I Hate Spelling Tests

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Spelling tests are such a yawner, are they not?  I mean, they are the ultimate example of fill-and-drill dryness.  Memorize by rote and write it down without help.  Yawn.

At the risk of being burned at the stake for teaching sacrilege, I think there might be a better twist on an old standby.  Don’t get me wrong.  I believe there is a place for assessing spelling and I do practice it in the Magic Tree House, but let’s be real here for one quasi-hippie moment.  I know incredibly brilliant adults who are terrible spellers.  You do too.  I think you either have the gift or you don’t.  I have heard others’ speak of research to substantiate this tsunami of a claim, and I really should document it here, but I am not in the mood to spend copious amounts of time with my search engine at the moment.  Sorry.

Beyond that, remember when the only way to check the spelling of a word was to open a (gasp) DICTIONARY?  Now dictionaries are loaded onto our laptops, tabbed on our dashboard, and are only a mere click away.  Maybe the need to memorize our words is less critical than it used to be.  Maybe emphasis should be placed instead on understanding what words mean and how they impact a sentence or a broader thought.   Just sayin’…

Back to Fridays. 

We work on our list of ten words all week.  We explore meaning and phonics rules and how they fit into the English language.  I love words and I want my students to fall in love with words too.  We spend a great deal of time playing with ways to use them.  Words rock.

But then Friday rolls around and it is time to get out a clean sheet of paper, number it to include a few bonus words thrown in, and get ready to torment already-tired first grade brains into yielding the magical, mystical spelling of those coded symbols.  It is tough slogging for emergent readers.

I am not sure when I first instituted it.  Some Friday in my very first semester of teaching it showed up unannounced.  My brain is odd that way.  While doling out words orally and peeking over shoulders to make sure all were with me, I found myself weaving the week's spelling words into a story that lasted the length of the word list.  I was amazed (and happy) to see I had their complete, absorbed attention.  Kids love stories.  I love to tell them.  It was a perfect marriage of instruction and entertainment.

Friday Spelling Stories are now a mainstay of my classroom.  The rules are few but important.  1.  I do not think about the story before the test begins (no cheating for Mrs. Dahl!) 2. The words are given in the same order as they are listed on my sheet from the teaching basal, and 3.  The story must always have a happy ending.  Here is an example:

This week’s spelling words were:

Ant

Trip

Sand

Grass

Very

Land

Fast

Sink

Help

West

Vest

The story went something like this:

“Once upon a time, there was a teeny, tiny ant named Ferdinand.  Ferdinand woke up one day and thought he would very much like to see the world beyond the beach where he lived, so he decided to go on a trip.  Ferdinand got into his teeny, tiny ant car and drove across the sand until he reached the grass far, far away.  It was a very long trip.  When Ferdinand reached his destination, he got out of his car and struck out on foot to explore this strange new land.  Ferdinand had only taken a few courageous steps when he heard a very odd sound.  Just as he was about to take another step, a hive of angry hornets exploded out of the grass and were headed right for Ferdinand!  Oh, no!!  Ferdinand turned around and began to run very, very fast.  He ran and ran and ran.  When he had outrun those furious hornets he slowed down to catch his breath and fill his teeny, tiny lungs with air when (wouldn’t you know it), he stepped right into a patch of quick sand and began to sink.  Poor, poor Ferdinand!  Whatever will he do?  He began to do the only thing he COULD do.  He began to call for help.  “Help!” cried Ferdinand in his teeny, tiny ant voice.  “Somebody please help me!”  Ferdinand was sinking deeper and deeper into the thick muck.  First he had been stuck up to his teeny, tiny knees.  Now the goopy sand was up to his waist, and now his chest.  Ferdinand cried for help all the harder.  “Please somebody!  Please save me!”  Just when the sand was to his chin and then just under his tiny ant nose, he heard the cry of a bugle that sounded something like this, “Da da da dah, dah dahhhhh.”  It sounded like the cry of the Calvary.  It sounded like help!  And it was coming from the west!  Ferdinand watched hopefully as suddenly a giant black, shiny beetle burst upon the scene.  The beetle was enormous and wore the oddest vest Ferdinand had ever laid eyes upon.  Ferdinand could no longer speak for the quick sand had covered his mouth, but he thought frantically, “please, please hurry!!”  As Ferdinand watched helplessly, the enormous beetle pushed a button on his vest and a long, robotic arm shot out of Beetle’s vest and a fake hand reached quickly across the sand to our sinking hero.  The hand grabbed Ferdinand by the top of the head and yanked him out of the quick sand faster than you can say, “glub, glub!”  Ferdinand lay panting on the edge of the mucky hole and was glad to be saved and glad to be alive.  He thanked Beetle gratefully and decided that it was time to go home.  His sandy beach suddenly seemed like the perfect place to be.  It was time to go home.  The End”

When I had given the last word off the list, eight pairs of eyes were riveted on my face and eight chatty mouths were silent and literally gaping open.  I have to prompt them at each new word to get back to the business of writing spelling words.  I provide them ample time to sound their word out and think carefully.  It is not a rushed process.  Six-year-old brains need processing time.  The next segment of the story must wait for all to be ready.  Our tests take a little longer than they probably should.

So now I suppose you want to know how they score on such a lark of an assessment.  It is a fair question.  Do they do better?  Worse?  Hard to know… Those that study do better, of course, than those who don’t.  Some things in the classroom do not change.  I do think and hope that it instills a love of language within in them that will serve them their entire lives. 

Is this responsible teaching?  I don’t know.  I honestly don’t.  I do know it is fun for them and me.  When all papers were turned in on Friday, one little pixie wrapped arms around me and shouted joyfully, “That was FUN!” 

It was indeed.

The End