mental block with certain words so we would make up a silly sentence with each word starting with the next letter IYSWIM, so "because" was Badgers Eat Cabbages And Uncle Stuart's Eggs - he is now year 9 and still uses the sentances occasionally. :)

we have a white board at home in the kitchen and we do maths on there and dd does spellings, tescos have 12 whiteboard pens for £3 and their boards are about £5. DD loves it.

how about filling in the blanks?

You could choose 5 or ten words a week
could you do hpp or similar first day.
then h _ y etc.

When you say she studies spelling everyday, what exactly do you mean? Is it spellings she is required to learn for school? Or something else?

What has she actually been taught at school? I am surprised she does not write independently yet if she is in top sets - are you in the UK? From the examples of mis-spellings you have given, it seems that her phonic knowledge is still fairly rudimentary and this would normally need to improve before her spelling improves. Does your DD know what vowels and consenants are? Does she know what syllables are and can she count how many there are in words? Does she know that each syllable normally needs to contain a vowel? Once she has some idea of this, she can look at individual spelling patterns.

I would also advise you to ask her school what they think her difficulties are and recommend what you can do to help?

yes, yes and yes, that why I am she does know phonics too. She doesn't seem to associate it with the spelling.

No, not in the UK, but it is an english school. They test more regularly and she does well in those tests (except the spelling one), but as I said she can copy pretty much all her answers from the questions asked or the text to read. (i.e. rearranging the words to make an answer as she has no comprehension problems)

She has 15 words to learn/week and I try to do that everyday little by little + revisions. I ask her verbally and/or make her write and say some of the word every night, on top of her reading. Not much as I am alone with a 20 months old who I have to keep occupied so she can have peace.

The teacher thinks she is not studying, I told her otherwise now and hope she will get more help at school.

I do think she has a very good memory and "fake" read at school, I have started her on new books at home so she can read properly, so hopefully it will improve.

She is also trilingual and I think she is confused sometime. She is also catching up (entered directly year 2 from kindergarden), that is why I am not worried, I just want ways to help her.
I have never done this at school (I am old and not from the UK either).

Thanks all, I will try the fridge and the crazy sentence for complicated words.
Do you think dictation/correction will help? (for some reason she really dislikes that and the time I tried it ended in tears) instead of just orally or just writing/reading.

Goodness, you and your dd sound as if you have an awful lot on your plates. I hope she will now get more help at school. Not sure what to suggest. Is it dictation or correction that she doesn't like? The only thing I can think of is that if she had greater understanding of why words are spelt the way they are, she would find remembering the spelling, or at least getting an approximation of the spelling, easier. I would be inclined to split the words up so there is just a small group to be covered each evening and then ask your dd to think how she might spell each word. Then be very positive about the parts that she has got right - eg 'well done for thinking that, but it is actually spelt ... ' and if you can gently provide some explanation of why each word is spelt the way it is, it might help.

I think she doesn't like me being there when she write, and definitely doesn't like being wrong. She is very competitive, like to be 1st and best, just give up when it doesn't come naturally. I am working on that too.

It would help if her dad was at home during the week, he is the native english speaker, I do have problems with "th" and "H", may be he should do the dictation over the phone and I correct later (he is extremely busy and lazy though, he will need a massive kick up the ass to do that...).

I will try to make her spell syllables and then blend them in a word. Thanks.

She is doing incredibly well, IMO, I don't want her to get too worked up because one thing isn't coming easily.

Do you approve of computer use?

If so, someone on MN recommended Spelling City. If you register (free) you can input your daily words and then there are tests and games to play to learn these words. It also gives meaning of the words

They ask you to pay, but you dont need to, but you should register to keep the words recorded

Sounds like she is only hearing the phonetic sounds so try the site, but if it is too hard dont push it.

Little and often is a good approach!
You could try her with something like Apples and Pears (very structured phonic programme) or get Superphonics Spelling and work through that with her bit by bit.

www.prometheantrust.org/startspelling.htm
www.amazon.co.uk/Superphonics-Spelling-Ruth-Miskin/dp/0340851953

Given what you say about her difficulties, the Apples and Pears scheme might be the best one to start with - just try and do 10 minutes every day.

If she is trilingual, it may be hard for her to get the right grapheme ( spelling sound) in te right language. I would relax, read with and to her lots, and keep asking te school to help- am sure it will all click soon.

I think the priority here is that she stays very confident in what she can do already, and continues to enjoy reading. The school sounds pretty ill-informed. it is fairly widespread knowledge that bi-lingual (let alone tri-lingual) children develop far later but eventually outstrip their peers in literacy. She has three times as much info coming in, and has to sort it. Like trying to fit the contents of three houses in a camper van. She needs a break.

Rationally, it's easy to see why she'd invent letters. With three languages to choose from, she has logically worked out that other people did just that, so why can't she?

Also, I agree with you that it's very important for her to hear English mainly from the native speaker. It's often suggested that non-native parents speak their own mother tongue to children, exclusively, to help them distinguish between the two. I don't know how easy that would be in practise for you, if her dad is away, but when he;s around, he could do the bulk of spelling with her.

In terms of non-phonetic words, I give them silly names, like 'cheeky words' who put their l before the e (as in table) or secret words that have a silent letters hidden in them, like night or knee.
Teach her the magic e that changes the vowel sound from short to long - that helps a lot. So she'll know, because of the e at the end, that it's pronounced tay not ta as in tat.

She'll get there. There are very good reasons why she's slower than others. She has far more to assimilate. Just keep her confident and happy for now, when she reads and spells. Sounds like she's doing fine.

I think the priority here is that she stays very confident in what she can do already, and continues to enjoy reading. The school sounds pretty ill-informed. it is fairly widespread knowledge that bi-lingual (let alone tri-lingual) children develop far later but eventually outstrip their peers in literacy. She has three times as much info coming in, and has to sort it. Like trying to fit the contents of three houses in a camper van. She needs a break.

Rationally, it's easy to see why she'd invent letters. With three languages to choose from, she has logically worked out that other people did just that, so why can't she?

Also, I agree with you that it's very important for her to hear English mainly from the native speaker. It's often suggested that non-native parents speak their own mother tongue to children, exclusively, to help them distinguish between the two. I don't know how easy that would be in practise for you, if her dad is away, but when he;s around, he could do the bulk of spelling with her.

In terms of non-phonetic words, I give them silly names, like 'cheeky words' who put their l before the e (as in table) or secret words that have a silent letters hidden in them, like night or knee.
Teach her the magic e that changes the vowel sound from short to long - that helps a lot. So she'll know, because of the e at the end, that it's pronounced tay not ta as in tat.

She'll get there. There are very good reasons why she's slower than others. She has far more to assimilate. Just keep her confident and happy for now, when she reads and spells. Sounds like she's doing fine.

oops. Sorry. Got distracted and posted twice.

What are her other two languages?
If they have better spellings, e.g. without inconsistencies like 'gave-have, merry - very, blue, shoe, flew, through, too, she might find learning to spell English not just more difficult but extremely annoying.

She might cope better if u draw her attention to the irregular bits in the words she has to learn for tests, explain that they are silly, but that she just has to learn them.

Like most good adult spellers, u might have trouble seeing which letters in words are irregular, because u are so used to them (bite - might, bubble _ trouble, far - are. My EnglishSpellingProblems blog can help u to become more aware of them.

Masha Bell

Thanks all it is helpful.
Nothing against computer that's how she learned most of her phonics, thanks cbeebies!

Yes, I wasn't going to get too much pressure on her but she is stressing out (i.e. crying) and ready too give up (which won't be helpful in the long run). She knows about magic e, and tricky words and some just have to be learned, but she is an extremely logical person and just doesn't like not to be able to get it by herself.

Dad is home and has been able to do some dictation with her without any crying.

Other languages are french (completely insane spelling too, which I am not teaching at all, I will let her catch up later to avoid confusion) and romanian which is like italian and everything is spelt as it is said. She is extremely good at it considering that nobody speaks it at home and she gets 0 help for homework. I think it just doesn't sit well with the english spelling. But she is doing it at school so there is no avoiding the mix up.

She needs time and I need the proper tools . It is so much easier to learn english as a second language (i.e. you already now how to read and just adapt from there).

just That's brilliant, I will try to play the hangman with her. She will probably like it better this way!

It seems to me that she is going through what I did when I first met English at the age of 14, after Lithuanian and Russian, with a logical turn of mind as well. I was really angry about English spelling being so illogical.

Our teacher made it easier by constantly pointing out the stupidly spelt bits of English words and blaming our spelling difficulties on the silliness of English spelling.

Your teacher has a lot to answer for, masha

To update, DD1 loves the hangman, chooses all the difficult words... But it is not really helping (only 20% at her last test ) going down. So we are back with the read, hide and write...
It might be a concentration problem, she usually have the beginning of the word right and then it goes to pot.

Also somehow, even if when quizzed she knows her vowels, w r and n seem to be used as vowels (she lived in wales for 3 years may she remembers!)

Any other tips?

Her reading is really improving, her handwritting is really good (so can't blame it on that).

Is she day dreaming during the test? Last one she had "handsome" and "sheets" right and the rest wrong, some easier to spell than that.
How do you boost concentration though? (especially that if she wants to do she can be very attentive)

Is it because of her pronunciation? r can be y or w depending on the words. Just beginning to have her sh, ch and ss right.