10 Unique Ways to Test Spelling Skills: Fun Spelling Test Alternatives

Hey there my amazing educator friends! Today I want to share some fun spelling test alternatives to help you assess your student’s spelling skills!

Spelling Test Alternatives to Assess Spelling Skills

1. Label it!: Find or create an image with parts your students can label using words from the patterns you are studying.

2. Spelling Skills Race: Similar to the traditional spelling bee. Teams get a point for each letter that is correct when spelling a word. The team with the most points wins!

3. Word Hunt: Provide a passage and let students circle or highlight words in the word pattern you are studying (such as Short A words). You can easily create these using AI, or use a passage from your reading curriculum. Need some fun phonics decodable passages? Check out these super fun Phonics Comics!

4. Spelling Detective: This is a twist on the word hunt! Turn your students into spelling detectives. Provide your students with a passage with words from the word pattern you are studying spelled incorrectly. Their mission? Find and circle the misspelled words in a passage or story.

5. Listen and Write: Give your students a few dictation sentences with words from the spelling pattern that you are studying.

6. Spell-tacular Storytime: Have each student write a short story. Encourage them to use their creativity and spelling skills to use as many of the week’s spelling words as possible. Make this super easy with Picture Prompts and Spelling Test Alternatives (included in my super fun Phonics Comics) or make your own!

Here is how they work: Dictate the words and students write them under the matching picture. Then, your choice: Dictate a sentence using the spelling words, or Let students write their own sentence. Students then cut out and add the pictures that they used to the setting picture at the top.  They can glue the pictures they didn’t use on the back.  They use the checklist to check their sentences. You can find these in any of my Phonics Comics resources!

7. Fix it: Provide students with a list of words spelled incorrectly. They fix the misspellings. Make it extra challenging by throwing in a few words that are already spelled correctly.

8. Spelling Word Bingo: Provide students with a bingo board with the number of squares you need for the words that you want to assess. Call out the words you want to use and let students write them anywhere they want on their bingo boards. Then, use the boards to play BINGO! You may want to have more words than spaces so the kiddos don’t have to write down ALL of the words.

9. Find it!: Make a word search for your students using their spelling words, but don’t include the word list. Dictate the words to your students and have them write them down and then find them in the word search. (I am not affiliated with this website).

10. Blooket: Create a Blooket game where the students identify the word that is spelled correctly. My students LOVED Blooket and were always happy to play. ( I am not affiliated with Blooket in any way.)

Help your students to continue spelling their words correctly even after they have been assessed by having them add their spelling words to their Student Spelling Dictionary! No more lines at your desk with students asking how to spell…?

Assessing your students’ spelling skills doesn’t have to be a daunting task! By incorporating some creativity and playfulness into your spelling activities, you’ll not only get a clear picture of your students’ spelling skills but also make learning a memorable adventure for them.

What are some of your favorite alternative assessment methods for spelling? Let’s keep the conversation going in the comments below!

Wishing you a spellbindingly awesome day in the classroom!

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Happy Teaching,