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I checked out spellingcity.com - good little 52 week plan there to get me going - thanks for that link! It made me realise that for years I've been wondering how they teach spelling in other countries - do they use rhyme in the same way that we use "cat, mat, rat" or not?
Does anyone know if websites or resources that address and teach this. I know from my own language learning in school that I always felt it would be easier to learn a language in the same way that I learnt English - it never came together. Now I wonder what my son could be absorbing. We have done some Italian - but we have relatives in French and German speaking countries and I don't know if there are Latin courses that tackle this?

Any ideas anyone?

I do not really understand your question, but latin based languages are very phonetic and spelling is not such an issue as it is in English.

I just re-read my old post - and apologize - it's not very clear and I was mixing up concepts I think.

I guess my line of thinking is:

We learn to write English using the same models it seems. For example, when I was, they would start you out by making you write "cat, bat, rat" - so that you were learning words that sounded similar, were spelt in a similar way.

I used to be bilingual and speak German fluently - but I wasn't taught to write in German. I'm just wondering whether anyone else here learnt to write a foregin language at 5 - and what type of exercises you did, or give your children to do now to learn a foreign language?

Do German people have words like "cat, bat, rat" that they give their children to write?

Do French people have words that little kids learn that rhyme - the same way British/American people do?

What do Asian folks do? Or people learning Russian? etc.

Does anyone use foreign language resources to teach thier kids a 2nd languge that theya re fond of?

We used to have one called "Heine und Hane" about a little girl and boy where you would cut and paste German words onto these worksheets.

If your child is bilingual then go ahead and use the material they would use if they attended school in the other country. That's what we do with our children.

If your child is older and learning a new language chances are he/she will pick up the spelling while learning new words. At least that's my personal experience.

As for your question. No, not all languages are taught the same way like English. There may be no special words to learn or start with especially if the language is fairly phonetic. There may be lots of rules but the basics can be quite simple and go hand in hand with learning to read.

My DS is learning Mandarin through Rosetta Stone. He likes it a lot. It's very simple to use and the lessons are broken up into small pieces.