Jamie Braswell
Say
Ahh went
the Doc
Emergent Literacy Design
Rationale:
In
order for
children to learn to read and spell, they must be aware of the units of
sound within
a spoken word, and then be able to recognize the letters that represent
them.
Short vowels are perhaps the most difficult sounds to learn. This
lesson will
focus on the short o (o = /o/) correspondence. Students will learn to
recognize
this correspondence in spoken words through a memorable representation
as well
as through the written letter symbol. Students will also have practice
in
pulling the /o/ sound out of a word.
Materials:
- Primary paper and pencil; sentence strip with
the tongue twister printed on it: Odd
Oscar’s octopus had an operation in October.
- Labeled picture cards that correspond to
riddles
- Doc
in the Fog, by:
Sheila
Cushman, Educational Insights.
- Assessment worksheet: Picture page with the
following sets of pictures: dog, cat,
bird; stop, cab, jet; vest, sock, mat;
frog, ring, cap.
Procedure:
1. The
lesson will
be introduced by explaining to the children that our language can be
written using
a type of code, but this type of code goes along with how our mouth
moves when
we say words. Today we are going to learn about the /o/ sound, and
notice how
our mouth moves when we say /o/.
2.
Have you ever
been to the doctor and he wanted to look at your throat? What did the
doctor
ask you to say? When I go to the doctor, he asks me to say ‘ahh’ when
he puts
the stick to my mouth. Everyone should now pretend they are at the
doctor, and
the group should say the sound at the same time (several times). Now
stick out
your tongue, use your imagination and pretend you are at the doctor—put
your
thumb to your mouth and say /o/.
3. We
are now
going to try a tongue twister (have the tongue twister printed on a
sentence
strip): Odd Oscar’s octopus had an
operation in October. Practice the sentence whole group several
times. Now
we are going to stretch out the /o/ at the beginning of the words: Ooodd Oooscar’s oooctopus had an oooperation
in Oooctober. Now this time break off the /o/ at the beginning of
each word
and separate it from the rest of the word: /O/dd
/O/scar’s /o/ctopus had an /o/peration in /O/ctober.
4.
Using the
primary paper and pencil, explain to kids that the o is the letter we
use to
represent /o/. We are going to practice writing it. We start at the
fence, and
without lifting our pencil, we circle on the way back up to the fence
where you
started. Everyone hold up your letter o. Now remember that when you see
the
letter o in words, that is your
signal to say /o/, the stick-out your tongue doctors sound. When you
hear /o/,
that is your signal to write o.
5. I
am going to
say a riddle and hold up two pictures that can be possible answers. One
picture
will have the /o/ sound and one will not. Call on students to answer
the
riddles. Once the answer is found, students should repeat the word and
stretch
out the vowel sound. A few example riddles are:
I am thinking of something that
we use to
scrub floors. It has the /o/ sound in the middle. Is it a mop or a rag?
I am thinking of something that
you do when
you exercise. It has the /o/ sound in the middle. Do you jog or swim?
6.
Read
Doc
in the Fog and discuss the story. Now read it again, and explain to
the
kids that each time they hear a word with /o/ in it they should give a
thumbs
up. Have the students write a message on the following topic: If you
were Doc
the Wiz, what would you tap and change? (Students should use invented
spelling.) They may draw a picture and describe the message.
7. For
Assessment:
Have the students complete the picture page. The picture page will have
four
rows of three pictures and the students should circle the picture whose
names
have /o/.
References:
Anderson, Jenni. Say
ah…OK, Doc. http://www.auburn.edu/rdggenie/guides/andersonel.html
Eldredge, J. Lloyd. (1995). Teaching and decoding in holistic
classrooms.
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