Is it just me, or have first grade spelling words gotten a lot more difficult since I was in first grade?
I almost fell over when Ryan’s first week of spelling words came home in October. Words like tail/tale, main/mane, etc. Each week he’s supposed to learn 20 words, and then gets tested on 10 of them on Friday. And the spelling words are differentiated just like reading groups, so that different groups of kids are getting different lists of words to learn based on their ability level. Ryan tested quite high on the initial spelling inventory, but it does appear that perhaps spelling is not his strong point. Nor is STUDYING for the spelling tests, which is essential for these kinds of words.
Part of me is like this is FIRST grade. Where are the spelling words like mat, cat, fat, hat, splat? And twenty words is a lot. His teacher is not concerned; says not to worry, that he’s doing fine. But then the OTHER part of me (um, the anal retentive compulsive speller part) is thinking how can any child of mine NOT want to study the words for 30 minutes every night till he can spell them backwards and forwards? Wha wha? He doesn’t LIKE spelling?? How can this be?? :) He doesn’t CARE that he gets 6/10? OH THE HORRORS.