Uhhh… I don’t know!
A Beginning Reading Lesson
By Amber Allman
Rationale:
To become successful readers, students must learn to identify letter symbols and
the sounds that those letters make. Short vowels are very difficult for
children to learn because several short vowel phonemes sound very similar.
In this lesson, the children will learn the correspondence u=/u/. The
students will learn meaningful representation of u and have practice identifying
written and spoken words containing the correspondence u=/u/. They will also
read a decodable text that focuses on the correspondence u= /u/.
Materials:
Graphic image of girl thinking; cover-up critter; Elkonin
boxes for modeling and individual Elkonin boxes for each student; letter
manipulatives for each child and magnetic or smart board letters for teacher: d,
u, g, c, a, b, r, n, p, j, t, m, l, b, h, e, s, p
; list of spelling words on poster or whiteboard to
read: dug, cab, run, pup, jet, gum, club, lunch, and sprung; decodable text:
Bud’s Sub and assessment worksheet.
Procedures:
1. Say: In order to become expert readers we need to learn the code that tells
us how to pronounce words. We have already learned to read short vowel words
with
a,
like,
tap,
and today we are going to learn about the short vowel u.
2. When I say /u/ I think of a little girl or boy thinking about answering a
question saying “Uhhhhh!” [Show graphic image]. Watch my mouth as I say /u/.
Whenever you hear the /u/ sound let’s all put our finger to our head like we are
thinking!
3. Now let’s try a tongue twister with the /u/ sound in it. Have a chart with
the tongue twister and point to the words. “Uncle Justin was upset until he saw
Bud run up with the umbrella.” Now everyone say it together. Good, this time we
say it every time you /u/ I want you to stretch out the sound “Uuuuuncle
Juuuustin was uuuuupset uuuuuntil he saw Buuuuud ruuuuun uuuuup with the
uuuuumbrella.” Great!! Now let’s try one more thing. This time when we say the
tongue twister, I want you to break off the /u/ sound from the word. “/U/ncle
J/u/stin was /u/pset /u/ntil he saw B/u/d r/u/n /u/p with the /u/mbrella.”
4. Say: Before we learn about the spelling of /u/, we need to listen for it in
some words. When I listen for /u/ in words, I hear
u
make the thinking sound /u/. When I say /u/ my mouth is wide open. Watch and
listen as I say some words. When you hear the /u/ sounds I want you to make the
thinking face: up, uncle, tug, umbrella, and trunk
5. Each student should now have Elkonin boxes and letterbox set on their desks.
Model how to use them by first folding out three Elkonin squares. Say: “I use
three square because there are three sounds in tug, /t/ /u/ /g/.” Use teacher
set for the entire class to see. “If I wanted to spell the word tug, I would
place t in the first box because the first sound that I hear is /t/. In the next
box I would place my u because I hear the /u/ sound like I am thinking. Last, I
would place g in the third box because I hear /g/. Now I want you to try to
spell some words.” Have students spell: dug, cab, run, pup, jet, gum. Move on to
four and five phoneme words: club, shred, lunch, crisp, trunk, strap, and
sprung.
6. Once students have spelled the words, I will read one or
two words from the list modeling how to read a word. Then I will have them read
from a list on the board as a class.
Once students have read in unison, call on
individuals to read one word on the list at a time until everyone has had a
turn.
7. Say: You have done a great job reading our new words for /u/. Now we are
going to read a book called Bud’s Sub. This book is about a sub named Bud. The
sub floats in water. But the tug hits an iceberg! Bud comes to the rescue, but I
hope that no one is hurt. Let’s read to find out. Lets take turns reading Bud’s
Sub to find out if anyone got hurt!
8. Say: Before we finish up with our lesson about u= /u/, I
want to see how well you can read Bud’s
Sub. Have students read a portion of the text to you individually and score
accuracy by using a running record.
While students are reading to teacher individually,
other students should complete the short u worksheet.
Resources:
Worksheet: https://www.etap.org/demo/langart1/lak3l1_3w5.pdf
Ashley Wood
"Uhh
Don't Punch Too Hard"
Meg Griffin:
"Uhh--Thinking About the
Letter U"
Decodable Text. "Bud the Sub". Educational Insights. 1990.