Rationale:  Recognizing phonemes is a crucial part of learning to read.  Though this is often difficult for children this lesson is designed to help students identify the /o/ (short o).  From the lesson I hope that children will recognize the /o/ sound in written and spoken words.

Materials:  Primary pencil and paper, poster with tongue twister ãOscar the octopus ate olives in Octoberä, stickers, drawing paper and crayons, picture page drawn by the teacher containing a frog, box, dog, fox, mom, olive, Doc in the Fog- Educational Insights

Procedures:
1. Introduce the lesson by explaining that our written language is a secret code.  The tricky part is learning the sounds that each letter makes.  Today we are going to work on spotting the mouth move /o/.  It may be difficult to spot at first but with practice it will get easier to find the /o/ sound in words.
2. Ask students:  Have you ever gone to the doctor and he has asked you to open your mouth and say ahhh.  That is the sound that /o/ makes.  Letâs pretend that we are at the doctor and say /o/.  /o/.
3. Letâs try a tongue twister (on poster).  ãOscar the octopus ate olives in October.ä  Everybody say it three times together.  Now say it again and this time stretch the /o/ at the beginning of the words.  Oooscar the oooctopus ate ooolives in Oooctober.  Try it again, and this time break it off the word:  ã/o/ scar the /o/ ctopus ate /o/ lives in /o/ ctober.  Very good!
4.  [Have students take out primary paper and pencil.]  We can use the letter o to spell /o/.  Letâs write it.  Start at the fence line, curve around and touch the sidewalk then curve back up to the fence line. [Model each step]  I want to see everybodyâs o.  Once I have given you a sticker make five more just like it.  When you see o in a word all by itself thatâs the signal to say /o/.
5. Ask students some questions.  When called upon ask them how they knew.  Do you hear /o/ in dog or cat?  Mom or dad?  Wrong or right?  Frog or snake?  Letâs see if you can spot the mouth move /o/ in some words.  Say /o/ if you hear /o/ or no if you donât.  [Give words one by one.]  Oscar, the, octopus, ate, olives, in , October.
6. Sing a song to the tune of The Farmer and the Dell but change the words as follows:  ãWhat sound starts the words?  What sound starts the words?  Hi-ho the der-ri-o, what sound starts the words?ä  Say on, off, oscar.  Everyone repeats on, off, oscar.  Sing the song two more times using the words octopus, olives, October, odd, ox.
7.  Read Doc in the Fog and talk about the story.  Read it again and have students raise their hand when they hear /o/.  List the words they choose on the board.  Then have students draw a picture of the wizard and tell what they would change into if they could using invented spelling.  Display their work.
8. For assessment ask children to circle the pictures that contain the /o/ sound.

Reference:  Eldredge, J. Lloyd. (1995).  Developing Phonemic Awareness.  Teaching Decoding in the Holistic Classrooms.  Pp. 59-61.

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