The lack of correction of Spelling by Primary Schoolteachers

[ELIlford]

This is a real irritation, In short my children will have their school homework marked, particularly work completed by themselves with a tick from their teachers ...Oh Great work Well Done etc etc etc and there will be poor grammar and spelling mistakes, not corrected.

Other parents within their classes also agree

This state primary he goes to in London is meant to be according to Ofsted Brilliant and outstanding, however not in my books.

I know the old cliche it was better in my day but my siblings and I undertook an independent school education ( Which our parents sacrificed alot for)all at Primary and the teaching was very strict on spelling grammar and Arithmetic.

I worry seriously about their future and am thinking the private route may be the sacrifice that will warrant proper teaching, as the academic standard is poor in this so called outstanding school.

Any comments interested to hear from those in independent sector if they have found the same problem......!!!!

Do they not correct anything at all, or just leave some mistakes not highlighted as such?

If not anything at all then that is a problem imo.

But, selecting a subset of mistakes to highlight can be quite sensible. Children are encouraged to use a variety of language and constructs. Marking every mistake can lead to children playing safe and using words such as 'good' instead of 'excellent' or 'fun' instead of 'enjoyable'.

At DD's school they correct topic-specific spellings, especially words that were on the task sheet, and then only the easier wrong words iyswim? I think it works well.

I can see the rationale behind not correcting every mistake (the child would get demoralised).
At the DC's schools there tends to be a "learning intent" for each piece of work and it is marked based on that. If the learning intent was spelling following particular patterns then those words spelt incorrectly would be marked as such. Similarly if the lesson was focussed on using commas, incorrect use would be flagged.

Things they'd done recently and would be expected to "know" will also be marked as incorrect.

Is this something that always happens, or only sometimes? If the point of an exercise is to get the child using imaginative language, experimenting with ways of expressing themselves, then it is better for the teacher to praise their efforts in that area, rather than squash down creativity with an insistence on detailed accuracy.

OTOH if it is meant to be practice in spelling or using full stops and commas correctly, then I would expect the marking to reflect that.

A balance between those sorts of tasks is normal, particularly early on in primary schools, so if it is only certain sorts of tasks that are being returned without detailed corrections, then I don't think you need to worry.

How old is he?

My DS is in reception so not had full experience yet but they tend to focus on getting key words right at this stage. So in his piece about half term he wrote "I wnt to Itle" - "went" was corrected but "Italy" wasn't. At his age, it's great he attempted Italy and I'm pleased the teacher recognised that but he knows, and should know went by now. So I think she got the correcting spot on. I'd expect more correcting as he goes through school, but they are still very little, and primary is all about encouraging development and learning so I think the teacher needs to acknowledge where they attempt good language and be gentler on them with their attempts at those tougher words.

A friend's DD went private from Reception, hated the long lists of spellings. She hardly ever did 'free writing' and was quite scared of getting it wrong. Switched schools and now in Y2 (also private) is writing much more, better language and story telling. Occasional mistakes, corrected where needed, but focus is on breadth of language. Improvement is amazing.

This happens in dds' fantastic school and in the schools of my friends' dc. The basic argument seems to be that they don't want to put children off writing by over-correcting. Which is fine. But there seems to be very little spelling correction at all from what I can tell - and the dc don't seem to think it matters at all as a result.

I actually think you have to do it at home - if I spot a world spelled incorrectly, I now ask dd how she thinks you spell it. She often knows the right spelling when pressed - she is just lazy about it. I am doing this more and more, because I am shocked at her poor spelling. DD2 has brilliant spelling for a 6-year-old, largely because I have started correcting her much earlier.

This is one of my bears at DC school.

I understand that they do it so children don't get upset with work being marked as wrong. But as a parent of a child you is dyslexic it is hard when sometimes work is marked as good (full filled the learning objective) but another time spelling is picked up on.

I would rather they marked some words wrong and DD can concentrate on learning those words and getting them correct rather this week that's ok but next work it's not.

How old are the children, and what is the learning objective for the piece of work ?

How old are your dc, OP?

IME, my (state educated) dc were not corrected often - though some words would be picked out and corrected from the beginning. Until they reached Y3-4 at which point spelling became far more important in terms of school focus on it.

I actually think reading, or learning in context, is the best way to learn to spell. Having a teacher point out correct spelling, and/or rote learned spelling tests, seem to have no impact at all on my eldest - whereas reading more, and writing words in the context of a full sentence, do.

Nor do I think there is 'one' best way. dd1 reacts badly to having spellings corrected - she sees it as 'bad writing' and gives up. Whereas dd2 is motivated by wanting to get it right, and please the teacher - so it works well for her. In terms of actual writing (content) dd1 is far more creative than dd2.

Surely I'm not the only one itching to correct the OP's typos?

Lol Jennai.

I know at GCSE candidates are told which of their answers will be marked for spelling and grammar in addition to the substance of the answers ("SPAGs" for short I believe).

I know what OP means, but DD is dyslexic, so her work would look like a car crash if it were marked "properly".

Surely I'm not the only one itching to correct the OP's typos?

Sitting on hands, Jennai

All that money, too....

It's called emergent writing and personally I think it sucks! (And I'm a primary school teacher - or was!).

It meant that by the time kids reached my class in Y6 they had spelt the same common words incorrectly for years and it was bloody hard work getting them to stop.

And don't get me started on not marking with red pen . . . . !!!!

I spend time and effort carefully marking work done in school as I know how independent/supported a child has been. And yes - I do correct spellings, as does every other teacher I know. But, as I was told on my first teaching practise, homework tells you more about the parents than it does about the children. There are a limited number of hours in the day and I choose to spend them as effectively as I can. Taking a long time to mark homework (which may or may not have been completed by parents) is not an effective use of time. I will acknowledge the effort that has been put into doing it and the fact that the child remembered to take it out of their bag. Just because spellings aren't corrected on homework, don't assume they aren't corrected in school.

I spend time and effort carefully marking work done in school as I know how independent/supported a child has been. And yes - I do correct spellings, as does every other teacher I know. But, as I was told on my first teaching practise, homework tells you more about the parents than it does about the children. There are a limited number of hours in the day and I choose to spend them as effectively as I can. Taking a long time to mark homework (which may or may not have been completed by parents) is not an effective use of time. I will acknowledge the effort that has been put into doing it and the fact that the child remembered to take it out of their bag. Just because spellings aren't corrected on homework, don't assume they aren't corrected in school.

What happened there?!?

I correct most of the spellings in exercise books, but not the homework books. The children are all supported different amounts, and I really don't see the use in correcting every spelling because a) it's often big brother's work b) homework takes forever to mark and has no real benefit, imo c) children rarely read the marking in their homework books d) lots of the tasks are topic based, so the focus isn't spellings e) the books go missing every second week anyway.

I am an over zealous marker in their books when I think there's a chance it will make a difference. To be honest, my TAs often mark my homework books and their spelling skills are crap

It very much depends on how old your children are, I think. DD is still in Y1 and I was a bit confused about the lack of emphasis on spelling at first, but it has been a revelation to me to see how she has gone from spelling all but the most regular words completely wrong in Reception to getting 90% right first time and mainly noticing which ones might look wrong and asking for help now that she is in Y1. No spelling tests, no spellings to learn, nothing but more practice and reading more widely has led to this. Also, I am very much impressed by how ready she is to give hard words a go and see if she can work them out. I think this will take her a lot further than mindless repetition to learn spellings and I also think that the lack of correction has played a major part in her eagerness to give things a go without fear of getting things wrong. She is generally a bit scared of doing/saying the wrong thing, so it is wonderful to me that she's so confident and unafraid with her school work. I'd be worried if she was Y4 upwards and still getting a lot of words wrong, I think.

Her homework has all been artistic or creative so we haven't had to worry about spelling there, yet.

They had an author on Question Time a while back who ,Dh said, was horrified at the practice of not correcting mistakes/teaching proper grammar.
You can be as creative as you like, but if you can't spell the words or you don't know the grammar then it's a lost cause.

They don't seem to correct spellings at DDs school either which I think is just plain unhelpful. I get that covering a piece of work in red pen isn't going to build confidence but surely basic words should be corrected so they learn them. It would be a better use of time then spelling tests each week!

We don't do spelling tests either- we teach spelling patterns/ rules as part of our literacy lessons.

We either focus on a particular rule (for example, why is the plural of story stories, but the plural of monkey is monkeys) or we focus on homophones such as which and witch.

I tend to correct ambitious words so the child can learn them correctly and use them again, and I correct words that I'd expect the child to know.

Like I said earlier, I don't correct many in the homework books. I have better things to be doing with my time like being on Mumsnet when I should be writing report/ sleeping

Surely I'm not the only one itching to correct the OP's typos?

I have red pen marks all over my monitor. The teacher in me just couldn't help myself.

First of all the ages of the children boys are 7 to 9 Year 2 to Year 4 TeenandTween ::Nothing at all is marked or highlighted so having visited a Highly regarded Independent school in SL with a prep school. The children are on a different level in terms of spoken language & the evidence of written work spelling and descriptive writing was very very good. Examples of Nise wich where and were etc..wrongly used...are not corrected.
SQUIDDLE: The notion that you have to do it at home is always the case for parents who want more for their children but it doesn't account for LAZY teaching. No matter what your passion Good yes top Employment institutions employ people who can spell...ELIBEAN: Yes there is "No One Way", yet spelling is core & imperative..I believe Phonics are a problem. DomesticCEO: Yes I've heard of Emergent writing ...Not Good.

TTOMUCHICECREAM: I hear you:Primary school is hard work but that is no excuse for poor academic teaching at a fundamental age.

My old Prep school was on and still is on a different level judging from there results and achievements. Wish I didn't live 100 miles away

Finally the point of this post Is self evident also I have seen so far that the children in the state sector who have pushy parents, butter up the right people within the school and pay for extra tuition, tend to be pushed by the school to go to selective schools.

I agree OP, it's a shame so many parents who aren't as well educated as you will not be able to help their children in this way, and their already disadvantaged children will be disadvantaged further as a result.