Open
wide…and say Ahh!

Rationale: In order for children to learn to read and spell words, they must use insight from the alphabetic principle to understand that letters stand for phonemes. They must also understand that spellings “map” out phonemes in spoken words. Before they can match letters to phonemes, they must recognize phonemes in spoken words. Short vowels are usually hard for kids to identify. This lesson will help students identify /o/ (short o). They will learn to recognize /o/ in spoken words by learning a meaningful representation and also a letter symbol. They will then practice this new correspondence by finding /o/ in words.
Materials:
· Primary paper
· Pencils
· Poster with tongue twister “Oliver had an operation in October, and Oscar gave him an Octopus” written on it
· Chalk board and chalk
· Tongue depressor for each student (popsicle sticks work too)
· Laminated poster with primary lines drawn on it
· Dry erase marker
· Copy of “Doc in the Fog” for each student (Educational Insights, 1990)
· Cards with words to read for sound /o/ and pictures of each word for students to look at (cards: jog or run; broom or mop; pan or pot;- each word will have a corresponding picture above it for the students to look at)
Procedures:
1. Introduce the lesson by telling students that
written
language is our secret code that we must “crack” or figure out before
learning
to read. Sometimes the hard part is
learning what the letters stand for (the mouth moves that we make as we
say
words). Today we are going to work on
learning the mouth move /o/. At
first,
/o/ will seem like it is hiding from you in words, but as you get
better at
cracking the “code” you’ll be able to find it in all sorts of words.
2.Ask students “Have you ever been to the doctor? When he wants to look at our throat, he
tells us to open wide, stick out our tongue, and say /o/.”
That is our mouth move for today. We
will be looking for this mouth move in
many different words. Let’s practice
together. Everybody get your tongue
depressor and place it on your tongue like this (I will model how to do
it). Now,
let’s all do it together,
/o/.
3.Let’s try our tongue twister (on poster board).
“Oliver
had an operation in October, and Oscar gave him an Octopus.” Now, everybody say it three times
together. Now we will say it again, but
this time stretch the /o/ at the beginning of the words. “Ooooliver had
an ooooperation
in Ooooctober, and Ooooscar gave him an Oooctopus.”
Try it one more time, but this time break the /o/ off the word.
“/o/ liver had an /o/peration in /o/ ctober, and /o/ scar gave him an
/o/
ctopus.” Great
job!
4.Have students take out primary writing paper and
a
pencil. Say “We can use the letter o to spell /o/. Let’s write
it.” I will use the laminated
poster to model the correct way to write the letter o. I will say “To write a
lowercase o, we start at the fence, draw a curved line down to
the
sidewalk, and then keep the curve going back up to the fence.” I will draw several lowercase o’s. The students will follow my direction and
draw one lowercase o. Say “I
want to see everyone’s o’s. When you
get a happy face, you can draw nine more just like it.”
Next, I will say “To write an uppercase O,
we start at the rooftop, draw a curved line down to the sidewalk, and
then keep
the curve going back up to the rooftop.”
I will draw several uppercase O’s and then tell the
children to
draw one on their own paper. I will say
“once you get a happy face by your uppercase O, I want you to
draw nine
more just like it.” I
will say “Now
that you know what the o looks like, when you see it, you will know to
say
/o/.”
5.Say “Let me show you how to
find /o/ in the word stop. I am going to stretch out the word
in very
slow motion and listen for the doctor sound.
Ssstop, ssstttop, ssstttooo…there it is! I do hear the
doctor
sound in stop!”
6.I will hand out a set of cards to each student
with two
words and two pictures on each card (cards: jog or run; broom or mop;
pan or
pot- each word will have a corresponding picture above it for the
students to
look at). I will call on students who
raise their hands. They will tell me which word they hear the /o/ sound
in, and
how they know: Do you hear /o/ in on or in?
Jog or run? Broom
or mop? Pan or pot? I will ask students if they can think of
some words with the /o/ sound. I
will
write these words on the board.
7.Say “Doc is a wizard.
He has magical powers. He points
his magic wand at things and they change into different things. Doc
even changes
a dog into a pot! What will happen to
the dog? We will have to read the book
to find out!” Read Doc in the Fog and
discuss the story. Read it a second
time, but now have students raise their hands when they hear words with
the /o/
sound (tell them to think really carefully and not just raise their
hand
because someone else is.) List these
words with /o/ sound on the board (along with the words the students
came up
with ). Have the students draw a
picture of Doc the magic wizard and write a message about it. Tell them “I can’t help you spell the
words. If
you get to a word that you
aren’t sure about, sound it out the best you can.”
8.For assessment, I will hand out the worksheet with 4 pictures in a row (some words will have the /o/ sound, and others won’t). I will tell them to color the pictures that have the /o/ sound in them. First, we will go over each picture and say what it is (so the students do not interpret the pictures wrong).
Assessment:
Reference:
Doc In the Fog.
Educational Insights. 1990.
Heather Lynch. Reading Genie Website. Stick out
your tongue…
and say ah.
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/persp/lynchel.html
Reading Genie website- How to Teach Phoneme
Awareness. “Making Friends with Phonemes”
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/phon.html
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