Dad’s
Fat Hat
Beginning Reader
By: Volandra Holloway
Rationale:
Beginning readers need to know letters and the phonemes that match.
“Short
vowels are harder to identify than long vowels.” (
Materials: “Pat’s Jam” by: Sheila
Cushman, primary paper and pencil, chart with “Pat has dad’s black
cap.”
Picture page with hat, cup, bag, girl,
cat, dog, apple, flag, boy, bat,
individual letterboxes for each student, letters needed: b, a, t, m, p,
g, r, w
Procedure:
1. Start by telling children that a=/a/. For example hat,
cat, bat.
In order to read words like those you will have to know a=/a/. “Today
we’re
going to read, write, and spell words that have /a/ in them.
2. “Can anyone tell me other words that have the /a/ sound?”
[sat,
bag, apple] “Those are all correct. Very good!”
3. “Who can tell me the noise that sheep make? [baaa, baaa]
“Very
good! The word baaa has the /a/ sound in it. Let’s pretend like we’re
sheep and
say baaa.” [baaa, baaa] “Excellent!”
4. “Now, I’m going to call out some words and each time you
hear the
/a/ sound in a word, I want you to pretend like you’re sheep and say
baaa.
Let’s practice.” “Cat” [baaa, baaa] “that” [baaa, baaa] “girl” [?]
“Very good.”
“Let’s say this tongue twister together; Pat has dad’s black cap. Again
when
you hear the /a/ sound say baaa.”
5. “Now let’s practice writing the /a/ sound. Take out your
pencil
and paper. Let’s write cat. Can someone come to the board and show us
how cat
is spelled?” [That’s correct]. Continue with a list of words.
6. Introduce letterbox lesson to children. “Okay boys and
girls now
we are going to do a letterbox lesson. I’ll tell you the number of
boxes you
need then I will tell you the word to spell. There should be one letter
in each
box.” The list of words are: bat, map, tag, rat, wag, trap, brag.
7. “Next we’re going to do partner reading. This will help
you
become better readers. Take out “Pat’s Jam and find a partner. Start
reading.”
8. Pass out picture page. Say: “Let’s read the words on this
page
together. Now I want you to circle each picture that has the /a/ sound
in its
name. Let’s do a few together. Would you circle cat [yes] dog [no]
Good! Okay
now finish the rest.”
Reference: Adams, Marilyn J., Beginning to Read: Thinking and Learning
about
Print.,
Murray, B.A., and Lesniak, T., The letterbox lesson: A hands-on
approach for
teaching decoding., (1999), 52& 644-650.
Educational Insights by: Sheila Cushman
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