Year 1 Spellings

[makesomenoise]

Looking for a bit of advice and other experiences really.

My dd turned 5 in august, she is in Year 1. It is a mixed Yr 1/2 class as it is a small village school. From the second week of term, she has been given 10 spellings to learn every week. I have just found out that others in Yr 1 are being given 5 (easier) and i am struggling to get my head round her having 10. This week, the spellings include the following: Author, Phonics, Alphabet, Dolphin, Launch.

She is fairly bright but not exceptionally. In contrast, she is having to read every book in the ORT level before being moved up, so she is still on a fairly low level (although one of highest in the class) and she is capable of reading more complex books. The words in her reading book are far simpler than the spelling tests.

I wondered what other peoples experiences were of Yr 1 Spellings and whether I am being precious, or whether these sort of spellings are typical. Thanks.

Our school Has just changed how they do spellings but at the beginning of September my eldest two dc yr1 and yr2 would both get ten spellings a week
My year one child's spellings were always considerably more tricky than my year two child's but this was suited to their ability
Yr 1 dc is in a high group for reading spelling phonics
Yr 2 dc is in one of the lower groups in his class

My S2 is y1. I do know that his class have differentiated spellings. He has 7 per week of words such as - with, this, and, as, so etc. However, his friend gets 10 words that are harder.

If they are too hard for her then you need to speak with the teacher.

Your dds teacher must think she is capable of these spellings, if you don't you should speak to them

DS3 is in a yr1/2 class, he is in yr1. His spellings are all linked to the phonics work they have been doing in school. So one week for example they had words with either 'oy' or 'oi' in them. But so far I haven't had to teach him any as he has learnt them all in school. Is your DD able to spell the words easily/understand the phonics behind them? From the list I wonder if they have been doing 'ph' and 'au' although that seems an odd combination but the rest of the words are fairly 'phonically simple' if that phrase makes sense. If she is struggling to learn them, I might have a word with the teacher.

both mine have had/have 10 spellings on a monday to learn for a test on a friday in Yr1. Some of the children have just the first 5 words on the list (I think it is the lowest group and a few others who are English as a second language. not sure how many overall but at a guess 5-10 children out of 30?) the majority have 10. a few of the words are high frequency type words and then the others are linked to the sound of the week, these can include some hard words but they should all be phonetically fairly simple as Littlemissgreen refers to. ph and au jump out from the list you gave so would imply those sounds are being talked about in class.

DS exactly the same age. Those spellings are way harder than ours - bark, card, shark, room broom, loom etc. his reading is good but no way would be able to comprehend those spellings.

On the other and we also got how many vertices in a square based pyramid for numeracy homework and I had to look that up as I'd never heard of vertices!

It should be linked to her phonics. DD is in a high group for phinics and has had 10 words like those (I seem to recall August, author, haunted, and a couple of others) since halfway through reception. She is very much the exception to the rule in her school though.

Thanks for sharing your experiences. I will have a talk to the teacher at parents evening. Looks like although maybe not the norm this sort of spellings are not unusual.
Quangle - I'd have had no idea where to start with that either!!