We ended our week reviewing punctuation sentence stoppers (periods, question marks and exclamation marks) and the correct usage of capital letters. There are many students who use capital letters unnecessarily within words so that will be a habit that we will work very hard on breaking!
I also introduced most classes to Write and Wipe (M. Lachapelle's class is a bit behind due to a special presentation last week. They will get caught up this week). Write and Wipe is an activity that I plan to do almost weekly with my grade 2 classes to help my students think about spelling patterns and word families. It is called Write and Wipe simply because students write on dry erase boards and then wipe them off. For our first Write and Wipe session we practised words containing the 'an' sound, such as 'fan', 'chant', 'panic', 'animal', or 'ranch', and thinking about where in the word we heard the 'an' sound (beginning, middle or end). Students were then asked to try spelling these words on their personal dry erase board. I always include at least one challenge word to attempt, and this week's was "fantastic". I have no expectation that the students will be able to spell these words perfectly. My goal is to have them thinking about the sounds that they hear and recognizing patterns so that they will do the same in their independent writing.
My classes have also started using a class word wall. This is a list of words that children will have access to every time there is a writing activity. It includes many high frequency words that they should be able to spell by the end of the year. Each week, children will do a variety of activities to practise four of these words, as well as an additional word chosen by them from their class writing or personal interests. You can find a copy of the word wall words in the "spelling" tab of the blog home page. While there will not be a formal weekly spelling test, children will bring their weekly word lists home each Friday and are encouraged to continue to practise if they have not mastered them yet. That being said, I believe one of the best ways to become a great speller is to be exposed to words so please encourage many opportunities for reading and writing in English over rote memorization of a few words.
All of this talk about spelling but you will still notice that I will be encouraging students to use what I call "inventive spelling" or "phonetic spelling" during their actual independent writing.Inventive spelling is a phonetic way of spelling words that is completely appropriate for students at this level of learning. It allows them to independently write their creative ideas and not be hindered by the “correct” way to spell every word they want to write. It also is very good practice for letter sounds and blends. As your child becomes more familiar with writing, he or she will make the transition to standard spelling. Please see the image below for an example of inventive, or phonetic spelling.
That being said, this does not apply to word wall words! I will insist that those are spelled correctly since they are words we have practised and are posted in the classroom. I also give my students access to personal dictionaries, and will have word lists related to the topics they are writing about posted in the room for them to refer to. If you are interested in reading more about inventive spelling, please click on the links below.
http://www.cultofpedagogy.com/spelling-mistakes/
All of this talk about spelling but you will still notice that I will be encouraging students to use what I call "inventive spelling" or "phonetic spelling" during their actual independent writing.Inventive spelling is a phonetic way of spelling words that is completely appropriate for students at this level of learning. It allows them to independently write their creative ideas and not be hindered by the “correct” way to spell every word they want to write. It also is very good practice for letter sounds and blends. As your child becomes more familiar with writing, he or she will make the transition to standard spelling. Please see the image below for an example of inventive, or phonetic spelling.
That being said, this does not apply to word wall words! I will insist that those are spelled correctly since they are words we have practised and are posted in the classroom. I also give my students access to personal dictionaries, and will have word lists related to the topics they are writing about posted in the room for them to refer to. If you are interested in reading more about inventive spelling, please click on the links below.
http://www.cultofpedagogy.com/spelling-mistakes/
http://www.greatschools.org/gk/articles/invented-spelling/
Next week we will begin discussions about schema. Activating schema is just a fancy schmancy way of saying that a person is pulling from prior experience or involvement with a topic in order to better understand a new subject. It helps readers understand what they are reading. Everyone has different schema since everyone has had very different experiences. As we read, we learn new things and our schema grows. We will be comparing our schema before and after reading a variety of books this week to demonstrate that fact.
Next week we will begin discussions about schema. Activating schema is just a fancy schmancy way of saying that a person is pulling from prior experience or involvement with a topic in order to better understand a new subject. It helps readers understand what they are reading. Everyone has different schema since everyone has had very different experiences. As we read, we learn new things and our schema grows. We will be comparing our schema before and after reading a variety of books this week to demonstrate that fact.
Making connections will be next up after that.There are three main kinds of connections that readers can make: text to self where readers find similarities between what happens in the story and their own life; text to text where they find similarities between two different books; and text to world where similarities are found between the book and the world (or community). I invite you to encourage your children to make connections in the books that they read at home too, referencing specific examples in the books to support their answers.
Phew! That's enough for tonight. I promise that my posts are not usually quite so lengthy. I hope everyone is well rested, and I'll look forward to seeing all of those smiling faces tomorrow morning!
Phew! That's enough for tonight. I promise that my posts are not usually quite so lengthy. I hope everyone is well rested, and I'll look forward to seeing all of those smiling faces tomorrow morning!
