The SpellWords.xls collection was compiled over a dozen years of teaching English to learning disabled and mildly retarded high school students.
The words are sorted into four groups: Group 1, the lowest, Group 2, next in line, Group 3, getting ready to be mainstreamed, and Group S, for students who were partially mainstreamed but still had spelling and writing problems.
Group 1 words are collected from the Dolch sight word list and includes word pattern choices.
Group 2 words are collected from 4th-5th grade spellers and include irregular and regular verb forms and other confusing words.
Group 3 words are collected from 6th-7th grade spellers and include homonyms, antonyms and other irregular word forms, as well as common prefixes and suffixes.
Group S words are collected from the Spelling Demons list and a 9th grade spelling word list in a grammar book.
There are four pages in the excell workbook, one for each of the above groups. Each page is divided into the six standard units of the year (report cards every six weeks), with the first week of the year reserved for administering the Test of Written Spelling or other assessment to place the students into their spelling groups.
In my classroom, the spelling word lists were given out on Mondays, and students worked on a "Spelling Assignment", which required them to write each word ten times, write a definition (either from a dictionary or in their own words), and then write two complete sentences using the word in each.
On Friday, the students took a Spelling Test for which I called each word (one group at a time, since I often have students in any of the four groups in a given class), and used it in a sentence. After the words were called, The students wrote a sentence for each word under the spelling words on the paper. The test was completed by filling our a crossword puzzle (made with software), in which the student had to complete the word given the definition.
If you are teaching multi-level students, you may find these spelling word group lists of value.
Page created September 28, 2007. Anne Pemberton. Updated Fri, Dec 24, 2011. AP.