Spelling words

My son is in 2nd grade and he gets 12 words a week, 10 words + 2 "bonus" word. I really think it is a huge waste of time myself. His words this week included: mother, father, and brother. The only word he had a problem with was century, which he spelled with an s. Granted he did all of his spelling words in less than 2 minutes while watching TV and when I asked him to spell the century a second time, he spelled it correctly.

My 6th grader gets 20 a week and they are tested on all of them. She has a 6 page "spelling packet" on those 20 word each week plus along with the packet they have to write all 20 words 5 times each. They take their pretest on Wednesday and have to write all missed words 10 times each as an extra page in the spelling packet. I don't see the point of giving 40 words and only testing on 20 of them. Seems like it's kind of telling the kids "we only care if you learn 1/2 of what we teach" . I would think testing 20 out of 20 would be a better motivator.

Even for fifth grade 40 seems too much. My two boys have seen so many diferent approaches it makes my head hurt to think about it, but they've never had 40 in a week. My 4th grader currently has 20 with 3 pages of worksheets and the teacher requiring each word be written 5 times each the night they are received. My 7th grader does not have spelling per se, and he says he likes it that way.

wow, I think that is too many to study and learn at one time. unless they are all fairly simple common use words. my daughter is in 7th grade and she gets 25 words to learn the spelling and 5 words to learn the definition of. I think in 5th grade she was responsible for 15 words and 3 definitions.

This way they teach the kids must work because otherwise they wouldn't do it. This is the way they have taught kids for many many years, and so they have the experience to know it works. My kids are now grown adults, but when they went to school about 15 and 20 years ago they did the same thing, and my kids did very well with it. I don't remember how many words they got to study but I know it was a few. Good luck to your children and I hope they do well in school.

I have one in Kindergarden she has 5 words a week. The other one is in 5th grade they have 30, to learn. and 5 extra words to learn, if they can spell them then they get extra points on their test. I feel that it is alot for them to learn on top of all the other things they have to learn. And the reading for there AR. school is crazy these days.