Located in Fort Wayne, IN for 1st-12th Grades

Interested in Learning More About Our Half Day Homeschool Program?

Watch the “Short Version” Video Above

OR Call or text Ray Reish at 260-450-7063.

(Full Length Video With Class Descriptions

and Schedules for All Grades Below!)

To Enroll, please call Ray at 260 450 7063 or e-mail characterink@gmail.com

Click here to print Half-Day Homeschool Information 

Character Ink will continue its new teaching arm – The half-day homeschool for 1st -12th grades in which all academics are taught, followed up on, recorded, and graded for YOU!

ALL of this is done as your students come to “school” for 8-12 hours a week!

The following schedule and guidelines have been developed for the 2020-2021 school year. Adaptions can be made to meet your family’s needs.

 

1) Responsible for curriculum securing, teaching, assigning, and overseeing for ALL academic subjects for 1st-12th grade students.

2) Teaching will be small group classes, block teaching, daily class meetings, one-on-one tutoring, and independent studies all in our home at 11120 Aboite Center Road Fort Wayne.

3) 180 days of instruction (and record keeping and accountability) (e-learning will be utilized for inclement weather)

4) Daily lesson plans, check sheets, and accountability (Students, Ray, and parents can check.)

5) Curriculum found and laid out for each subject

6) Math, language arts, and reading taught by/planned by specialists in these areas. All academic
areas will be covered in various sessions, blocks, and independent learning.

7) Thorough, safe, and fun environment to learn

8/12/2021 First day of class (Thurs)

1/10/2022 First day of second semester

5/132022 Last day of class (Fri)

1) Have students in class daily on time

2) Provide time in afternoon or evening for older students to complete a subject or two if needed

3) Read daily with elementary students (in addition to their daily reading lessons here)

4) Provide a final transcript for your student from your own private school (We will help with this.)

5) Send snack and drink daily if desired,

6) Pay monthly tuition the first week of each month.

7) Pay for curriculum (consumables, book rentals, and lab fees) up to $300 per year per student.

Monthly Tuition over 10 months

Students 1st -12th

1st student $310/mo

2nd student $280/mo

3rd student $240/mo

Call or email today for more information or to enroll!

260-450-7063 or 260-433-4365 characterink@gmail.com

High School Schedule (8th-12th grade)

Monday and Wed – Attend group classes at Reish’s home
Tues, Thurs, and Friday – homework at home
One private tutoring session each week to cover any subject.
Classes included: Bible/Character, Language Arts, Literature,  Math, Science, History and Social Studies as needed.

Middle School Schedule (6th -8th grade)

Monday thru Wednesday – homework at home
Thursday – Friday 8:30 – 12:00 at Reish’s home
One private tutoring session each week to cover any subject.
Classes included: Bible / Character, Reading, Math, History, Science, Language Arts, Literature

Elementary Schedule (1st -5th grade)

Monday and Wednesday – homework at home
Tuesday and Friday 12:00 – 3:00 at Reish’s home
Thursday 11:30 – 3:00 at Reish’s home
Classes included: Bible / Character, Reading, Phonics, Math, History, Science, Language Arts, Literature

Call (260) 450 – 7063 for more details or questions.

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CHARACTER INK HALF DAY HOMESCHOOL STARTS AUGUST 12, 2019!

 

Character Ink will continue its new teaching arm – The half-day homeschool for 4th -12th grades and expand it for K-3rd grades – in which all academics are taught, followed up on, recorded, and graded for YOU!

ALL of this is done as your students come to “school” for 8-15 hours a week!

The following schedule and guidelines have been developed for the 2019-2020 school year. Adaptions can be made to meet your family’s needs.

Character Ink Half-Day Homeschool will offer the following:

 

1) Responsible for curriculum securing, teaching, assigning, and overseeing for ALL academic subjects for K-12th grade students.
2) Teaching will be small group classes, block teaching, daily class meetings, one-on-one tutoring, and independent studies all in our home at 11120 Aboite Center Road Fort Wayne and at First Assembly of God Church (on Mondays).
3) 180 days of instruction (and record keeping and accountability) (e-learning will be utilized for inclement weather)
4) Daily lesson plans, checksheets, and accountability (Students, Ray, and parents can check.)
5) Curriculum found and laid out for each subject
6) Math, language arts, and reading taught by/planned by specialists in these areas. All academic areas will be covered in various sessions, blocks, and independent learning.
7) Thorough, safe, and fun environment to learn

 

General Schedule (180 days)

 

8/12/2019         First day of class

1/6/2020           First day of second semester

5/22/2020        Last day of class

 

 

Parents’ Responsibilities

 

1) Have students in class daily on time
2) Provide time in afternoon or evening for older students to complete a subject or two if needed
3) Read daily with elementary students (in addition to their daily reading lessons here)
4) Provide a final transcript for your student from your own private school (We will help with this.)
5) Send snack and drink daily if desired and lunch for high school students on Wed.
6) Pay monthly tuition the first week of each month.
7) Pay for curriculum (consumables, book rentals, and lab fees) up to $300 per year per student.

To Enroll:

1) E-mail characterink@gmail.com with the following information

Student name
Birthdate
Grade level (in fall)
Parent’s names
Any allergies or medical conditions we should know about

2) We will have a phone conference or meet in person to confirm curriculum for year.

3) Will need $200 deposit to start purchasing curriculum (after conference).

4) First day of class — 8/12.

 

High School Schedule (8th-12th grade)

Monday – Attend group classes at First Assembly of God
Tuesday – 8:30-12:00 at Reish’s home
Wednesday 8:30-2:45 at Reish’s home
Th and Fri – homework at home or Reish’s home
Classes included: Bible / Character, Literature, Math, American History, Science, Language Arts, Economics

 

Middle School Schedule (4th -7th grade)

Monday – homework at home
Tues-Fri 8:30 – 12:00 at Reish’s home
Classes included: Bible / Character, Reading, Math, History, Science, Language Arts, Literature

Elementary (K – 3rd grade)

Monday and Wednesday – homework at home
Tues, Thurs, and Fri 12:15 – 2:45 at Reish’s home
Classes included: Bible / Character, Reading, Math, Phonics, Science / Social Studies units

 

Call (260) 450 – 7063 for more details or questions.

The post Half Day Homeschool Expanded for 2019-2020 School Year appeared first on Character Ink.

By now, most of our local Character Ink friends have heard the news : We are starting a half-day homeschool in our home in six weeks (mid August 2018!). If you haven’t heard, you can see our original announcement here.)

So far, it has been such a joy to see the “exact clients” that we had in mind for our endeavor! They say the exact words that we felt would describe someone who wants this special service:

1) They love homeschooling—the lifestyle, the time with their kids, the home-centered approach to life that homeschooling offers, the relationships that are built through being with your kids way more waking hours than you are not (and knowing what is going on in their hearts through frequent interaction).

2) They value education—This can be said of most homeschoolers, but we are finding many parents who value education but felt that with their time constraints, work, and other commitments, they couldn’t give as much to their kids’ education as they feel is needed.

3) They are willing/able to spend a little extra on their kids’ education—They have the means for their kids to go to private school, but they want more control over their kids’ education—and they don’t want their kids to be gone 35 to 40 hours a week and don’t want to lose the home-centered approach to life that they have been enjoying through homeschooling.

4) They want the one-room schoolhouse feel that they offer at home–small teacher-student ratio that allows the teacher to know where his students are at all times in every subject.

5) They would like for someone else to keep track of everything academic—the teaching, the curriculum, the records, the grades, and yes, even the prodding some days!

We wanted to give some updates as Ray’s half-day homeschool takes shape with each enrollee. For example, we have found that high schoolers may or may not want to come every morning. Some of them don’t want the long drive. Others have jobs, etc. So Ray is altering the schedule for high schoolers who want to come longer some days and not at all other days.

While we have taught between 150 and 250 kids each semester for the past ten years in our four Cottage Class locations and have begun teaching dozens of kids online, this is new territory for us—being in charge of a student’s complete academic program and getting it all done by noon each day! 😊 (As Ray keeps saying with each plan, each book, each discussion—“Down memory lane again!” So many memories from our thirty-two years of teaching our seven kids at home! That has been so heart-warming.)

So we are tweaking, discussing things with our enrolling parents, and seeing what fits for each family. It is quite the journey—but a very exciting and rewarding one for sure!

This post is to give you some updates and let you see our registration information more fully. If you are near Fort Wayne, Indiana, and this concept appeals to you, Ray would love to chat with you and answer questions and explain our program more fully. Call him at 260-450-7063 or email him at characterink@gmail.com to set up a phone consult.

Check out the full registration document by clicking HERE!

In a nutshell…..

Character Ink Half-Day Homeschool will offer the following:

1) Responsible for teaching, assigning, overseeing, grading, and record keeping for ALL academic subjects for

2nd-12th grade students.

2) Teaching will be small group classes, block teaching, daily class meetings, one-on-one tutoring, and independent

studies all in our home at 11120 Aboite Center Road Fort Wayne and at First Assembly of God Church (on Mondays).

3) 180 days of instruction (and record keeping and accountability) (e-learning will be utilized for inclement weather)

4) Daily lesson plans, checksheets, and accountability (that Ray checks–not you!)

5) Curriculum found and laid out for each subject

6) Math, language arts, and reading taught by/planned by specialists in these areas. All academic areas will

be covered in various sessions, blocks, and independent learning.

7) Grading sheets every 9 weeks for all high school subjects and major subjects for 2nd-8th grades

Approximately 11/1, 1/15, 3/15, and 5/30)

8) Thorough, safe, and fun environment to learn

Check out the two weekly schedules for youngers (2nd-7th graders) and for high schoolers (8th-12th graders) below!

And thanks, once again, for your continued support of Character Ink blog, store, Cottage Classes, publications, downloadable products, online classes, parenting/homeschooling helps, and more! We appreciate you!

PIN THIS POST!

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Heading towards retirement and with a job change in his immediate future, Ray is leaning towards fulfilling a long-time request of us by homeschooling families: Starting a “school” in our home (as an extension of your homeschool) that takes 3.5 hours a day to do all academic teaching and instruction.

Please read on if you….

~Want your kids home with the family flexibility of homeschooling but are overwhelmed with all of the daily teaching, record keeping, grading, and prodding (smile…)

~Love the flexibility and freedom for afternoon homeschool activities but need to do other things (i.e. toddlers and preschoolers, work, caring for aging parents, home business, etc.) during the mornings

~Wish you could have all of the benefits of homeschooling without being the “bad guy” to make your students complete all of their work each day

~Desire to have someone who has homeschooled for 32 years and has taught/overseen subjects for over 2,000 students do the academics of homeschooling for you

~Want to have your students led, taught, and kept accountable by a wise, godly man who has already done this successfully with his own seven children

Character Ink Half-Day Homeschool Will Offer the Following:

1. Small group classes, block teaching, daily class meetings, one-on-one tutoring, and independent studies all in our home four mornings a week (Tuesday-Friday 8:30-12:00)
2. Responsible for teaching, assigning, overseeing, grading, and record keeping for ALL academic subjects for 2nd-12th grade students 
3. 180 days of instruction (and record keeping and accountability) (e-learning will be utilized for inclement weather)
4. Daily lesson plans, checksheets, and accountability (that Mr. Ray checks–not you!)
5. Curriculum found and laid out for each subject (in the form of daily checksheets)
6. Math, language arts, and reading  taught by/planned by specialists in these areas (All academics will be covered in various tutoring sessions, block teaching, independent learning, etc.)
7. Grading sheets every 9 weeks for all high school subjects and major subjects for 2nd-8th grades
8. Thorough, safe, and fun environment to learn

Schedule

Academic Year

Tentatively 2nd week of August through the end of May with Christmas and spring breaks (will work around already-scheduled trips for families enrolling)

Monday

-Junior High through High Schoolers take up to two classes at First Assembly in FW from CI teachers as part of Half Day tuition and book fees (See example at end for what this could look like.)

-More than two classes at First Assembly will be billed separately

-Elementary students may take middle school speech and science at First Assembly or will work at home on Mondays (See complete Character Ink Cottage Class Schedule.)

Tuesday-Friday

-8:30-12:00 at Reishes’ home in SW Fort Wayne

Monthly

Student 1-1 review meetings with Ray 12:00-12:30 (alternating students)

Parents’ Responsibilities

1) Have students in class daily on time (Tuesday-Friday mornings)

2) Provide time in afternoon or evening for older students to complete a subject or two if needed

3) Read daily with elementary students (in addition to their daily reading lessons here)

4) Provide a final transcript for your student from your own private school (We will help with this.)

5) Send morning snack and drink with your student (lunch time will not be included in the schedule since we will release at noon).

6) Pay monthly tuition the first week of each month.

7) Pay for curriculum (consumables, book rentals, and lab fees) up to $400 per year per student upon enrollment.

SAMPLE Breakdowns With Monday or Tuesday Cottage Classes

Elementary– Home on Mondays; all academics taught in blocks, daily meetings, and independent study on Tuesday through Friday mornings

Middle School– Middle school speech and Junior High Science at First Assembly on Mondays and followed up each day; remaining academics taught in blocks, daily meetings, and independent study on Tuesday through Friday mornings (See newest Monday class schedule here!)

High School– Science (biology, chemistry, or physics) and Spanish at First Assembly on Mondays and followed up each day; remaining academics taught in blocks, daily meetings, and independent study on Tuesday through Friday mornings

If this interests you, please call ASAP to discuss as we are looking for immediate feedback–fall school will be here soon!

Sincerely,

Ray Reish

Character Ink

260-450-7063

The post Character Ink Announces Its NEW “Half-Day Homeschool” appeared first on Character Ink.

The scene was a common one for this “young mama” (then!) of five children ten and under (so far!): I worked my tail off all day long and still felt like a complete failure. My husband came home from a typical twelve hour day to my cries of “I didn’t get anything done today that I needed to do” and “I just don’t understand why I can’t get more done as long as the day is and as hard as I work.”

And once again, he answered with sweet words that pointed me to prioritizing, something that I was still in the process of learning: “Did you rock and feed the baby?” I nodded yes.

“Did you do Bible time this morning?” I nodded yes.

“Did you do read aloud time?” I nodded yes.

“Did you do story time with the littles?” I nodded yes.

“Did you speak words of encouragement to the kids?” I nodded yes.

“Did you make sure everyone did their morning routines and chore sessions?” I nodded yes. (He knew my schedule well!)

“Then you got everything done that you really needed to! You got the PRIORITIES done.” ….And off he went to finish dinner and clean the kitchen.

And somehow, I was encouraged. I was encouraged through completing my priorities.

We had always talked about our priorities. We had agreed on them. We had mechanisms and routines in place to be sure we got to them.

Yet, the grandeur, non-daily, and sometimes exciting eluded me (and oftentimes, some of the dailies still eluded me!).

It would be a couple more years until I grasped the joy of fulfilling my daily priorities. And many more years until I understood that the quote by Aristotle is absolutely, positively true: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”’

(Find out how that happened for me in this productivity video)

It’s funny because today, after thirty-two years of homeschooling and now two years of empty nesting, some of my greatest joys come in prioritizing and fulfilling my priorities each day—my dailies first then the “grandeur, non-daily, and exciting”!

So how can you (1) Determine your priorities and do them? AND (2) Find encouragement through doing them?

There is something amazing about sitting down (with spouse, if possible) and writing out your true priorities for the year or the month or the week. And then writing the actions that it will take to make those priorities happen.

But there is something magical about following through on those things during that year, month, or week. Being able to look back and see that you really did the things that you have pre-determined are true priorities is the ultimate encouragement for homeschooling parents.

I know this isn’t the typical “outside encouragement” from a motivating article or moving speaker. (I love those too!)

But I also know that nothing felt as good or brought me as much encouragement as prioritizing and following through on my priorities did. And I so want this for young homeschooling moms.

Of course, it doesn’t just give you encouragement…you are heading towards big goals when you prioritize and follow through. Your preschoolers will learn to obey and sit still and be kind. Your new readers will be reading fluently before you know it. Your pre-teens will become independent with their daily school lists. Your teens will follow through on their assignments.

And you will be encouraged.

So encouraged.

So….some prioritizing and encouragement tips!

1) Prioritize your day.

Put the most important things first. And do those before you do anything else. Only put the things in your schedule for the first part of the day that truly need done every single day.

2) Make a List of Priorities for the Month and Attach Actions to It That Will Help You Fulfill the Priorities

We say something is a priority. A lot. However, we have to understand that a priority is only a priority if we do it. Otherwise, it is a wish or a dream. Many times we are unsuccessful in carrying out our priorities because we have vague, dreamy ideas of what they should be—but we don’t put real actions with them to be sure we DO them.

Priorities are what we do. If you were to pull out your virtual calendar, daytimer, or daily to do lists, anyone could read them and give you a list of your priorities. You might argue about their observations. You might say, “No, that thing is not my priority. My priority is this….” Something loftier, more noble, or more similar to what you would like your priorities to be. However, if we do not do something consistently it is not a priority because priorities are what we do. (Read 5 Influences to Determine Your Priorities)

3) Put the Actions That Help You Meet the Priorities in Your Daily Schedule—and Don’t Do Anything Else Until You’ve Done These

If Priorities Are What We Do, it follows that they are ACTIONS. Therefore, in order to meet priorities, we must DO something. Once my husband and I determined our priorities, we made action lists and put them into the daily, weekly, and monthly schedule. If these are our priorities, they should come ahead of everything else.

I know these steps sound simplistic. But there is nothing simple about following through on priorities. Tyranny of the urgent takes over. Messy diapers and boiling oatmeal take over. Our own lack of diligence takes over sometimes.

But I know through my life, prioritizing and following through on my priorities have gotten me where I wanted to go in graduating seven kids from homeschooling and maintaining an amazing marriage.

Blessings and encouragement to you—as you seek to prioritize!

I’ll leave you with some other articles, videos, and podcasts to help you learn to prioritize even more—and encourage yourself in the process:

1) Podcast: Overcoming Obstacles in Parenting

2) Podcast: Foundations for Becoming an Efficiency Expert in Your Home

3) Video: How to Prioritize

The post Finding Encouragement Through Prioritizing appeared first on Character Ink.

We all want to raise children who love learning—and if they love homeschooling, too, well, that’s even better. I wanted my kids to love learning and homeschooling so much twenty-five years ago that I wouldn’t teach a child to read unless he could learn within a few weeks with no tears. (Otherwise, we put it on the back burner for a couple more months.) I was serious about this love for learning stuff!

However, in an effort to be sure our kids enjoy homeschooling, we often run into something that makes it hard for us parents to enjoy it—and something that actually handicaps our children in the future. This concept is one of indulgent homeschooling vs fun homeschooling.

Just like our children “don’t like” this or “don’t want” that or “have to have” this or “can’t be happy without” this–and thus, are often not happy with the “normal” things of life–so it is with our children in homeschooling.

Before I come off sounding like an ogre, I want to assure you that we had a fun homeschool. If you were to ask our children (seven of them ages seventeen through thirty-three) if our homeschool was fun, you would hear answers like the following:

“Oh yeah! Dad used to use these huge red pressboard bricks to teach Bible stories. We would build the temple, Zacchaeus’ tree, and even Jesus’ boat!”

“Fun? How many kids do you know who got to sleep at the top of the jungle gym at Science Central overnight—WITH their parents!”

“I can’t imagine more fun than having your mom read to you for two hours every morning and two hours every afternoon. School was definitely fun at our house!”

“It was a blast! When Mom and Dad got us new books and other fun things from the homeschool convention, they would wake us up at midnight when they got home and show us everything and start reading them to us!”

However, one reason that our children found homeschooling fun was because everything didn’t always have to be fun. Just like an indulgent child can’t be happy unless she gets to have a friend overnight, order pizza, and buy new make up to do make-overs often, a homeschooled child will not think school is fun if he has to have fun all the time. I call this the fun factor in homeschooling.

So, strange as it may seem, my first suggestion to making school fun and helping your kids love learning and love homeschooling is to not try to make everything fun.

Our kids knew fun times were coming. They knew that Mom and Dad loved learning and loved homeschooling and would make things fun at times. They knew that we had something fun up our sleeves to pull out any time.

But they also knew that school was their occupation–and it was often just plain hard work sometimes. And it needed to be done. Day in and day out. Just like Dad went to his job and worked his tail off–so Mom and the kids do the same at home.

Our mantra was “daytime is for learning and working and evenings are for fun and family.” (Obviously, we did fun things during the day too—see partial list above….but they knew that they couldn’t just do anything they wanted during the day. They needed to be learning, working, growing. It was their occupation. (And yes, we did have play time for youngers; breaks; etc.!)

We didn’t need to have bells and whistles all the time because they began to love normal (just like their parents did—hint hint–modeling!). They always knew the expectations, and they knew that every day they had to get up and follow a routine for learning, growing, becoming, and maturing.

They learned the joy of following a loose (block) school schedule, setting goals and meeting them, completing tasks, and of gaining knowledge.

They knew that there were many things we do just because they are the right things to do. Every subject, every day doesn’t have to be fun. Chores don’t always have to be games and contests–or rewarded (though sometimes they were!).

Independent lists were there to keep them on track. They were their to-do lists every day.

Chores were a part of our day because chores make a home run smoothly—and give us more time in the evenings for fun family activities.

We taught our children a contentment in homeschooling–in our way of life—that made the fun even more fun, the special even more special, and the extraordinary even more extraordinary.

The Fun Factor in Homeschooling–the fun begins when the normal is good too.

The post The Fun Factor in Homeschooling appeared first on Character Ink.

We had some definite advantages to raising children and homeschooling during “the stone age”! 🙂 For one thing, we didn’t have many choices of activities, so it was much easier to stay home and build good study habits, household work schedules, and family time. (Obviously, it can still be done today, but we were forced to stay home more in general.) Secondly, we were blissfully unaware of the demanding academics of today. We didn’t know that our kids needed to know everything that is now required to graduate and go to college. We didn’t do labs, advanced math, and other more strenuous academic pursuits with our first born at all. (I’m not saying this was good–I’m just saying it gave us more of a precious commodity that everyone longs for today–time.)

This “stay-at-home, do-your-work, learn-to-get-along-with-the-friends-you-have-here (siblings!)” way of living was actually pretty sweet. We had long, wonderful days together, and I will carry those warm memories with me throughout the rest of my life. (Sorry, I tend to wax nostalgic over days gone by quite often lately!)

With those long days at home came some things I am forever grateful for–in addition to the closeness of our kids and warm memories. The time and necessity of developing habits.

Time to develop them because we were often home all together doing school and household things twelve hours a day while Ray was at work. Necessity because we were often home all together doing school and household things twelve hours a day while Ray was at work. 🙂

Now that I’m all grown up and an entrepreneur working from home, helping parents, sharing health, teaching other students besides my own, and still mentoring grown children (and babysitting grandkids each week), I am so aware of the power of habits in my own life.

With seven children grown, ages 19 to 35, many still in various levels of college and post grad school as well as some with their own businesses and growing families, I am aware (and grateful) fo the time and necessity that we had to help build habits into their lives.

(Want my take on applying all of my productivity tips to homeschooling and entrepreneurship? Check out my productivity video series at Donna Reish blog.)

Below are some links to books I use and love. I am an affiliate for Amazon.com. If you click on the links below I will earn a small commission. Thank you for your support of this blog!

One of my favorite books on the topic of habit building is The Power of Habit

But for time saving purposes, I recommend an amazing TedX talk on this subject. It emphasizes the importance of teaching habit, self-control, and self-regulation to our children. I think you will benefit greatly from it whether you are a parent, homeschooler, or educator. Take a look here:

Here are some resources/posts that can help you in building habits in your children in the new year!

Attaching Important Things To Your Schedule

Love-Hate Relationships With Homeschooling Schedules

How to Build Chores Into Your Daily Schedule

Age Appropriate Printable Chore Posters

Independent Work Lists for Junior High and High School

How to Use Independent Work Lists for Elementary Children

Video: Using Check Lists for Student’s Independent Work

The post The Importance of Building Habits Into Our Children appeared first on Character Ink.

Crossword puzzles. Hidden words. Fill-in-the-blanks. Join-two-or-three-parts-of-words-together (not always at syllable breaks..agghh….). Graph paper practice. Circle the correct spelling. Highlight the word families. Syllabication. All viable spelling word practices. Some work. Some don’t. Some work for some kids but not for others. Enter my Six S Spelling Secret Packet–the technique that is used weekly in my Character Quality Language Arts program–and that brick and mortar and homeschool teachers are using weekly thanks to our new downloadable products!

Before I explain the four ways that students practice their spelling words with this packet, I’ll give some tips associated with the methods contained in it:

1) Students need to use multi-sensory spelling practice methods. Some kids learn better visualizing; some writing; some speaking aloud.

2) Students should not be burdened with practicing words that they already know how to spell.

3) Students benefit from incremental practice. If this step doesn’t help, the next one might. The incrementality in this packet helps students learn what works best for them!

4) Students get better at spelling practice by repetition. By doing the same steps each week to practice spelling, they become skilled at using those techniques.

5) Students work harder on pre-tests and pre-practice (practice before the practice!) if they know they might be able to drop some spelling words from their practice steps. This helps them look harder at words to see what they already know.

6) Students are encouraged by protocols that show them that “they know more than they think they know”! This packet does that for students (along with teachers who continually tell them that “they know more than they think they know!”).

7) Teachers like built-in spelling practices that are user-friendly for all word lists and that are easily mastered by students so that the practice becomes automatic each week.

This packet is currently available at three of my stores: CurrClick, and Character Ink Store as a downloadable product. And it’s available to you for free at Teachers Pay Teachers !

To learn more about this product via audio, click here.

The “Six S Spelling Secret Packet” gives your students four helpful ways to practice their spelling words–three traditional methods and one “secret” method! These methods work for students of all ages, but are especially effective for second through eighth grade students who are able to self monitor their progress (which this packet will help them learn to do even more!).

Here are some suggestions for using the Six S Spelling Secret Packet:

(1) The first page of the packet is a traditional “pin-point your challenging words and syllabicate and copy.”

This works especially well with spelling programs in which the syllabication is given for the student’s spelling words–though it is also effective for extremely phonetic learners who can syllabicate on their own. If the student does not desire to syllabicate, the lines are provided to simply copy challenging words multiple times for repetition. This step also gives the student the option of listing words under the coordinating spelling commonalities/word families in Language Lady’s Spelling Notebook. This is optional, of course, but for those desiring to create your own SN, the preview of the SN (available at Teachers Pay Teachers, CurrClick, and Character Ink Store) gives the Table of Contents that may be used to create a phonetically-based, systematic spelling notebook for recording mis-spelled words.

(2) The next two pages of this packet contain two pages of graph paper with two different sizes of boxes in the graph.

This allows younger learners who write larger to use the larger boxed paper and older learners with smaller penmanship to use the smaller boxed paper. Writing each word, one letter per box, helps many students visualize their spelling words, one letter and one shape at a time.

(3) Lastly, the “secret” part. The instructions for the Six S Spelling Secret Sheet are given on the actual sheet for each student. Here are some other keys to using this document:

(a) Stress to the students that they only need to use The Six S Spelling Secret Sheet for words that they mis-spell in a pre-test. This alone is sometimes enough encouragement for a student to practice prior to the pre-test. (They will not have to work on any words
that they “passed” in the pre-test.)

(b) Work through the columns of the sheet with your students one column at a time for one word, completing each step that is listed for each column. You will want to do this several times in order for them to be able to do it completely independently as they study
for their spelling test.

(c) Emphasize honesty in the cover, write, etc.. portions of the sheet. While it isn’t a test per se, looking up the spelling (not covering or folding the page over) will not help the student learn how to spell the word (obviously). Encourage them to complete the sheet as
it is given, reminding them that this repetition and multi-sensory approach will help them become excellent spellers.

(d) For classroom use, I recommend that you have a pocket or stacking tray or other area in which students can pick up copies of The Six S Spelling Secret Sheet at any time (even if you pass out a sheet to each student weekly).

(e) Consider passing out the sheet each week when you give new spelling words–and walk through one word (a challenging one from their list) with the students at that time. They will be more likely to use the sheets on their own if they are emphasized and even
re-taught each week.

Enjoy my freebie for subscribers this week! I hope your spelling practice goes amazingly well this semester!

P.S. What spelling practice protocols have you used with success? Have you tried this packet yet? 🙂

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