Here's a great game idea I picked up from scholastic books' website:
http://www.scholastic.com/kids/home.htm
You make a "board" out of chalk on the ground outside and then put the letters of the alphabet, one in each box, and have the kids spell out vocabulary words by hopping letter to letter. We tried it a few different ways with different sets of rules and found that what worked best for us was for me to call out a child's name and then call out a word for them to spell. As they hopped on the correct letters of the word I'd call out the letter name. If they hopped on a wrong letter I would remain silent - that way they and all other children playing would still only hear the word and then the correct spelling of it no matter how many wrong letters the hopping child stepped on.
This was easy and fun for all of us! We allowed one hop outside the "board" if the letters were so far apart that it couldn't be hopped to easily. Even my 3 year old got good practice, but especially my 6 and 8 year olds. We will definately do this again. I may even make one on cardboard or poster board to do inside when it's yucky out. Maybe I'll even make a smaller version for pointing out the spellings.
Anything that makes Spelling fun is a winner in my book. My oldest HATES spelling and he definately needs the practice. Ok...now go try it! :-)
