My school does not give spellings as homework .. this is supposedly in line with latest research

[Twiglett]

according to god cod that is

I am relieved and interestingly he can spell rather well in my view ... I occasionally correct but not that often

he is year 2 .. I am always stunned at all the 'spelling' threads because it has always been stressed to me that children pick up spelling naturally and spellings are not necessary

i really wish DDs school had that point of view. Does that mean all primary schools are phasing spelling tests out then?

I really wish ours didn't. DD1 (yr 1) loves making up stories, writing letters etc, but she has started getting spelling lists home and is now anxious about whether she's spelling things correctly. It really slows her down and makes her less creative in what she's writing.

I'm sure she will pick up the "real" spellings in time and I wish she still felt free to make up her own, gloriously eccentric spellings like she did in Reception.

Ooh, can anyone share the research? Would love to read it!

In Scotland this has been the case for years. I have to say that my older teenage children's spelling is appalling

Our school gives spellings but I think they are a waste of time. DS1 (now 9) learns to spell random words that are not in his active vocabulary for a test - gets most of them right and then never uses them again. DS2 (6) knows all the ones he is given already and asks me to check he is spelling what he calls 'harder' words correctly - this week he chose 'cautiously', 'particularly', 'traditional' and 'disappointment'.

I think it would be much more useful if the teachers corrected 1-3 incorrectly spelt words per piece and got the child to write them out a couple of times. DS1 does not need to know how to spell 'gurus' (not that tricky, really, anyway), but it would be good to make sure he is certain of 'temperature'.

All scottish primaries I know do spelling.

I must read the research. Lots of children do not pick spelling up naturally. But it would be interesting to read if being taught spelling patterns helps at all.

What I thought was being referred to was the decision to stop correcting spelling mistakes in writing. Kids still did spelling but I think that not being shown where mistakes have been made has meant their spelling in general is poor.

ah, right, yes. Not correcting them in writing, yes.

DD1 doesn't appear to be getting spellings. I tend to assume that her eccentric spelling style will adjust as she grows up, although this kind of depends on whether she grows up like her father (who is so hopeless at spelling he spelled her name wrong for ages) or mother (who only stopped herself from correcting the spelling on the emergency consent form before giving birth on the basis that the bloke who couldn't spell 'ventouse' was about to wield a rather sharp instrument where the sun never shines...)

All private schools do spellings and lots, 20 per week usually from year 2. This week, apparently, Oxford is taking a very high percentage of its students from private schools. Why? because of traditional teaching methods.

my sister and i can spell but by the time my younger siblings were at school they weren't stressing spelling on the grounds that 'they'd pick it up naturally'. they didn't.

Oxford accepts almost exactly the same proportion of applicants from state schools as of applicants from private schools, mind you.

I don't think correct spelling is that important, i'd be more interested in if the child can apply techniques when spelling (sounding out/ chunking etc). At least you then know they understand sounds and how words are formed and can hopefully apply this when reading. THis can be discussed without pressure, if they come up with a spelling that's wrong you can just ask "oh yeah, of course, why did you spell it like that?" and then maybe show how/why you'd spell it differently. but I'd only do this occasionally. I wouldn't want them to feel like they're always wrong. If i noticed a word spelt right that was tricky I'd praise and again ask how they knew how to spell it. I still believe the best way to be a good speller is to be a good reader.

I think that comes with age and reading. (said/sed, they/thay etc). I only gave spelling because it was school policy! It was surprising how kids could get spelling right in a test situation but forget it during writing...
I'm not looking forward to my chilren getting homework!!!

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I'm guessing you're joking but I'd love that!

I disliked giving homework when I was a teacher. I really think it is unnecessary for primary age children. Reading books are the exception, and even then I think sharing stories was more beneficial than boring scheme books.

I gave out spellings because the parents expected it really, but we used to learn them in class as well. Otherwise you might just as well test the mother - some children don't have parents to do their homework with them and it was yet another way for those children to fail publicly

you're my type of teacher hildegard! I agree totally, shared reading is such a gift for children and it shouldn't be considered homework but enjoying each others company and bonding. I could tell day one of school when kids brought in their own reading books that they had started over the holidays that they would (usually) be the best spellers and writers. off track but I once read that the best chat up line is "what are you reading at the moment?"

There are some things in life that need to be learnt by heart. English spelling is very irregular/idiosyncratic and doesn't obey rules in the way that spelling in many other languages does. So spelling needs to be learnt by heart.

Same for multiplication tables - they need to be learnt by heart to make mental arithmetic easy throughout life.

At my DS (age 8) school, he gets 8 spellings per night for 4 nights and then a big test on Friday. The test is written sentances, so that you have to also know the meaning and context of each word. He has dull Ginn reading book 2 nights a week, and the other 2 nights we get to read something of his own choice. At the moment we are also learing times-tables, a different set every week.

my son is dyslexic and his spelling is pretty bad, but always did okay in spelling tests, because the words for the week were usually the same sounds. He knew that words for that week had "ough" so he would be able to get them right. However,when it came to writing the words individually in a sentence he would more than likely get the word wrong.