4 Spelling Strategies You Won't Want to Miss + Free Segmenting Activity

This actually isn’t too uncommon. Many children have trouble spelling in the context of their writing, especially if they don’t have a separate editing time. Often they are not ready to put all of the skills they have learned together in outside writing until junior high or older, depending on their struggles. When students are writing outside of spelling time, they have many more things to focus on–content, creativity, organization, punctuation, spelling, grammar, capitalization, what kind of audience they are addressing–it’s a lot to think about at once.

says: Customer Service

says: Customer Service

says: Customer Service

November 30, 2019 at 7:36 pm

Do you have any questions about All About Spelling, Natalie? It made all the difference for my daughter when she was 10. Here is a video that overviews our programs and how they work.

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says: Customer Service

November 26, 2019 at 8:13 am

says: Customer Service

May 20, 2019 at 6:33 pm

We ship directly only to the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the UK. For other countries, we recommend using a freight forwarder located here in the U.S. Freight forwarders are pros when it comes to helping folks receive shipments from other countries in a timely and hassle-free manner. They can also help you save on overall shipping costs by combining your orders from many companies into fewer shipments. On our shipping page, we now provide a link to MyUS, a freight forwarder that many of our international customers have used with great success. Check out their video, How MyUS Works. (You are also free to use a different freight forwarder if you already have a favorite one.)

Another option is to order through a distributor:

Rainbow Resource carries All About Reading, All About Spelling, and All About Homophones, and they ship worldwide.

Thanks for your interest. I hope you can find a way to make it work. Please let me know if you have additional questions.

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Muhumuza James

says:

April 17, 2019 at 2:11 am

Am a teacher in primary four, my learners are badly off with spellings! How can i solve this?

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Robin E.

says: Customer Service

April 17, 2019 at 1:29 pm

Muhumuza,
All About Spelling is designed to take the struggle out spelling.

He may have fluency issues. Students can sound out what they read but can’t read it fluently. If they are focusing on the work of reading, they won’t be able to focus on understanding what they read.

He may be a word guesser. Students may rely on word-guessing strategies, and incorrect guesses lead to a lack of comprehension. Some also skip small words.

He may be reading too fast. Sometimes the opposite of fluency issues is the case. Students think that a “good reader” reads very quickly. Students who do this tend not to have time to think about the meaning of text. See our blog post on reading too fast for more information.

Vocabulary issues may be the problem. Students may have the phonics skills to sound out and read words that they don’t know the meaning of yet; this can happen especially with young, advanced readers. For example, think of a simple word like “milkman.” How many 21st century kids would have any idea what a milkman is?!

Lack of life experience can result in poor comprehension. If students can’t relate to what they are reading they can’t understand it. Again usually because of young age.

Lastly, students do understand but feel overwhelmed when asked to put what they know into words. This isn’t the case for your son, as you would notice similar issues with listening comprehension.

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Gedeon Jeudy

says:

May 11, 2017 at 12:04 am

Thank you much Robin….

enhle

says:

April 14, 2017 at 12:16 pm

hi can you help me this question…Discuss three strategies that the educator can use to help adults learners discover spelling patterns

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Robin E.

says: Customer Service

April 14, 2017 at 2:02 pm

enhle,
It sounds like you are doing the same assignment that users pontsho and Simon are doing. Without more information we cannot answer with any more detail than we have already.

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pontsho

says:

April 6, 2017 at 12:55 am

hi…pls help me with the three strategies that can help learners to explore sound and also the three strategies that educator can use to help adult learners discover spelling pattern

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Merry

says: Customer Service

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Ritesh

says:

September 18, 2016 at 3:40 pm

Dear sir/madam
I am 38 years old. My problem is that I make lots of spelling mistake. I really want to over come this wikness of mine. Please let me know can you help me with this. I can read well but writing is a big issue with me. Pls suggest how to improve this.

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Robin E.

says:

May 14, 2015 at 6:14 am

It is frustrating for both student and teacher to teach spelling into the teen years. The student believes he/she is doing something childish. The teacher believes it is necessary and helpful. We continue on, hoping that we can make headway before the child refuses any more instruction. Modifying this series slightly for the age of the student has been helpful and the rules seem to stick better than traditional spelling instruction. Thanks for a great product that can be used with any age.

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Robin E. at All About Learning Press

says:

May 14, 2015 at 11:29 am

Dawn,
I’m glad you and your student have found All About Spelling to be so helpful. Many older students find satisfaction in knowing why words are spelled the way they are, and All About Spelling helps with that.

Thank you for sharing here. Keep up the great work.

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Angela O

says:

May 7, 2015 at 7:07 am

One son is a decent speller when he thinks about it (which often isn’t the case). But the other son struggles so much because he is not a visual learner at all. I’ve asked him whether he can “see” the words in his brain and he just said, “What do you mean?” It’s been really hard trying to get him to get past phonetic spelling and to apply the rules. I can’t imagine how he would be doing if we weren’t using AAS!

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Robin E. at All About Learning Press

says:

May 7, 2015 at 5:14 pm

Angela,
I find it fascinating how people learn and think so differently. My husband can visual how the plumbing runs inside the walls of our house in perfect detail, even though he wasn’t here when the house was built. Yet, I struggle to visual what store is next door to the place I shop at at least once a week for the last 5 years.

That’s why I love All About Spelling and All About Reading so much. It hits all the learning and thinking styles, so that everyone can find something to help them learn.

Let us know if you need some ideas to help you help your son with applying the rules in spelling. It sounds like you have things handled,, but remember we are here to help in whatever way, big or small, at support@allaboutlearningpress.com or 715-477-1976.

Have a great weekend!

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Alisha Howard

says:

May 2, 2015 at 3:35 pm

This program is making such a difference for my struggling speller. She is 12 and after years of trying almost every program on the market and a few years of dictation alone I finally gave in to the tugging in my mind to try AAS even though it seemed to remedial for her. She has come so far in just 4 months of using it and has admitted that she loves using the letter tiles. She thanks me every time she realizes she is using a rule to spell a word.

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Robin E. at All About Learning Press

says:

May 4, 2015 at 10:12 am

Alisha,
This is wonderful!!! Thank you so much for taking the time to tell us how your student is doing, and I am so glad that we had a part in her finally having success. Keep up the great work, both of you.

I hope you two have a lovely week.

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kindness egwu

says:

March 22, 2018 at 5:34 pm

As a teacher, how can I become an effective language art teacher

Robin E.

says: Customer Service

March 23, 2018 at 1:32 pm

Kindness Egwu,
You can become an effective Language Arts teacher by educating yourself on the subject. Here are some links that may help you get started:
Language Arts in My Household
Help Your Child’s Memory
Helping Kids Sound Out Words
How to Teach Phonograms
12 Reasons Teachers Love All About Reading and All About Spelling

I hope this helps, but please let me know if you have additional questions.

Abigail's Mommy

says:

April 17, 2015 at 5:35 pm

This was very helpful. Thank you for posting.

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Sylvia

says:

April 16, 2015 at 11:07 pm

I appreciate how many different approaches are used in this program. One problem that I’ve dealt with is my daughter’s ability to spell correctly on a test but then misspell those same words when writing a letter to her grandma or such. Hopefully using this program will help ingrain the correct way to spell so that it comes naturally in all aspects and not just on tests.

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Merry at AALP

says:

April 17, 2015 at 10:34 am

Hi Sylvia

It’s common for students to have this problem–they either learn it for the test but then forget it, or they struggle with automaticity–they aren’t ready to put the skills of writing and spelling together yet. The customized review in AAS can really help in both cases.

We even devoted a blog entry to this topic: Helping Kids Achieve Automaticity in Spelling. http://blog.allaboutlearningpress.com/helping-kids-achieve-automaticity-in-spelling/

When students are writing outside of spelling time, they have many more things to focus on–content, creativity, organization, punctuation, spelling, grammar, capitalization, what kind of audience they are addressing–it’s a lot to think about at once. In fact, even adult writers need to take time to rewrite and edit their work (and sometimes there are still mistakes!). Our students definitely need a separate editing time if the piece is going to be polished at all. Also, remember that since even professional writers need editors, our students will too. I think you’ll find some helpful tips in the article I linked. HTH! Merry :-)

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Ahmed

says:

April 14, 2015 at 2:01 pm

How to make a spelling program for ESL learners with learning disabilities?
How to start( from single vowels or consonants) and what will be the last level in the program that meet their normal grade spellers(4th grade)?
Thank you.

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Merry at AALP

says:

April 15, 2015 at 4:16 pm

Hi Ahmed,

AAS is used in ESL classes in the US and around the world, as well as for students with learning disabilities, so you could definitely use it for your students. The thing that sets AAS apart is the emphasis on the sounds of the English language. We approach spelling from sound first, and then we translate that sound into written letters. ESL teachers appreciate the fact that we teach the sounds, and we have the Phonogram Sounds Download, which is also helpful.

Our program is logical and methodical. The challenging part of English spelling is the different vowel sounds, and the many ways to spell a single sound. There are more than 250 ways to spell the 45 sounds in the English language! Many languages have a reliable vowel-sound correspondence, and students need to learn our many more vowel-sound correspondences. AAS teaches this in a methodical way.

Our lists are arranged according to patterns, rather than according to word frequency or grade levels as some lists are. For example, when kids learn that AW says /aw/, they learn a list of AW words all at once. Our brains like patterns, and AAS emphasizes the patterns of English spelling.

We break words into syllables, so that students can see how syllables affect spelling.

Our method is multisensory, so kids learn through sight, sound, and touch.

We have continual review built into the program, so that you can spend extra time on just the topics and words that are tricky for your students.

As a side benefit, AAS has the structure needed to help ESL learners pronounce words properly, too.

And, AAS is based on the Orton-Gillingham method, and has many built-in strategies for helping students with various learning struggles.

As far as how many levels to do to bring a student up to 4th grade level–the levels and word lists in the All About Spelling program are arranged by concepts and spelling patterns rather than by grade levels. Though many of the words presented in Level 1 are found on typical first grade lists, other words in the same book can be found on typical fifth grade lists. The method we use defies normal grade level classification.

says:

April 3, 2015 at 9:27 am

Sherry,
Great question!

Actually what is happening in words like “about” etc… is that the vowel sound is muffled because it is in an unaccented syllable. This is what is referred to as a “schwa” sound. Usually vowels in unaccented syllables will muffle to a short U “uh” sound, though sometimes they may sound like another short vowel. Every vowel can make the schwa sound, but it would be confusing to add the short U sound to every vowel phonogram.

The letter A does not normally make the /u/ sound unless it is in an unaccented syllable. The letters U and O CAN make the short /u/ sound in accented syllables (like the O in love and mother), so that is why you see the sound for those letters but not the others.

AAS uses visual, auditory, and morphemic strategies for the schwa sound. One starts in level two with words like cabin, problem etc… Kids are taught to pronounce them for spelling. Sometimes I say, “when we say this word normally, we say the vowel so fast that it doesn’t say it’s correct sound–it sounds like ‘cabun or problum.’ So we need to say it slowly to hear the vowel–cab-IN, prob-LEM.”

says:

says:

March 31, 2015 at 2:31 pm

says:

March 17, 2015 at 3:40 pm

Hi Steph,

I feel for you! When I started with AAS, my son once spelled the word ask, “aic.” He used the C because he thought it could be both /s/ and /k/ in the same word, and he threw in the i because sometimes words seem to be decorated with extra vowels. In other words he left out vowels or other sounds all together (consonant blends were also difficult for him). He was 11 when we started. AAS helped clear out these confusions and many others, and gave him ways to reliably spell the majority of words. It really did make a big difference here.

If you ever have questions or hit a rough spot, please email us at support@allaboutlearningpress.com. We’re here to help, and we provide lifetime support for all of our programs. We want to help kids like your son succeed!

BTW, if you’ve never seen Marie’s story about her son, you should check that out. Amazing! (They were told he would never read or write, and to prepare him for a life without reading.) http://www.allaboutlearningpress.com/about

Hang in there! I know sometimes it’s difficult, and just when you think they know something, the information all seems gone the next day–but keep on. It really does get better. (My student who wrote “aic” is headed off to college next year!)

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Julia Molewyk

says:

March 9, 2015 at 5:59 pm

My daughter is a natural speller, but my boys are not. All about Spelling has been a big help with my youngest. We have just completed book 1, and I am already seeing a difference. Thanks.

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Jessie

says:

March 9, 2015 at 5:53 pm

Love this info!

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Melissa Huddlestun

says:

March 9, 2015 at 3:34 pm

My husband is not a good speller. We pray our kids will be good! He never learned the phonograms or basic rules.

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Betty Tracy

says:

As far as “wrong ways” to use them: use them as a tool, not as a crutch. To avoid using it as a crutch, if the child has already learned a word, have the child “reason” his way through it. What rule applies? What other strategies has he or she learned that apply?

says:

March 4, 2015 at 6:06 pm

Hi Karin,

There is subtle instruction in morphology throughout. For example, in Level 1, students have to identify the root word to correctly make them plural (cat-cats versus glass-glasses). (And they have to understand what it means to make a word plural–why “cats” is plural but “gas” is not.) In Level 3, students work with suffixes, and in Level 4 they add prefixes to the mix. In Level 7, students work with Latin roots and Greek word parts, which form the foundation of so many different words. Students who want to continue that study may want to add on a curriculum such as English From the Roots Up, Vocabulary Vine, Vocabulary from Classical Roots, or other programs that focus specifically on learning Greek and Latin roots.

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says:

March 3, 2015 at 8:12 pm

Thanks for the tips! I really like the way you explain the phonetic spellers, as a director of reading programs in a 1:1 learning center- we benefit from all your tips and its been very helpful to mix the different strategies! Thanks again~

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gadget

says:

says:

March 5, 2015 at 12:18 am

Shawn,

I bought level one for my fourth grader because she was making some very basic mistakes. We went through about 19 lessons, and 2/3 of the cards in the first week. If she knew it, we just moved on until we found our starting place. For example, we did not spell three letter closed syllable short vowel words, because she knows these, although we did review the rules for c and K (and the definition of a closed syllable). Also, I was dumbfounded that she struggled naming the vowels and did not know what a consonant was. We found that there were about 6 or 7 rules she didn’t know at all and we focused on those lessons. We reviewed the ones that she didn’t know cold, Within a few months (she really struggles with spelling), we moved on to level 2. There are more lessons she doesn’t know in. Level 2, but we still do not need to review everything. My recommendation would be to go through the cards and see what your children know. If they know it, put it in the learned section and move to the next lesson. Oh –I went once through the cards and my daughter got most of them right even though she didn’t know all the rules. Probably years of seeing them. So we really focused on the rules for those lessons. For example, she knew how to smell miss and fill and fluff, but didn’t know the rule. Anyway, we found that it has gone very fast and we are concentrating only on what she needs to learn (the gaps). For my first graders, it is different. We go through the lessons pretty much how they are laid out since they are learning all this anew.

I don’t know if this would work for everyone, but this approach has helped my daughter make huge strides and it is not boring at all for her. It actually takes very little time each day (maybe 10 minutes for her, longer for my first graders because of the dictation, which we also use as handwriting). Good luck!

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Merry at AALP

says:

March 5, 2015 at 4:16 pm

Hi Shawn,

As Jenna said, focus on what your child doesn’t know. I started my kids at ages 9 and 11. I was surprised that they weren’t very solid on the letter X, strangely enough! But most of what they didn’t know from the beginning lessons was just some of the additional sounds for the letters. We worked on a couple at a time–simply show the phonogram, say the sounds, have your student repeat. The review literally took just a minute or two. We did it quickly at the beginning and ending of a lesson time so that they could master those phonograms more quickly, and then added in a couple of new ones.

You don’t need to review all of the phonograms that are already mastered, or to review words your students know already–maybe you are trying to review mastered cards? If your student can already answer quickly and easily, a card should be moved to the “mastered” tab.

Once she understands the general concept that there are sounds that get muffled and that we need to say things slowly to hear all the sounds for spelling, then she will be able to get these types of words correct over time.

When you get to the point where you are doing the review cards, then tell her, “I’m going to say these words how we normally say them. I want you to pronounce them for spelling, and then write them.” If she struggles with the pronunciation, give that to her, have her repeat it, and then write the spelling. Keep the card in review. When she can both pronounce them AND spell them correctly without hesitation, then move it to mastered.

Your goal is for her to reprogram how she thinks about this word. We don’t want her to think “itum” when she says it fast. We want her to think “item” even when she says it fast–and by saying it slow and showing that it truly is an /e/ sound, she can make that transition.

You may need to spend a lot of review time on these words. Some parents find they need to keep these word cards in the review section even after they get them correct because of their difficulty. Make sure to include them later on when the lesson says to review mastered cards. If your daughter struggles with any, put them back in the daily review for awhile.

I hope this helps! Please let me know if you have additional questions.

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Tara I.

says:

March 3, 2015 at 3:50 pm

We are finishing level 1 of AAS and nearing the beginning of level 2. We are using this with three of our four children. Our six year old son has ADHD, regressive autism, and profound sensory processing struggles. He is able to follow and learn with this program.

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Merry at AALP

says:

March 3, 2015 at 4:41 pm

That’s great, Tara! I’m glad your son and your other children are doing well with AAS!

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Laura Kramer

says:

March 3, 2015 at 2:41 pm

Just got level 1 and am so excited that there are ALREADY some things my 4th grader is learning. I guess we have a lot of gaps to fill in!

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4 Spelling Strategies You Won’t Want to Miss

Phonetic Spelling Strategies

Rule-Based Spelling Strategies

Visual Spelling Strategies

Morphemic Spelling Strategies

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