Homework - should I be correcting DD's spellings as she's writing?

[fuzzpig]

I'm torn between my perfectionist tendencies and my effort to leave DD (yr3) alone when she's doing her work!

What do teachers prefer - am assuming it's better that they see exactly what she can spell on her own? Even if a vast majority of words (eg this week she wrote a menu so lots of the foods she's never written before) are wrong?

And would it make a difference if it were a bit of display work like a poster?

Please advise! Thank you in advance

Yes, I would get her to change it.

yes teach her how to spell the words properly!
get her to sound them out and talk about how the sounds come together etc

Also curious! I tend to correct a couple and leave the rest

If you correct the spellings how are the teachers then meant to know how your dd is doing. If you know the homework is possibly going to be displayed then I'd encourage her use a dictionary.

No. Yr 3 should be doing homework independantly. If you do give help you should note down what support you have given.

Donkir masked great points IMHO.

using a dictionary is fine if the word is one that you wouldn't expect a 7 year old to know however if the words she are misspelling are the words that she SHOULD know then you are better getting her to use her phonic knowledge to sound out the word and then apply the knowledge she has.
she is not going to get a dictionary out every time she needs to spell common words. she needs to be reminded of her phonics and helped to learn.

Gymboy, DS does spell phonetically - handel rather than handle, for example.

I'm thinking about fluency and promoting enjoyment.

How would most of us feel if we made a great effort to speak to somebody in another language - French or Spanish - that we were starting to learn. And then that person kept stopping us and telling us everything that we did wrong.

We probably wouldn't want to talk to that person again. Or any other French/Spanish speaker.

My ds is year 3 and I will get him to write the word correctly 2-3 times at the bottom of the page if it's something I feel he should know, or will be using a lot in this terms topic iyswim?

If he spells it phonetically, we will have a giggle about how silly the real spellings of some things are, he is always praised for the effort because you can see exactly why he has spelled it the way he has.

get her to sound them out
S O U P.

The spellings which children get wrong are mostly ones which cannot be simply just 'sounded out': soup, move, through....

How does your dd feel about having her spellings corrected by u?
Does she want your help?

sorry-when i say her phonic knowledge-i don't mean allowing her to spell phonetically.

i mean reminding her of the different ways to write the 'o' sound... is this word spelt 'oa' or 'oe' or'ow'? if he is spelling handel rather than handle then talk to him about le words...

this is all stuff he will be learning in phonics in school. if you back it it up at home it will help him.

I teach Year 5, and have a DD in Yr 6.

I encourage my DD to work with a dictionary / spell checker beside her.

When she has finished, I read through her work and look out for words I would expect her to spell correctly (different - yes, dilapidated - no).

I then say 'I think there are 5 spelling mistakes in there that you could spot', and then encourage her to check.

If she doesn't find them, I leave them for her teacher, as her school runs a 'personalised spelling system', and any mis-spelled words will end up on her weekly list to learn.

I do, otherwise Dd is just learning/remembering them wrong.
When she has finished I point out all the errors and help her get them right.
The teachers get plenty of work done in school to see where they are, spelling tests etc. do you really think the teacher has time to go through with each child? Not in my experience and you need to catch spelling mistakes quickly, otherwise it sticks in their brain as the correct spelling!

I asked in when DD was in year 3 what to do. The following s the suggested path.
Ask DD if she knows what the first three letters are
If she is correct direct her to a dictionary
If she is not correct give her the first three letters and then direct her to a dictionary.
We have the Oxford school dictionary which has been worth every penny.

Thanks Gymboy!

I expect DS to spell common words correctly, I generally point out where he's made mistakes and ask if he can remember how it should be spelled. If he's using words he wouldn't be expected to know and he doesn't ask I leave them. I don't want to stifle his creativity by constantly making him redo things. I want him to have the confidence to use ambitious vocabulary rather than playing it safe and only using words he knows how to spell.

I find this difficult as DD has awful spelling and finds using a dictionary hard. If I have her a dictionary and left her to it she would be doing homework for hours, which is not ideal either. She is yr 4. So I help quite a lot with spellings. She has lost a lot of confidence through her yr 3 teacher correcting everything in sight. And it has all reduced her creativity, which used to be great.

Thanks for all the replies!

I'm still torn so I will ask the teacher as well.

You know I never even thought of using a dictionary with her we have a massive OED but I like the look of the oxford primary/junior versions so I'll get one. Now I realise that this recent homework would've been perfect for looking up all the foods - I think she would quite enjoy it.

She loves writing but I think the issue is that she writes too fast. Over the weekend she's written a story - she always has a notebook in bed because she never sodding sleeps and filled several pages. She's taken it to school today but I've said she could type it up (I think it's about time she practised properly) and print it like a real book, so perhaps that could be a good opportunity to get her to self correct as we go along?

By the way I will also look out for any patterns in her mistakes, that's great advice. She is a confident reader and can tackle new words easily, I think it's more carelessness when it comes to spelling, when there are a few alternative spellings of a sound she won't bother to think about which one it is - so they are usually phonetically plausible.

She's just started getting spellings at school, I have no idea how personalised they are. But I don't think she'd mind at all if I added a couple when I'm testing her, as she is really enjoying it.

If
she always has a notebook in bed ... and filled several pages,
then u really have nothing to worry about.

Typing her writing up in Word, with the spellchecker on, would help to bring her misspellings to her attention.

She would probably much rather spell correctly than not, but at her age it is difficult for children to concentrate on what they want to say AND on spelling.

gymboywalton's advice is by far the best that has been given on this thread.

If you're going to use a dictionary then get the one that Ferguson is always recommending (sorry, forgotten what it's called) as the words can initially be identified by their sounds. Ordinary dictionaries aren't much good as you have to know the correct spelling before you can find the word. Telling the first 3 letters doesn't help with linking sounds to their spellings, which is really the best way to learn to spell.

I would correct wherever possible as continually writing a word wrongly just reinforces kinaesthetic memory of the 'wrong' spelling' and means that the wrong spelling will automatically be written when she is in full flow of composition and not particularly thinking of how individual words are spelled.

I discussed this issue with a Teaching Assistant friend who said, 'having worked....with this age group, there is the modern view of not having to tackle everything at once. The belief is that by concentrating on a couple of targets tailored to the child (eg capital letters, using adjectives, spelling or whatever) at a time allows a greater depth of learning that sticks. Trying to do too much all at once means revision in the later years groups.'

I was taught French in an era when grammatical correctness and the ironing out of every error - in case it got programmed in - were considered all-important. As a result I hated speaking French for many years and was virtually tongue-tied in a language that I studied for almost a decade. What freed me up was doing a TESOL course where I realised the underlying thing was enabling communication to take place. (Working on fine-tuning the communication so that it becomes more accurate and precise is a gradual process.)

I think there is also a distinction between supporting teachers, and pretending to be teachers. Our children are trying to tell and show us things, and having a response to them that is basically positive seems important.

It's worth thinking about Mumsnet itself. Many posters use incorrect grammar, shaky punctuation and poor spelling. However, when other posters step into point out these faults, it is almost never experienced as helpful. It is considered good manners to focus on the content, rather than just the form of what is being said.

I always used to send DS to a dictionary if he asked how to spell a word but his year 5 teacher told the class 'your parents are talking dictionaries' ! School also recommends parents chat with DC about the homework they are doing. My approach now is if DS asks I prod him towards the correct spelling. If he hasn't asked and I spot something glaring then I'll ask ' does that look right to you?'. As he writes in pen, the teacher can easily spot there was an error and then correction.