Spelling Tests Don't Teach Spelling!

"Why do you give Nathan spelling tests?"  

This was the question my husband posed to me a few nights ago, that for some reason, I kept coming back to.  One reason it hit me off guard, is because he is usually asking me to do more "schooly" things with the kids.  When he regarded spelling tests as completely ridiculous, I had to stop and really ponder the subject of spelling.  

The fact is that I don't know why I did it.  It's one of the few remnants left over from my teaching days that I just never gave much thought to.  Spelling was never that important of a subject to me, and therefore, it never really integrated easily into other aspects of literacy.  I thought spelling was all about spelling tests--I mean, how else do you learn to spell?  

My first clue that spelling tests weren't important was looking at my daughter's writing.  Having just turned 5, Zoe's writing was improving by leaps and bounds.  She was writing things like, "MARR CHISMES MOMMY." Yes, she was getting better at sounding out words and adding vowels, all of which could be attributed to her growth in phonetic understanding.  But when I looked more closely at her spelling attempts, I noticed that she was experimenting with conventional spelling--like the two 'r's in "merry" and the 'ch' in "Christmas," even though there is no 'ch' sound in "Christmas."   She was actually spelling beyond phonics.  Even though I encourage her to spell inventively,  Zoe is naturally picking up on conventional spelling--even without having ever taken a spelling test in her life. 

After the seed of doubt was planted in my mind, I began looking at Nathan's writing.  At 7, he is a pretty good speller.  He can spell most 3 & 4 letter words correctly.  Most of the time, he adds the silent 'e,' uses double vowels and consonents, and uses 'er,' 'ir' and 'ar' in the right places.  He has been taking spelling tests since the beginning of the year, and one might assume that his spelling is good because of those spelling tests.  However, I know that the spelling words I have been giving him have not been words with these complex spelling patterns.  His words were from typical first grade phonetic-based spelling lists.  They consist of words like "spin, spot, spit..." or "vest, mast, jest..."  So I came to the conclusion that Nathan's spelling was improving even beyond what was required of him on his spelling tests.  

Then it dawned on me that I don't give my children any other kind of test, besides spelling tests.  I don't believe that children learn to understand math concepts by being quizzed in math facts.  They don't connect with books because I ask quiz them about their understandings after they read it.  They don't learn history by memorizing dates for a test.  I hadn't realized until a few days ago, that it just didn't make sense to be giving Nathan spelling tests, because kids don't learn to spell in daily practice by memorizing a few words at a time for a test.  

Kids learn to spell just like they learning anything else:  They learn by doing.  Nathan and Zoe are always writing.  When we write, we have to spell.  And if we want someone else to easily understand what we have written, (which is the whole point of writing in the first place)  then we must learn conventional spelling rules.  We learn those rules by seeing the words in print a couple of dozen times, by seeing similar words (thus learning a "spelling rule"), and by getting tired of asking, "How do you spell ___?" enough times to commit it to memory. (I mean long-term memory--like the kind of thing you know you'll want to remember.  Not the short-term kind--like the kind to get it right on a spelling test.)  

So...

I've decided to give up spelling tests.  I am confindent that Nathan and Zoe will continue grow in the subject of spelling, just as they have up until this point.   Adults don't learn to spell new words by taking a spelling test.  Even if we did, we wouldn't remember it when we needed to use it.  Since my kids are writing all the time, they are learning to spell just fine--without a test.  

Why Blog?

I've decided to start this blog, because I can't finish anything.  I've written bits and pieces of several articles, a few chapters of a book on reading, and about half each, of two curricula.   I have skills checklists, book chapters, articles and book lists scattered all over my hard drive.  I've flip-flopped from writing about math to writing about reading ideas, countless times.

It dawned on me that maybe I can't write a nicely polished, finshed product at this point in my life.  It might be because I allow my kids the privilege of my time, more than I do my computer.  It might be because I don't really care about a neatly packaged curriculum as much as I do about sharing my ideas.  I am constantly running into parents who ask me questions that I can breifly answer, at the moment, but can't ever get into what I REALLY want to say.  (I secretly wish I had a book of my ideas that I could pass along to them!)  I think a blog would be a much better outlet for my desire to write about these ideas.  Blogs are never finished, are they?  

I have written hundreds of pages, that until recently, I have considered unrelated.  But now, in light of my inabliaty to finish anything.  I have decided that they do have a common link.  They are all about how children learn.  

I figure that writing this blog will give others access to the lonely computer files, just waiting to make something of themselves.  If nothing else, it might motivate me to finish one of the many projects I have started over the years.  Either way, I get to write about learning, which is one thing I love to do!  So, please enjoy the reading, add comments and pass this along to other's if you like what you see!