Aaaaa! Scary!
Rationale:
Phonemes give meaning to graphemes. It is essential to teach
phonemes in order to understand and comprehend graphemes. This
lesson will focus on a =
/a/. After the lesson is complete the
students will be able to master /a/ in spoken and written words.
Materials:
1. Letterboxes-cardstock 2” x 2” squares, 6 squares taped together
2. Letter manipulatives: (f, l, a, g, c, r, c, k, p, s, h, b, n,
k, t, d)
3. “The Fat Cat Sat on the Mat” by Nurit Karlin
4. Primary paper
5. Pencil
5. The Haunted house display board with doors on it. Words
like bat, sit, ant, cab, box, lock,
and at will be behind each
door
6. White Erase board
7.
Markers for the board
8.
Cards that read PASK, WAST, PAND, and TRAB.
Procedures:
1. “Today we are going to learn that the letter a says /a/.
Now can everyone say /a/. It kind of sounds like the sound you
make when someone scares you…./a/!! Now I want you to all say
“Ants always aggravate Alice.” Now I want you to stretch out that
/a/ sound. Aaaants aaaalways aaaagravate aaalice. Good job
boys and girls! I am going to tell you some words and you tell me
which word has the /a/ sound in it. Do you hear /a/ in sat or
run? In front or back? In cat or mouse?”
2. “Now we are going to do a letterbox activity. Everyone
get out your letterboxes. I am going to model first how we are
going to do this activity. First, I need three letterboxes.
(Have four letterboxes already drawn on the board). Now, I want
to spell the word flat.
Put a f in the first
letterbox, l in
the second letterbox, t in
the forth letter box, and say “flaaaaat”…oh
/a/, that box is an a.
(Talking about the third letter
box). Flat, like the
desks we are using are flat surfaces.
Now I want you to try with some other words.” (Give them the
words (flag, crack, clap, crash, blank,
and strand) and let them
spell
them out on their individual letterboxes). After each word is
spelled have the students sound out and read what they have spelled.
3. “Now everyone look at the haunted house display board up at
the front of the room. I am going to open the door one by one and
if you see a word that has the sound /a/, I want you to each hold up
your arms and scream /a/!!!!!” As I open the windows
of the haunted house that have bat,
ant, cab and at the
students will raise their arms and scream /a/.
4. Give each student a copy of “The Fat Cat Sat on the Mat.” I
will already have them in assigned groups of two so that they can take
turns reading to each other. "Now we’re going to read a book
about
a cat and a rat that live together! Can you imagine a cat and a rat
living in the same house? Do you think that might cause some problems?
Let’s read and find
out!"
5. To assess the students I will have them each meet with me
one-on-one and read psuedowords I have created. These words will
be PASK, WAST, PAND, and TRAB.
References:
Frey, Katheryn. Abigail Ant. http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/invent/freybr.html
Murray, Bruce A. and Theresa Lesniak. “The letterbox lesson: A
Hands On
Approach for Teaching Decoding.” The Reading Teacher. Vol
52, No. 6
March, 1999. 644-650.
Karlin, Nurit (1996) The Fat Cat Sat on the Mat. HaperTrophy. United
States of America.
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