January 7, 2010

...is a fantastic word study program that was developed at the University of Virginia to give children a methodical way to practice (and hopefully learn) letters, sounds, and spelling patterns.  I first was introduced to this program by a professor at JMU, whose husband had been a part of the development of WTW.  Later I took a 6 week class in it while working for Fairfax County.  The best thing about this "spelling" program is that it is tailored to each child's needs--there is an assessment that is given, then the children are grouped according to which parts of the assessment they needed to practice. 

I am slowly introducing it to my students now, and the second grade team implements it about 6 weeks into the school year.  Cameron is in the pink group in Mrs. Robinson's room.  The pink group is the highest group, so they have the toughest lists.  Each evening he does the assigned activity, working diligently to complete his homework and to score well on the Friday tests.  Some weeks the rules are more complicated than others, and he tends to struggle a bit.  He refuses to go down to the lower group, and says that he would feel like he was giving up and disappointing Mrs. Robinson and me.

He has his spelling test tomorrow, and his lists still have him flummoxed. As we went through them tonight, he was frustrated to the point of tears, and I just wanted to hug him.  Instead I told him that he couldn't go to bed until he had a better handle on it, and that I'd help him as many times as it took.  1 1/2 hours later, he had improved but still hadn't mastered the lesson.  I tucked him in and told him that I loved him and I was proud at how hard he had worked without giving up, and he thanked me for helping him and said it was worth it.  So nice to hear.