GIPS+-+Spelling+TPL2+Reflections

Glen Iris Primary School Meg, Emily, Shanae and Jenni
 * Term 3**

On Wednesday 28th August we attended futher PD by David Hornsby. This reinforced our research into the practical and explicit teaching of spelling to our students. Through this PD we consolidated our understandings and began learning more about the developmental stages of spelling.
 * Weeks 7-10**

On Saturday 14th September two members of our team attended a 'Assessment of Writing and Spelling' PD lead by David Hornsby P-2. The other two members lead a similar PD lead by Deb Sukarna focussing on years 3-6. We looked at the use of several proformas to quickly analyse writing. This helped us to identify common misunderstanding that a student might have with spelling. We will trial these proformas with 6 students in our class into term 4.

On Monday 12 August we presented our TPL research to our staff. The session went well and staff were very receptive, with all feedback we received being positive. Several staff have already implemented and trialled some of the ideas we discussed on Monday and have come to share their successes with us. All staff were provided with documentation of a Spelling Overview which we have asked them to look over and discuss in teams. Once we receive this feedback we will be hoping to finalise our Overview by the end of this term.
 * Weeks 5-6**

Today (19.08.13) we will be meeting with Lisa Keskinen to discuss her approach to teaching spelling. We will also be attending a David Hornsby PD next week. After these sessions we will be reflecting on the readings and learning that we have undertaken and moving towards looking at the assessment and implementation of spelling for the remainder of our days.

**Weeks 1-4**

 We are in preparation for our whole school curriculum day on Monday 12 August. We will be presenting our TPL research to date and seeking feedback from our staff. Some of the things we are going to be covering include:
 * where we started
 * what we've found
 * what we've trialled
 * documentation we have been provided after attending PD with Deb Sukarna
 * where to from here.

We have been attending PD on weekends and looking forward to a session with David Hornsby Wednesday 28 August regarding assessment of spelling. Through our research we have found David/Deb to have the most practical approach to the teaching and learning of spelling and spelling strategies.

We have recognised that although we have seen some changes in our students though our trials to date, the whole school improvement of spelling is a long term project as the students build upon their spelling knowledge and experiences year to year. Our goal for 2013 is to understand the theory ourselves and communicate our finding with staff with the hope consistent practices can occur commencing 2014.