Click, Click, Take a Pic!

Emergent Literacy-Phoneme Awareness
By: Julianne Robinson

1.  Phoneme to teach: /k/

2.  Rationale: The goal of this lesson is phoneme awareness. This lesson will help children identify /k/, the phoneme represented by C. Students will learn to recognize /k/ in spoken words by learning a meaningful representation (picturing themselves clicking a camera) and the letter symbol C (the lens of the camera on the front). They will practice finding /k/ in words, and apply phoneme awareness with /k/ in phonetic cue reading by distinguishing rhyming words from beginning letters. Finally they will practice writing the upper and lowercase C.

3. Materials: Primary paper and pencil; picture of a camera (as seen below), chart with "Carl and Carson can cook candy and carrots", drawing paper and markers/crayons, a mirror, cards with the words CAT, CRAZE, and CAVE on them, list of words including car, bat, rug, came, cup, sit, and assessment worksheet from http://www.kidzone.ws/kindergarten/letterc.htm

4.  Procedure:
Say: "Today we're going to be learning about the letter C. The letter C makes the sound /k/, like the sound that a camera makes when you take a picture. You can imagine clicking the circular button that looks like a C on the top of the camera or the front of the camera that also looks like a C."(Show the Picture)
Gesture: Both hands, holding a camera and pointer finger pressing the button to take the picture. (Make the sound as the student "clicks" the camera button.) Let's say the /k/ sound as we click the camera and take a picture.

5. (Have a mirror for each child, or one for them to come look in) Say: "Be sure to pay attention to the way your mouth is when you say /k/. I open my mouth to say /k/, and then end with my mouth open as well. Look at your mouth in the mirror. See how it is open? Also, air comes out of your mouth as you say the /k/ sound. You try it! (Have student put hand about an inch from their mouth to feel the air) Do you feel the air on your hand?"

6. Say: "Let's try a tongue tickler now. Listen to this one: Carl and Carson can cook candy and carrots! Can you repeat it after me? (Children repeat) Do you hear the /k/ sound at the beginning of every word? Let's say it one more time. Now stretch out the /k/ sound at the beginning of the words."

"CCCCarl and CCCCarson ccccan ccccook cccccandy and ccccarrots."

7. Say: "Let's see if we can find the /k/ sound in wacky? I'm going to pay attention to if my mouth is open, stays open, and if a puff of air comes out of my mouth when I make the /k/ sound. W-w-w-aaaa-ccckkk-y.  My mouth came open and I felt the puff of air at the end of the word.  Www-aaa-ccckkk (there it is!)-yyy. I can feel my mouth make our camera clicking noise (do hand motion) in wacky."

8.  (Call on students to answer) "Let's do some practice now. Do you hear /k/ in sick or sad? Cash or money? Because or about? Hot or cold? Clean or dirty?
 Let's see if you can spot the /k/ (click) sound on some of these words. Take a picture if you hear /k/: car, bat, rug, came, cup, sit."

9. Say: "We use letter C to spell /k/. Capital C looks like a button or front of a camera. Is the click in cat or rat (Show CAT)?  Cave or brave (Show CAVE)? Maze or Craze (Show CRAZE)?"

10. Say: "I think you all have the hang of the sound /k/. Now let's practice writing the letter C. First we will do the uppercase C. (pass out primary paper) Watch me do one first, and they you will practice. Start with your pencil halfway between the rooftop and the fence. Draw a curve up until you land on the rooftop, then start curving down like you're drawing an oval. Be sure to only make your oval to the sidewalk! Keep making the oval until you reach the fence again and then stop! Now you try it! (Allow time for students to practice several times.) Okay now let's try the lowercase c. It's just like the uppercase C but, this time you'll start halfway between the fence and the sidewalk, up to the fence, make your little oval, and start coming back up until you get halfway to the fence again! Do you think you can do that?" (Allow more practice time; give help and encouragement if needed)

11. Say: "Let's look at a fun rhyming, alphabet book. Dr. Suess tell us about a silly animal whose name starts with a C. Can you guess what it is?" Read, and draw out /k/ in "C-c-cat in the hat." Ask the students if they can think of other words with /k/. Ask them to make up a rhyme that has one word that starts with /k/ like Cat in the Hat does, like bake the cake, or the car drives far. Then have each child write their rhyming title that they came up with, and then let them draw a picture of their word that starts with /k/. Display their work in the classroom for everyone to see each other's ideas."

13. For assessment, distribute the worksheet. Students are to circle the picture that starts with the letter C and makes /k/ sound. They can then color each word that they circled

14. References:
Adapted from: http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/projects/waltonel.html
Assessment: http://www.kidzone.ws/kindergarten/letterc.htm
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/sightings/murrayel.html

Phoneme Awareness Help: http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/phon.html

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