» All About Spelling (Levels 1 & 2)

All About Spelling (Levels 1 & 2)

Posted on 2009 under homeschool, homeschooling curriculum, spelling | No Comment

27 Dec

All About Spelling is a system that teaches spelling and phonics rules to children. It is a multi-sensory program — the lessons involve sight, sound, and touch. So it has something for all types of learners. For the visual learners they have the laminated letters and an extensive array of flash cards designed to test your child’s knowledge not only of their required spelling word, but the phonics rules that surround the word. For the kinesthetic learners, they can use the laminated letters and colored disks to do their sounding out exercises as well as forming complete words.

The techniques used in this program have long been used by Orton-Gillingham practitioners, and now they are available to homeschoolers through the All About Spelling program. All About Spelling combines the very best of the Orton-Gillingham approach with the latest research and proven spelling rules. And the staff of All About Spelling were also very willing to help with any questions or problems. Having that type of support when you are working with a new program is always appreciated.

As a parent there are many things that I enjoyed about this program. Being a work at home mom as well as a homeschooler, having the entire course scripted really saved me a lot of time when it came to prep work for the girls. Even if you haven’t had time to read through the lesson ahead of time, it’s easy to pick up where you left off and keep going. I also loved the laminated letters.

I received several sheets of laminated letters, letter combinations and even subheadings to help classify the different phonogram types. There are separate letters with extra vowels and other letters that can appear more than once in a word (such as the letter “s”). And then there are letter tiles that contain the phonogram combinations (i.e., “nk” or “th”). That was just so cool because so many ties I find an interesting curriculum, but I’m the one mstuck with creating the materials (or improving the components that I received). Having everything laminated and labeled saves lots of time and aggravation for me.

My eldest daughter enjoyed the ability to do the spelling work using the magnets since it eliminated her need to write out her words longhand. The flash cards were also instrumental in helping her to remember some of the spelling rules that have eluded her over the years. My younger daughter didn’t mind working with the tiles, but she didn’t like the little disks that she had to use to sound out the letters. Let me rephrase that — she loved the little circles that are used when the child is sounding out the words. Unfortunately she liked them for table hockey and finger frisbee. So I had to take those away from her for my sanity. My three year old son loves the magnetic tiles because he can move teh letters around when we sing the alphabet song together. So there’s something for everyone.

One thing that made this spelling course different (for me at least) was that they deal with the phonograms and not just the phonics. Phonics tries to teach spelling by sounding words out, but there are more sounds in English than phonics can work around. And that’s where the concepts of sight words come into play. Anything that doesn’t fit easily into the “phonics box” is memorized. This program does explain the other phonograms and talks about the rules that apply to them. Other programs that I have been exposed to didn’t do this as extensively if at all.

This is a good program for families who want their children to be good spellers and get a handle on the many rules that surround the English language. It’s both parent and child friendly and easy to work with. And with the daily review of the previous lessons you can be confident that the children are gaining a mastery over their subject matter.

The All About Spelling program has six levels so it there is something for every age within the family. The program is also very economical since once you get the starter kit, all you’ll have to buy in the future are the additional workbooks for the next set of children. So, this program would also work well for larger families too. You can learn more about the program by visiting www.all-about-spelling.com.