Ar Mate’!!

 

 

A Beginning Reading Lesson

By: Casey Free

 

Rational: This lesson will teach students about the correspondence /ar/. The /a/ is controlled by the “Bossy R”. There are many /r/ controlled vowels. When we put an /r/ on the end of our words it changes the vowel sound before the /r/. This is why we call the /r/ the “Bossy R”. They will learn in this lesson that the sound /r/ on the end of some words is actually spelled /ar/. Because there are so many variations of words, students need to become familiar with the look of words rather than memorizing spelling and pronunciation rules.

 

Materials:

 

Procedure:

  1. Say: In order for us to become expert readers we have to know about “Bossy R”. When /r/ comes after the vowel /a/ in a word it changes the sound of /a/. Usually the vowel /a/ would say its name a. Now say it with me: a. But when we have a “Bossy R” after the /a/ it says /ar/. Now say it with me: ar. Today we are going to learn about this “Bossy R” and the way we make our mouth when we say it. When we say /ar/ our lips are slightly open and our tongue almost touches the roof of our mouth. Also when I think of the sound /ar/ I think of a pirate. Don’t you? Lets all say Arrrr Mate’!!
  2. Say: Before we learn the spelling of /ar/ we should learn some/ar/words. When I say the word are I feel my tongue almost at the roof of my mouth. Now I want you to try it. (Class says are) Did you feel it? I am going to say some words and I want you to say Arrr Mate’! if you hear the /ar/ sound in them. Do you hear /ar/ in snow, cart, lip, jar, coat, mark, pant?
  3. Say: Now lets look at how we spell /ar/. (Write car on the board) Does everyone see the “Bossy R”? Good job! Now what if we want to spell the word star? “Look at the shooting star!” Star in this sentence means a bright object in the sky. To spell star in the letterbox we first need to know how many phonemes it has, lets stretch it out and count /s//t//ar/. We need 3 boxes. We heard the /s/ and the /t/ sound at the beginning of the word so this means we need to put /s/ in the first box and /t/ in the second box. In the third box we will put the /ar/.
  4. Say: Now we are going to spell some words in our letter boxes. We will begin out easily with 2 boxes for car and jar. What goes in the first box? (Children will answer) What goes in the second box? (Children will answer) As I walk around the room I will be checking your spelling. For the next word you will need 3 boxes, the word is scar. “I saw a hare in the woods.” In this sentence hare means a rabbit. What goes in the first box? (Children will answer) What goes in the second box? (Children will answer) Now what goes in the third box? (Children will answer) As I walk around the room I will be checking for you to spell these words in your letter boxes; far, star, spar. Now lets say all of our words together. (Children will say words in unison)
  5. Say: You have done a wonderful job spelling and reading all of your words. Now we are going to read a book called The Mare and the Hare. This is a story of a sweet little hare and a beautiful mare, in this book a mare is a female horse. They are the best of friends and play so well together but they get a little upset with some people that like to watch them. Lets read on and see what happens. Lets pair up and take turns reading pages of The Mare and the Hare. (Children will pair up and alternate reading pages while I walk around and observe. After everyone has finished reading we will all read it aloud as a class and stop between pages and discuss the plot.)
  6. Say: As we finish up our lesson I want you to do a fun worksheet with our /ar/ words. On the worksheet you are to color the pictures and draw a line to the word that describes the picture. (I will collect all worksheets at the end and evaluate children’s data)

 

Resources:

                Murray, G. Oh, I didn’t know! https://blackboard.auburn.edu/webct/urw/lc22554136011.tp0/cobaltMainFrame.dowebct

 

                Assessment Worksheet: http://www.kidzone.ws/phonics/ar3.htm

 

 

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