Blowin' Bubbles with B
An Emergent Literacy Design
By: Ashley
Runyon
Rationale: This lesson will help children identify /b/, the phoneme represented
by B. Students will learn to
recognize /b/ in spoken words by learning a meaningful representation (blowing
bubbles) and the letter symbol B,
practice finding /b/ in words, and apply phoneme awareness with /b/ in phonetic
cue reading by distinguishing rhyming words from beginning letters.
Materials: Primary paper and pencil with eraser; chart with "Bubba’s bagel baked
bacon bits"; Beverly Billingsly Borrows a Book by Alexander Stadler
(2002); drawing paper and crayons; word cards with BIG, MAKE, BUN, SHUTTER,
SANK, and MUST; assessment worksheet identifying pictures with /b/ (URL).
Procedures:
1. Say: Imagine you are
an undercover spy. You can’t discuss important topics in front of just anyone,
right? You have to have a secret code. Well, our English written language is
just that—a secret code. Even though secret codes may seem to be hard to learn,
I promise it’s not! Each letter is simply pronounced by movement of the mouth,
which is exactly how you say words. Today, we are going to target how the mouth
moves for /b/. We spell /b/ with letter B.
B looks like a stick to blow a
bubble, and /b/ sounds like blowing a bubble very gently.
2. Let's pretend to blow a bubble, /b/, /b/, /b/.
(Show blowing a bubble out of an
imaginary stick) Isn’t it cool how every time you say /b/, your top and bottom
lips have to touch? Try to say /b/ without touching your top and bottom lip
together. You can’t, right? Therefore, /b/ is a very special letter with a one
of a kind sound!
3. Here, allow me to show you how to
find /b/ in the word tube. Even though I
said tube like I was talking normal, this time, I'm going to stretch tube out in
super slow motion. Make sure you listen for my bubble!
Ttt-u-u-ube. Slower: Ttt-u-u-u-bbb-e
Hmm, I heard the /b/ that time!
Both my top and bottom lips touched when I said that word and I can feel the
bubble /b/ in tube.
4. Now
that we found the /b/ in tube, let's try a tongue twister [on chart]. “Bubba’s
bagel baked bacon bits." Everybody say it three times together. Great! Now say
it again, and this time, stretch the /b/ at the beginning of the words. I really
want to hear the /b/. "Bbbubba’s bbbagel bbbaked bbbacon bbbits.” I really liked
the /b/ I heard. Now, you’re going to do it one more time but this time, break
it off the word: "/b/ ubba’s /b/
agel /b/ aked /b/ acon /b/ its.”
5. [Have
students take out primary paper and pencil given at the beginning of lesson]. We
use letter B to spell /b/. Capital
B looks like a stick that is used to
blow bubbles. Let's write the
lowercase letter b. Start at the top
of the page. Draw a straight line from the top to the bottom. Then, start at the
middle of the straight line, where the dots are on the page, and make a
backwards c. It almost looks like a
half bubble on the straight line. Okay! I want to see everybody's
b. After I put a check mark on it, I
want you to make nine more just like it, which is how many total? 10!
6. Call on students to answer and
explain why they chose that answer: Do you hear /b/ in
book or
novel?
Blank or
note?
Bottle or
cup?
Bib or
hankie?
Rib or
chicken? Say: Let's see if you can
spot the mouth move /b/ in some words. Blow a bubble by holding the bubble stick
if you hear /b/: The,
bunny, butterfly, flake, yard, bat, tab, for, yellow, baby.
7. Say:
"Let's look at a story. Alexander Stadler, the author, tells us about a girl who
borrows a book. Can you guess what type of book she borrows?"
Read the first two pages and make sure to draw out /b/, having the
students blow an imaginary bubble when they hear it.
Ask children if there are any additional words that have /b/.
Ask the students to make up a couple of interesting book titles using
B, like Big Bubbles and Butterflies
or Bobby’s Butterscotch Bagel Bites. Then, instruct each student to write their
titles with invented spelling and draw a picture of what the cover of the book
would look like. Display their work.
8. Show
BIG and model how to decide if it is big
or wig: The
B tells me to blow a bubble, /b/, so
this word is bbb-ig, big. You try
some: MAKE:
make or
bake? BUN:
bun or
sun? SHUTTER:
shutter or
butter? SANK:
sank or
bank? MUST:
must or
bust?
9. For
assessment, distribute the worksheet.
Students are to complete the partial spellings, like insert the
b in front of the letters “oat” and color the pictures that begin with
B. Call students individually to read
the phonetic cue words seen previously in step #8.
Reference:
Stadler, A.
Beverly Billingsly Borrows a
Book. Harcourt Children's Books; 1st edition. 2002.
Meg Miller, Buzzy B's:
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/begin/millermel.html
Assessment worksheet:
http://www.kidzone.ws/kindergarten/b-begins2.htm