Spelling Bee

Weekly spelling test have started again. Justine has gotten a hundred percent on 2 out of 3 test! Caroline has been lagging she has gotten one wrong on the past 2 test. The first test the girls each got all 3 bonus questions wrong because they were different then what was listed on the schools website and we did not practice those, so I really don't count the first test.
We have a tradition of practicing the new words every Friday when we go out to dinner. I put all their spelling words for the year on index cards and put a number in the corner that corresponds with what week spelling word it is. So when we go to dinner I pull out the words we need to learn for the upcoming week and make a small pile of them. Then I choose one from that pile and 2 words from the pile of the rest, so we have 3 words, and the girls take turns creating a sentence using all three words, then they have to spell the word that we are focusing on. We shuffle through the words while we are waiting for our meals. The girls love this game, and I through the cards in my purse/bag so I can pull them out and either play the game or just quiz them whenever I find ourselves waiting somewhere.--I swear the stack weighs about 10 lbs, and I am way out of practice of lugging a heavy bag around.
Also I have been turned onto a fun website, where you can plug in your child's spelling words and have them play games using them on the website, or you can print off worksheets for the kids to practice on. They have match the definition to the word, or fill in the missing word out of the sentence with the spelling words, they have word searches and crosswords, etc. That is fun for the girls and usually a 5-10 min activity. Which is good when they are waiting for a snack or meal. http://www.spellingcity.com/
Another fun game I have found is Scrabble Slam. I don't really care for the direction the game comes with, so we made our own. The game consist of a huge stack of cards, that are designed to look like the original tiles, they are cream colored and have 1 letter printed on the front and another printed on the back, in the upper right corner both letters are printed so you can easily see what letter is on the back. So what I do is spread these cards on the table in neat little rows and columns. Then I give the girls a spelling word and they have to find the cards to spell the words, the first one to have the word spelled out with the cards in front of them wins! What do they win? um...nothing...just bragging rights for that round.
I have also found that the distance we live from the school gives us exactly enough time that we need to go through the spelling words one time for each girl while we are driving to school.
I was always a good speller in school...have no idea what happened to that skill. So I am excited to help the girls with their spelling. Although, there is nothing like trying to help someone master spelling, to realize that the English language really does not make any sense!
Math on the other hand...not so much. I need to look at ways to make some games out of math concepts, its just not as fun or exciting for me.
Any other ways or games that you know of? send my way

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