Teaching spelling words as they sound
Aim: Spot the part of a word that doesn't match its sound, and learn just that part.
How to explain it
Writing a word exactly as it sounds is a good strategy, and a sign of good phonics. It only breaks down on words whose spelling doesn't match their sound. The fix isn't to learn the whole word by rote: find the one part that is tricky and learn that. In said, only the 'ai' is unusual; in people, it's the 'eo'.
Starter (5 minutes)
Write a child-style phonetic spelling (sed, becos, peepul) and the real word. Children find the exact letters that differ.
Main activity
Tricky part highlighting: for each word, children write it, sound it out and highlight only the letters that don't match the sound. They make up a picture or saying for the highlighted part (people eat oranges).
Dictation sentences
- My friend said she would come because it was sunny.
- Once there were enough people for a game.
- Could you pass me the beautiful blue book?
Watch out for
- Writing the sounds only (sed, becos, frend, wos).
Quick check
Ask children to spell these without help:
- people
- again
- enough
- once
Example words
- said
- because
- people
- friend
- enough
- beautiful
- could
- would
- was
- once