Spelling Stress

Is spelling one of those stress subjects in your household? If you have a child that struggles with spelling, and your school has weekly spelling tests, it can result in stressful homework. It can also contribute to low self-esteem. I mean, who wants to get 1 or 2 out of 10 in a spelling test each week?

That was us in Year 4. We ended up asking the school to reduce the number of spellings each week, so we could be more successful with fewer.

And then I learnt something interesting. Children who learn to touch type, improve their ability to spell. There’s something about developing muscle memory on the keyboard that can help children spell correctly, even if they do the test with paper and pencil.

When you ride a horse, you develop core muscles that help you balance. These muscles can be used in other situations as well, such as when balancing on a swiss ball or walking along a beam. The same happens with touch typing and spelling.

So, in year 5 we continued with the touch typing and also started using Quizlet for weekly spellings. Quizlet allows you to create a spelling list, together with definitions of the words (which, in my opinion, are the most important part). The child can then play various games to learn the definitions, ultimately practising the spelling. And when they get it wrong it shows them the omissions and additions to make it right – incredible.

What made it even more fun, was my son invited his friends to join in, and they competed against each other to see who could play the games the fastest or get the highest scores.

I shared the idea with a teacher at a school where I’m a governor, and she also found this way of learning spellings had great results.

So, if you have spelling stress in your household. Start a touch typing course and look at Quizlet for the weekly spelling soothe.