09 June 2017
This week’s spelling activity has us making up words again and is due on Thursday 15 June.
We all know Roald Dahl’s wonderfully odd made-up words. Create a dictionary of eight words that we could try and use in class this half-term (obviously without offending anyone). Think about the most sensible way to spell them, how their meaning might link to their root words, how you could use Latin and Greek roots to create them and what word class they are.
Here’s my suggestion (and how you should lay your dictionary out):
stulty – (adjective) a bit stupid
Stultus is Latin for idiot which is what gave me the idea for the word and we could use it in class if somebody suggested a ‘stulty’ idea.
19 May 2017
This week’s spelling activity aims to build the children’s understanding of where words in the English language have come from and how this has contributed to spelling being difficult to master. This activity is due on Thursday 25 May.
Using these Greek and Latin roots and their meanings, create your own animals where their name gives you an idea of their appearance and/or behaviour.
For example, punctata quadrocornisbiped (a dotted, four-horned, two footed animal).
Create at least five different names and then choose one to draw and write a paragraph informing us about it.
| geo – means “the earth” | photo – “means light” |
| path – means “feeling or suffering” | gress – means “to walk” |
| phon – means “sound” | dict – which means “to say” |
| therm – means “heat” | tract – means “to pull” |
| mem – means “keep in mind” | scribe – means “to write” |
| tele – means “far away” | mit – means “to send” |
| fract – means “to break” | graph – means “to write” |
| bi – means “two” | ped – means “foot” |
| corni – means “horn” | punct – means “point, pricked, pierced” |
28 April 2017
This week, the children have a list of spellings to learn and they’ll be tested on them on Friday 05 May. I’ve chosen spellings which have odd spelling patterns or might have been learnt way back in Year 3 and 4 and, therefore, could have been forgotten.
It is a fair old list, but the children will only be tested on 20 of them.
- height
- forty
- vague
- hindrance
- business
- amateur
- colleagues
- halved
- peculiar
- stomach
- grey
- whistle
- excellent
- monarch
- synchronise
- rhyming
- chauffeur
- moustache
- seized
- tongue
- equipped
- symbol
- awkward
- leisurely
- weird
- cymbals
- queue
- calendar
- twelfth
- thorough
- library
- island
- cemetery
- lightning
24 March 2017
This week’s spelling activity focuses on common word endings, particularly when it’s tricky to decide which ending a word should have. Take note of the tricks and tips it gives you as these are really useful.
Do I use …tion, …cian or …sion?
Is it …tial or …cial?
Also think about when you use …ence or …ance as this is something we’ve struggled with and we’ll share some tips next week.
There’ll be a test of 20 spellings on Friday 31 March; all of the spellings will have these tricky endings to choose from.
17 March 2017
This week’s spellings all have unstressed vowels in them. This means that you don’t hear part of the spelling when you say it: animal (we don’t really hear the ‘i’ when we say it).
Create some tips for us to share on how to spell these words accurately which we’ll share with each other on Thursday 23 March.
10 March 2017
This week’s spelling activity is a bit of fun. Have a look at the Year 3/4 and 5/6 spelling lists you received at parents’ evening (or here) and create a game, quiz, crossword, wordsearch or anything else you can think of which will help us to practise them.
Bring your game to our homework review on Friday 17 March.
03 March 2017
This week’s spellings now focus on the prefixes on the left hand side.
Create and practise words with these prefixes and see how many other prefixes you can think of that are not on the list. Be prepared to discuss what adding the prefix does to the meaning of the root word.
You’ll be tested on words with prefixes on Friday 10 March.
24 February 2017
Year 6 will no longer have a list of words to learn. We’ll have an activity which will span across two weeks, reflecting the learning we’re doing in class. Each week, there will be a test requiring us to apply this skill.
Here is a list of suffixes and what they do to a word.
Practise adding the suffixes and think carefully about what spelling rules you need to follow. You’ll be tested on Friday 03 March on ten words which require you to apply this practice.
03 February 2017
This week’s spellings focus on homophones. Here are lots and lots and lots of homophone pairs. In your book, pick out those which you think you find more difficult and create some trick and tips for you to remember which is which. Good practice would be to get someone to say them in a sentence for you to choose which to use, like we do in class.
On Friday 10 February, I will say ten sentences and you will have to choose which spelling to use.
27 January 2016
This week’s spelling activity continues our work on how etymology can help us to understand word meaning and aid spelling.
What words can you create which include these prefixes? Create mini-dictionaries of words with the same prefix and see whether you notice their similar meanings.
