Anna is language obsessed. She reads dictionaries and thesauruses for fun and has a huge collection of them. She probably reads at least 3 hours a day. She is 11 and in 5th grade.

Recently I noticed that she would have a very odd spelling list each week. Instead of having a list that illustrates some rule of spelling, she would have 8 words that were really long and far beyond the normal vocabulary you would expect of an 11 year old.--examples "Ineluctably, differentiation".

Because I was curious I asked Anna where this list came from--she told me that the different teachers and aides in the special ed room where she spends some time would suggest words. I had noticed that she would come home with a 100 on every spelling test, so yesterday I asked her teacher what the deal was.

She laughed and confirmed Anna's story that the teachers were trying to come up with words to stump Anna and had resorted to a collegiate dictionary to try and find words. When composing the list each week, they would try out words by asking Anna to spell them--if she could without seeing the word, they would discard it and search for another word. She said sometimes it takes a while to find a word she doesn't already know how to spell. Once she has seen the word, she generally can spell it on the first try.

This is a crazy skill--if only it would translate to math LOL!

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Mary
Mom to Libby 6/92, Alex 9/93, Anna (DS)12/03

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Wow! That is amazing! Or rather, Anna is amazing!

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Barbie
Bill's wife 06/2001
Emeline's momma 10/2005

"When you can't see God's hand, trust His Heart."

That is absolutely fabulous! Go Anna!

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Maresa,
Mom to Alisa (10-29-2008) DS, complete AV canal repair on 3-6-2009

That is fantastic - well done Anna! Keep on encouraging her, Mary. No advice re maths...lol!

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Rachel
Mum to Thomas 05, Luke 07, Jacob DS 09. Married to Stephen.

Lol. I'll ask again... are you sure she has DS? Just kidding... she is one amazing little girl.

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Kellie, mom to Sean 13 yrs with DS and Carly 16 yrs

If you could see her doing math you would agree with the dx LOL. I think that she spends so much time reading that she has imprinted in her head how the words are spelled. Because she has bad small motor skills she dictates the spelling for spelling tests--which to me makes it even more amazing. I find when I am writing that I need to see the words--spelling outloud doesn't work for me.

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Mary
Mom to Libby 6/92, Alex 9/93, Anna (DS)12/03

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I think she needs to teach my 16 year old typical daughter how to spell! Lol

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Kellie, mom to Sean 13 yrs with DS and Carly 16 yrs

I have never found spelling easy - but that was no impediment to getting a good uni degree. I have always been a big reader. I have realised that I read and spell by recognising the pattern of the letters - rather than phonetically. It is visual, rather than audio, for me.
I sometimes wonder if Jacob is the same because he can see the word 'cow' for example, and make a good enough verbal approximation now, but it helps if there is a picture of a cow too. He doesn't know how to read the word phonetically, but I think he can recognise the pattern made by the letters.
A lot of primary school literacy education puts the focus on phonics. But I think pattern recognition is important too.

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Rachel
Mum to Thomas 05, Luke 07, Jacob DS 09. Married to Stephen.

Can I ask a question.....does she know the meaning of the words she is spelling?
What you say is amazing! Your daughter is an amazing young woman!
I love the fact that her literacy skills are so strong....

My daughter did something similar with numbers in aqua fit class on Friday.
I said to here...
"there more women in the class this week than last week!"
To which she replied...
"there was 22 in the class tonight and 10 in the class last week."
I said to her...
"you're always counting them!"
To which she replied...
"I didn't count them! I only have to look at the group and know the number in it!"

Now that took the wind out of my sails....she is very strong at maths!
At next class I plan to count the numbers and see do our totals tally!

Thanks for posting about Anna....I love hearing about her progress!

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Linda & John
mom to Hannah Kate (Age 16 ), Robert (Aged 10 - DS)


First Communion Day

Yes, she does know the meaning of the words. She has a huge vocabulary and she constantly surprises us with the words she chooses. One day she said to me "I have an aversion to 5th grade" whereas my other kids would have said "I hate 5th grade". When reading she definitely knows what the words themselves say, but she isn't always great at drawing the inferences from the words. So she would be able to tell you for example that the sky was azure, and know that meant it was blue, but she might not be able to infer from that the characters in the story would go outside to the beach.

I remember one time they told me at school that she wasn't very good at inferring after she read a story where a child was lost in the woods, fell into a hole and although he was yelling, his parents couldn't find him. The question was "why can't the parents find him?" and the logical inference was that he was down in the hole and the sound was muffled as a result. Anna's answer was that perhaps the parents had a hearing loss and couldn't hear his yells as a result. Of course, since Anna has a hearing loss, this makes absolute sense in her world, but didn't in the teacher's world.

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Mary
Mom to Libby 6/92, Alex 9/93, Anna (DS)12/03

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WOW!!!!!!!

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Everything is for the best!

Talitha is 9 and can only just spell her name and even then she gets it wrong sometimes. She is awesome in other ways though, just nothing academic

Anna is remarkable!!!

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Karyn
Mum to Nikki (Jul 89), Stefanie (Sep 96), Joel [June 98] and Talitha (DS) (Nov 05) AVSD/PDA repaired 23 March

"I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Marvelous are Your works, and that my soul knows very well." Psalm 139:14

Wow!! way to go, that is amazing!!! no way I could spell those words!

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Cathy - mama to Javi born 2/12 with a little something extra!!

Wow! She is great at spelling!

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Laura - proud mom to my 4 girls

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