Is Explode the Code good enough for spelling?

[Luvingmy4boys]

My boys do writing in the ETC books and they also do CLE Learning to Read Light Units daily. I have them do a page of Handwriting without Tears. If they are learning to read, it would almost make sense that they will remember the words and know how to spell them too. At least that's my thinking. I don't want them to hate writing.

[NorahsMom]

Originally Posted by Luvingmy4boys My boys do writing in the ETC books and they also do CLE Learning to Read Light Units daily. I have them do a page of Handwriting without Tears. If they are learning to read, it would almost make sense that they will remember the words and know how to spell them too. At least that's my thinking. I don't want them to hate writing.

Actually, spelling and reading are two totally different skills. At first, it was absolutely mind boggling to me that dd could read a word several times in her reading lesson and then turn around five minutes later and have absolutely no idea how to spell it. Then some more experienced moms pointed out that when a beginning reader is focused on decoding words, they aren't exactly focused on memorizing how to spell them. Granted, seeing words hundreds of times should help with spelling, but by that time, the child probably isn't using as much mental energy to actually read, so there is some left for memorizing how the word looks.

That said, ETC has LOTS of exercises for each word, lots of repetition, and pages that actually focus on spelling. So I think it's probably as effective as any other spelling program. It uses the same concept as many of them.