Word Study

Stacey at Two Writing Teachers just wrote about differentiation in word study, and as I was commenting on her post it was getting way too long. I decided to write a complete post here instead. Please let me know if you have any questions about word study that I do not address here. I also recommend clicking the link above to see Stacey's post explaining her own experience and with a great link to free spelling resources.

When I reviewed Vocabulary Their Way, I discussed how I first heard about Words Their Way and that I implemented it for the first time last year. However, I did not give a lot of details on the process I went through.

Because I work in a dual immersion school I decided to get Words Their Way with English Learners: Word Study for Spelling, Phonics, and Vocabulary Instruction. The professor who introduced me to Words Their Way had told me that I probably did not need to get this book and the regular Words Their Way since they would both provide a foundation for the program and the spelling inventories. She also said that it was not really necessary to buy the additional books that have pre-made sorts since teachers can make their own.

The first time that I had a mainstream language arts class (last year), I integrated Words Their Way from the beginning of the year. At the start of the year I gave my students the spelling inventories in both English and Spanish. However, once I got started, I realized that I did want the additional books after all. Trying to build my own scope and sequence with the sample sorts in the back of the book as a guide was quickly becoming too time-consuming during my first year of teaching in a self-contained classroom. I did not want to put off word study until I would have the time though.

Organization
The pre-made sorts were very beneficial and made it possible to implement from the first year. I bought shoebox sized storage boxes (one for each developmental category that my students placed into). Then I started creating a class-sort copy of each of the sorts on sentence strips to use for small group instruction. At first I had to go week to week in creating the sorts I needed. After a while I would have my assistants and practicum students work on the project whenever they did not have anything else to do. They are almost completely finished. I clipped each of the sorts together with a binder clip. Each sort has heading card with sort number on the top of the stack so that I can easily identify the sort in case they get out of order and as I pull them and put them back each week. My next goal, something that I wanted to finish this summer but did not get to, is to write sort notes on the back of each heading card. Then I will not have to have the book with me when I am doing group sorts, and I won't have to worry about forgetting something important. (Today I am at home. Maybe later I will take some pictures at school and edit my post.)

Classroom Procedures with Word Study
I adapted a weekly word sort form based on a form in one of the books. Each Monday I called back each individual group to introduce the sort. With my 6th graders we typically did open sorts. After our group portion, I handed out the weekly form and a copy of their word sort (supplied in the individual sort books) that they cut up and put in a plastic bag where they always stored their latest word sort. Then every other day there was ten minutes allotted for their weekly word sort form, including a daily sort, copying down their completed sort, having someone dictate the words out of order while they recorded them trying to spell them correctly and put them under the correct sort category, and finding example words of their sort pattern/trend in their own reading. Then on Fridays they had a spelling test of ten of the words off their current word sort. They had a word sort section of their binder where they stored all of their weekly forms with their spelling test behind it in order.

Improvements for this year
I am happy with my implementation of WTW last year as a first attempt, but here are some areas where I want to improve/make changes this year:

*Make notes on the back of all heading cards (see the organization section above).

*Rather than having all students on a Monday through Friday rotation, I allocated ten minutes to each day dedicated to word study. Each group will be assigned to a day of the week for their small group instruction. On that day I will do the ten word spelling check, a pre-test, and then introduce their next sort. The other students will be working on their independent practice during that time. This will make it easier for me because I will be able to have a consistent amount of time each day instead of having to find a longer block on Mondays and Fridays. (The only glitch in this plan is that as I am writing this I remembered how we have one week of English and one week of Spanish, so students would have to wait more than a week to complete the week process. I will have to see how that goes and may need to adjust.)

*Since there is not a pre-made Spanish book, my Spanish word study was not consistent and I never got into a routine of doing it every week. This year I am going to dedicate time to create my own scope and sequence and make sure that I do include word study every week. However, I will probably have to have the whole class doing the same sort to begin with. That is my trade-off on deciding what is a feasible step for this year. Differentiation will be my next goal.

*Assessments: I am going to more closely monitor progress this year. Last year I looked from week to week, but this year I created a form where I will record their weekly data so that I can look at their trends over a longer period of time. I am also going to incorporate in pre- and post-tests rather than just a weekly post-test. I will also record their pre-test data on their tracking form to compare their pre/post data.