kgharriman1@...

I am happy to tell our daughters how to spell words when they are texting each other on their ipods or writing a card or whatever.  But if I wasn't here it would be nice for them to feel empowered in their spelling ability. I am wondering how to go about helping them to know how to spell words without being schooly or teachery about it.. they are not in the least bit interested in such things anyway. I downloaded a spelling app onto their ipods but it was far too quizzy and it was deleted immediately.

I would like them to able to communicate in written form without needing to ask how to spell every second word. Is there a way of doing this through an unschooling lense?

Joyce Fetteroll

> On Oct 23, 2014, at 2:23 AM, kgharriman1@... [AlwaysLearning] <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> I would like them to able to communicate in written form
> without needing to ask how to spell every second word.


What do your daughters want? That's the "lens" to see the question through.

The reason the answer isn't clear is that you're asking how to make your idea for them work rather than asking about how to make an idea of their work.

Joyce

Sandra Dodd

-=-I would like them to able to communicate in written form without needing to ask how to spell every second word. Is there a way of doing this through an unschooling lense?-=-

I’d just spell for them.  It won’t be forever.

You didn’tsay how old they are; that might help.

Sometimes if there was something obvious about the word, or tricky, I would say so, but not like a big lesson.    Just one clue.  Like “two—like ‘twin’.”

Sandra 
  

kgharriman1@...

Our daughters are 9 and 7. I think they would like to be able to spell words without asking me all the time. I just don't know how to help them with this. I can spell well, maybe because of years of drills and tests or maybe not, and it helps in everyday life to be able to spell well. I don't know how to help them spell without it looking like school. I put up the most commonly used words on A4 pieces of paper on the wall in list form, but that hasn't been used or very successful at all. Too labourious for them to use and find the word they want. 

Sandra Dodd

Holly wanted a tool, when she was 11 or so, and we bought her a hand-held electronic spelling “game”/dictionary. That was 12 years ago, though. I use google when I’m not sure how to spell something, but kids might not recognize the right spelling, or be able to guess in the first place.

Just as kids learn to speak by hearing language, lots of people learn to spell by reading, by seeing the words. Not everyone is that visual, though. My husband isn’t I was.

Holly is more interested in words than her brothers are. What works for one person might not work for another.

I don’t think that requiring someone to look somethig up is a good idea, though. I think if you spell words for them a few hundred times, they’ll start to see the patterns, and the more they read and write the more words they’ll own.

Are there current spelling games people can recommend? (The young-kids computer games I knew aren’t available anymore. :-)

Sandra

Joyce Fetteroll

> I think they would like to be able to spell words without asking me all the time


But they haven't asked. You're trying to solve a problem that they may not see as a problem.

That's what schools do.

If *they* want to learn how to spell then it won't be this difficult to engage them.

Do you have a newish iPad or iPhone? They could ask Siri to spell a word. Other new tablets have similar systems you can ask questions verbally of.

Joyce

Sandra Dodd

-=-They could ask Siri to spell a word. Other new tablets have similar systems you can ask questions verbally of.-=-

I got excited about that idea, so I asked Siri how to spell [too/two/to] and she said “The answer is to.”

Not the best answer.  :-)

An iPhone (probably other things too) can use voice-input messages.  I press the microphone icon and can say something that it interprets into writing.  It’s not always correct and there’s no punctuation, but sometimes it’s right.

(“Right” made me think to ask Siri how to spell it. Could be right, rite, wright, but Siri spelled “right.”)

Sandra   

semajrak@...

<<I would like them to able to communicate in written form without needing to ask how to spell every second word.>>

I'm wondering if they are really asking you to help them spell every second word?  If not, why did you say so?  I have noticed for myself that when I exaggerate to make a point, I lose the ability to see the answer to my problem most clearly.  

My son learned to spell by asking me or his dad how to spell a word he was interested in typing.  I would spell the word (or look it up via Google, if I didn't know) and give him little bits to note, like "the k is silent in knight".  Sometimes I would play with the spelling phonetically.  Like, if he asked to spell gnome, I might spell it for him then say it in a funny way as though the G was audible. Sometimes that led us to play with other words that had letters that were silent.  We had a lot of fun with words.  Still do.      

He wanted to speak clearly when he was in public chats in games, so he took an interest in knowing how to spell things correctly.  I figured he was asking me because it was important to him.  I saw that as a good thing.  :-)  

I, on the other hand, am a terrible speller.  I aced my spelling tests in school though.  I was good at memorizing in the short term, but I really didn't learn patterns that would have helped me learn the english language better.  I often use the wrong words, even if I have the correct spelling of the word.  Like write as right as a simplified example of what I mean.  I rarely see him doing this.  That's fascinating to me.  My son, now 11, is much better with words than I was at his age.  In many instances he is stronger than I am now, even.  He has a better grasp on language in general than I do.  I believe it's due to his own interest in language, but also because he's had lots of room to play with words with my and his dad's uncritical and generous support. 

Karen James.
 

Sandra Dodd

If you have Amazon Fire or a new Roku maybe if you give it a voice command it will look for a movie. The “Movie name” could be the phrase the kids are wanting to spell, maybe. :-)

Jo Isaac



My son is 8.5 and just learning to read and spell at the moment - together. I do similarly to Karen - I spell all the words out loud that he needs, and we have fun with things that aren't phonetic and laugh at how silly the English language can be sometimes.

I would just keep spelling for them, and I also write common Minecraft commands and words on a list next to his computer for when i'm not there right away (not a huge, overwhelming list though). Scribblenauts is a fun app that *may* help with spelling, if they like it - but it's not specifically a spelling game - more of a fun game that requires you to spell in words to make objects - you can get the app or PC version.

Cheers
Jo




.

Trisha F

Grace, 7, likes help with spelling. When I am not able to help right away, she uses the voice function on the iPad. After doing this for a month or so, she is starting to recognize more words. She is also starting to notice when she thinks the iPad displays the wrong word. It's really fun watching this learning develop without any pressure. It's nice to have help and its nice to have options when someone isn't right there help,  but there are other options besides them learning how to spell independently right now.

kgharriman1@...

As I said in my first post I am happy to tell them how to spell words. I never ask them to look it up. I just feel that a tool that might facilitate the learning of different words that they can do independently would help. Maybe they don't want anything to do with such a tool and I am okay with that, I was just looking for ways to facilitate their learning.  They haven't asked for something to help them spell better, so maybe its not an issue for anyone else except for me. 

They can both read fluently after having worked it out by themselves at an early age so maybe the same process will happen for spelling. However, repetition doesn't happen with the spelling because they don't often want to write, other than in cards, or when they text one another on their ipods, so that's very different to the reading process which happened after having been read to (which continues) over several years every day and from having many many books in the house. There was repeated exposure to words. Learning to read early hasn't translated into knowing how to spell those words which they have known how to read for years.

Sometimes when a word comes up with silent e or k or ea vs ee etc, I do casually and conversationally talk about that particular nuance of the english language in passing as we go. They don't really care much though - they just want to know how to spell the word!! The one thing they have observed is how sometimes the r is pronounced with an american accent but not heard when we (Australians) say the word ("word" for example) or how if you sound out the word "ask" its "arsk" which is how I saw our 9 yo write it the other day. With an american accent you wouldn't write it like that if you were sounding it out. The differences in pronunciation and spelling come about too from watching many movies from the US. 

So things like that are chatted about. 

So I will just leave it be and continue to spell out words and check out a few more apps that are fun and not schooly. Will check out the Siri function on their ipods and Scribblenauts. Thanks for that. 

Joyce Fetteroll

Have you heard of Gary Chapman's 5 love languages. He suggests people perceive love in 5 different ways: gifts, quality time, words of affirmation, acts of service, and physical touch.

Maybe one of your daughters' love languages is "acts of service." It could be they feel loved by the fact that every time they ask how to spell something you're willing to answer.

You may think they're feeling dependent. They may see you as an easy and reliable resource. :-)

Joyce

Sandra Dodd

This is something I wrote in 1998, as a filler article for a local parenting publication. It’s old, but can be squinted at from 2014:

http://sandradodd.com/aradicalthought

Some adults have the idea from school or parents that there is virtue in looking something up, and sloth (one of the Big Sins) in just asking. There might be the ghost of that in you—voices saying “they need to learn to do that without you.”

They WILL learn it, and can learn it without damage. :-)

My husband’s spelling continued to improve when he was in his 20’s and 30’s, because he wrote letters to me when we were living in different towns, and event announcements for a club we were in, and because of programming and needing to be more precise. His spelling is great now, but it didn’t quickly in his youth, and he balked at schoolishness sometimes (being one of the mathish lefthanded type, another indication sometimes that spelling bees aren’t likely to be a hobby of choice).

When he and I were young in our 20’s, we made a deal that if I asked a math question he would just answer it without pressure, teasing or any lesson, and if he had a spelling question, I would just answer it. As the years passed, his spelling got better, and I got better at quick calculations than he was. Still, if it’s ratios or interest or odds, he’s the source. If it’s plain arithmetic or plane geometry, I’m quicker because I just do it without thinking which type of formula might be needed. When he needed help making a star on cloth, with a compass and protractor, I reminded him how very quickly and he did it.

That early agreement not to tease or shame made our partnership better before we ever had children, and so we extended that same courtesy to them—all they needed to do was ask. It helped with unschooling before we even knew we would have a baby.

Sandra

kgharriman1@...

Yes Sandra that could well be the case and I had a bit of an aha moment when I read what you wrote there about there still being that thing that they need to learn to do this by themselves without me. It brought me full circle back to the essence of unschooling. How liberating to just read those two sentences. Thankyou. Why should they have to learn to spell without me right now? AH! very schoolish of me. I often wonder how long it will take to deschool when you have spent years and years of your life (17 for me) in an academic institution. 

We love that story about you and your husband. My husband remembers you telling this story in April at the ALlive and he said it really stuck with him. Obviously made an impact :)
thanks, I feel like this is a non-issue now.

chris ester


>>>>>>>>On Sat, Oct 25, 2014 at 4:29 AM, Joyce Fetteroll jfetteroll@... [AlwaysLearning] <[email protected]> wrote:
 

You may think they're feeling dependent. They may see you as an easy and reliable resource. :-)

Joyce<<<<<<<<<<<<

My son is 18 and has always been unschooled.  He is very interested in technology and computer programming.  He will sometimes ask me a question about these things and I don't know the answer because I have never been much of a technophile.  He will then say something along the lines that he misses the days when I "knew everything" and could "answer all of his questions".  I then protest that I never claimed to know everything and was certainly never able to answer all of his questions.  My son will then say, "Yeah, but you always helped me when I needed it and that was nice, now I have more complicated questions and look them up for myself."  

I always spelled whatever my kids asked me to spell, read to them anything that they asked me to read (and more).  If they had questions, I helped them to find answers and/or told them what I knew.  For spelling, I read up on phonics and would occasionally mention the spelling rule or phonograms in a word when spelling.  Matter of factly, not teacherly.... I kept the Writing Road to Reading book available so that I could look the phonics up when I wanted to.  My children saw me do this and sometimes did it for themselves.  I always tried to be a resource of help.
chris