CAPTAIN WEBB PRIMARY SCHOOL AND NURSERY
Spelling Curriculum Statement
Spelling at Captain Webb
Learning to spell has strong links with reading and writing. In reading, the children’s knowledge of the relationship between letters and sounds sets the foundations for them as spellers. Spelling is also a significant aspect of the writing element within the curriculum. If we want children to become confident writers, a strong understanding of spelling and spelling patterns is crucial. As stated in the National Curriculum (2014), it states that ‘Writing down ideas fluently depends on effective transcription: that is, on spelling quickly and accurately through knowing the relationship between sounds and letters (phonics) and understanding the morphology (word structure) and orthography (spelling structure) of words.’
At Captain Webb, we have adopted a whole-school approach to spelling that builds as the children move through the school.
Read Write Inc Spelling
In years Reception and Year 1 spelling is taught through RWI Phonics. The children in years 2 to 6 have daily spelling sessions which follow the Read Write Inc spelling programme. This programme follows on from the Read Write Inc. Phonics programme with the aim of getting every child to spell effortlessly. It is a standalone programme that has been designed to meet the requirements of the National Curriculum. . There is a daily teacher led spelling session of around 15–20 minutes.
Children are assessed during the programme. There are Practice Tests which assess children’s spelling progress using the same format as the statutory assessments in England. This allows us to track individual children’s progress and identify units, words or concepts which we will need to re-teach.
How does this programme support your child in learning to spell?
RWInc Spelling is an interactive programme which teaches spellings in a fun and engaging way. Each unit is introduced with a short video. It helps children to learn spellings with common patterns and uses rules in order to help them recall spellings as well as teaching exceptions to these rules.
A short video to show RWI Spellings in practice. https://youtu.be/CuLGvjOTk6A
Daily Sessions consist of:
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Speed spell which tests children’s knowledge of words from previous units;
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Spelling Zone with an online introduction to the unit and rules and spelling patterns to be taught that week
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Dots and Dashes where children count phonemes and the recorded graphemes
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Rapid Recap of prior learning
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Word changes –by adding beginnings or endings to words (prefixes and suffixes)
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Words to Log and learn which helps children to log and learn new or unfamiliar words focusing on spelling patterns and rules. Rules are reviewed and practised through each unit until children can apply the rules in their own writing.
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Team teach and Four-in-a-row which help children assess their own progress;
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Jumping red/orange words which tests children’s knowledge of red and orange words (words from the word lists in the National Curriculum in England many of which are not able to be spelt by using sounds- these are often called the common exception , tricky words or High Frequency words).
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Challenge dictation sentences are available to challenge children to use new spellings.
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Below, you will find the words banks for each unit of the spelling programme so you can print these and look at them at home with your child. Your child's class teacher will be able to let you know which spelling list they are currently working on at school.
Year 2 - Spelling Word Banks
Year 3 - Spelling Word Banks
Year 4 - Spelling Word Banks
Year 5 - Spelling Word Banks
Year 6 - Spelling Word Banks
Handy Tips for Supporting Your Child with Spelling
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Practise spelling common exception words regularly. (Known as Red and Orange words)
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Revisit spellings from previous weeks.
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Ask your child to explain the rule for the week and get them to give you example words so that you can build up a word bank that can be referred to frequently.
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Make a note of the high frequency words which you notice your child is spelling wrong (remember that these are quite often RED WORDS and that you ‘Can’t fred a red!’)
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Play homophone games where you give them a word like right/write and they write you both spellings and show you on the sounds chart which graphemes they would choose to spell them right! Make sure they know which one is which!
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Play hold a sentence dictation where you give the child a short sentence with one of their spellings in which will help them to understand the meaning of the word and spell and punctuate correctly.
Supporting Your Child’s Spelling at Home
To help you to support your children at home with their spellings on a weekly basis, the children will be given 6-8 spellings from the unit they are currently on which will follow a set pattern. They will be tested on these at the end of the week.
In addition to these your child will also be given 6 red or orange words to learn from the National Curriculum word lists which are words the children are expected to know for their age range. To access a copy of the National Curriculum word list for each year group click on this link.