It has been a while since I have blogged due to a very busy summer. Isabel finished her chemotherapy, which was very exciting. Nick has been busy training for the ‘Ride across Britain’ bike ride from Land’s end to John O’Groats, which he completed last week. A gruelling 980 mile ride in all weathers over 9 days. We are all very proud of him!
We are back into the routine of school and Isabel is very happy to be back. She has come home with spellings for a couple of weeks now and she is not a fan of sitting down and writing them. It is very hard to motivate her to do them without tears and so I decided to make them a bit more fun and interesting for her with a few games and to show that learning can still be fun even when you are in Year 2!!
Game 1: Magnetic letters and a sensory tray
This is very quick to set up, you just need some sensory materials (I used pasta and rice). Place the magnetic letters that are needed to spell the words int he tray and add tweezers. The adult says the word and your child picks out the letters with the tweezers in the correct order. This game was popular with everyone and they all learnt something from it. Megan tried to recognise the sounds and Charlie practised his fine motor control using the tweezers.
Game 2: Water tray and ping pong balls
I used the ping pong balls I already had which have been marked with letter sounds using a sharpie. Place the sounds needed to spell the words into the tray. The adult says the word and your child needs to catch the letters needed in the right order.
Game 3: Spelling golf
Using the same ping pong balls line them up with a target some distance away. Adult say the word to spell and your child hits the balls at the target in the correct order. It helps if they say the letter before they hit it.
Game 4: Letter cutters and play dough
I have some letter cutters that I use when making birthday cakes. They are perfect for this. Roll out some play dough to make a flat surface. Adult to say the word and your child finds the correct letters and cuts them out of the play dough in order.
Game 5: Soapy flannel!
Isabel came up with this one in the bath tonight and she willingly practised all of her spellings without any encouragement needed. She made her flannel very soapy and stuck it onto the wall, then started drawing on it. She then decided to write words and asked for her spelling words so she could practise them. Even I was amazed at how keen she was to write with this method!
These games have certainly helped Isabel have more motivation to practise her spellings, she can still write them in her book at least once but this shows her that spellings can be fun too.
I hope these ideas inspire you and support the more reluctant children to be more motivated when it comes to learning those spellings. I think it is also important to say that children learn better then they are earning through play so this approach should help embed those spellings better so they are retained and used in everyday writing, not just for the test!
Happy Learning 🙂