November 19, 2009

Dear First Grade Families,

     We have had a fun week in first grade.  Yesterday, we went over to visit our college friends in Warf-Pickel for some one-on-one reading time.  The college students are learning techniques for teaching beginning readers and the first graders gave them an opportunity to practice their skills.  It sounds like a good time was had by all.   We have also been working very hard on "kid spelling."  This is a critical skill for first graders because they need to be comfortable expressing their ideas in writing so that they can begin to write longer and more thoughtful essays, stories, and reports.  Over the next few years, they will be building a solid knowledge base of spelling words, but right now, I do not expect them to know how to spell a lot of words and I do not want their writing to be limited by the number of words they can spell conventionally.  Some students very naturally take up kid spelling and others are more reluctant because they know it's not technically "right."  I cannot overemphasize the importance of encouraging kid spelling at this level.  If your child asks for help spelling at home, please encourage her to say the word slowly and write down the letter sounds she hears in the order she hears them.  Here are some actual examples of journal entries from confident kid-spellers.  Hopefully they illustrate the rich language and thoughtful writing that first graders can do when they are not worried about spelling all the words right:

 *  Dear First Grade Journal, Today I Was feeling Happy Beckos me and Wes and Ayden Was playeg with each other. 

*  Dear First Grade Journal, I am ixitid about crismis.

 *  Dear First Grade Journal, Today IM not feleg hape.  The Iscrm is not ther.

* Dear First Grade Journal, toDday was purfict be cus we got to watch Scooby Doo.

* Dear First Grade Journal, Today I wot to woht tv at houm I wont to woht pokemon.

* Dear First Grade Journal, today camron sed that He Will trade me his drum pie fentis and it has 8 cord on it.

*Dear First Grade Journal, today I was feeling sik kns My tume hts.

     This is not to say that spelling is not valued.  This week, we started doing some formal spelling work with rhyming words and word families.  This along with common used words will form a foundation of spelling that we will build on for the remainder of the year.  As students internalize what I call "dependable spelling patterns," they learn to generalize a few words and also grow more comfortable with the irregularity of the English language. 

     Homework this week: Complete a library journal entry.  It should be written in complete sentences with the first letters capitalized and appropriate punctuation at the end.