Writing and phonics

[Notcontent]

Background is that I am a bit annoyed at dd's teacher who seemed to suggest that dd's spelling is not great because she needs to improve her knowledge of phonics.

Dd is 7 and her reading is great, as acknowledged by her teacher, but her writing is not as good as her reading. Before Christmas at meeting teacher said that her spelling is letting her down and gave me a sheet with the phonics sounds to practice with dd. But the fact is that there are so many exceptions to English spelling that a lot of it is just memory work. I think that needs to be acknowledged. We have been doing lots of writing at home and I think her spelling is pretty good actually.

I do agree that phonics helps with reading, and helps a bit with spelling, but that's not the whole story, is it?

I've slowly lost the will to live with this thread, Column.

I was making the point that eigh is not an exception to how an 'ay' sound is made, which is what masha's post appeared to show, but that it's a group of letters which make the sound 'ay' and would be taught that way.

anyway- this is my lunch hour and I now need to prepare my lessons for real children using SP methods of teaching them to spell.

Well, next time you make such a point, why not use the correct letters? eigh, and don't type eig. There's no point in giving either adults or children the wrong letters, is there. And also no pint in criticising correct groups of such letters making that very point, regardless of whether they do so in rhyme or not.

tata.

Goodness- are you always so bossy?

You love telling people what to do, don't you.
Tootle off and write some more rubbish poetry.

Personal attacks are not allowed. If you have a valid (and correct point) you're welcome to make it. Many people fail to realise that attacking people doesn't improve the quality of their arguments. In fact it shows the absence of one.

When a decent argument is lacking, then silence is preferable.

but in the absence of a decent argument posting lists and pointless rhymes isn't silence

A pointless rhyme is an oxymoron; the point of a rhyme is to rhyme.

pointless lists and mindless rhymes - better?

Well, if it's the best that you can do, it's something, I suppose.

would you prefer vacuous rhymes?

inane?

risible rhymes

I'm not sure suitability attaches itself to random naming schemes.

I thought you might have a preference for describing the asinine quality of your rhymes since you didn't think meaningless was unacceptable.

thought meaningless was unacceptable *

Yes. The art of criticism traditionally involves some form of structure.

When a decent argument is lacking, then silence is preferable.

I honestly think you should take your own advice here, column. And I mean that in the nicest possible way.

I hardly think that's true. But supposing that anyone has a structured criticism, point or argument, let them put it forward.

After you CG

Well, masha's original point was that it is theoretically possibly to reduce our number of sound/spelling correspondences. It is possible, yes. (She wasn't even saying that it's desirable.) In what she said, she is, of course, correct.

Yes we all know that masha has been campaigning for years to change spelling so that we all spell you as U and since she wants to get rid of homophones U will cover people, sheep and trees but how does that help the OP?

If you read masha's posting where this diversion began you'll see that she answers that particular question directly.

Phonics is one tool in the box. For some children it clicks into place for others it doesn't. If you want to help your daughters spelling get the list and help her. There is spell city on the internet and you can put her list in there. There are word searches that you can generate to her word list. I have mild dyslexia an no amount of phonics or whole word approach would improve my spelling, just repetition and luck.
I think building a good vocabulary is more important than spelling :) Have a look at the history of spelling in English and you will realize that it was very fluid (along with grammar) .

I wasn't asking masha i was asking you how you thought it helped the OP, CG

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