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Lesson Design for Beginning Readers

 

Homer  with  the  nose  hoped  for  a homerun

 

 

 

 

A Beginning Reading Lesson

By Madison Johnson

 

Rational: This lesson teaches children about the long vowel correspondence o_e=/O/. In order to be able to read, children must learn to recognize the spelling that map word pronunciations. In this lesson children will learn to recognize, spell, and read words containing the spelling o_e. They will learn a meaningful representation (man with a large nose), they will spell and read words containing this spelling in a Letterbox lesson, and read a decodable book that focuses on the correspondence o_e=/O/.

 

Materials: Graphic image of man with a large nose; cover-up; whiteboard or smartboard Elkonin boxes for modeling and individual Elkonin boxes for each student; letter manipulatives for each child and magnetic or smartboard letters for teacher: e, c, d, k, n, o, p, r, s, t; list of spelling words on poster or whiteboard to read: 2—[ode], 3—[mote, bat, rose, cape, vote, hope], 4—[stroke, stove]; decodable text: Rose’s Birthday and assessment worksheet.

Procedures:

1. Say: In order to become expert readers we need to learn the code that tells us how to pronounce words. We have already learned to read shore vowel words with o, like hop, and today we are going to learn about long O and the silent e signal that is used to make O say its name, /O/. When I say /O/ I think of a man with a really big nose. [Show the man with the nose picture].

 

2. Say: Before we learn about the spelling of /O/, we need to listen for it in some words. When I listen for /O/ in words, I hear o say its name /O/ and my lips scrunch together and make a little o shape like this. [Make vocal gesture for /O/.] I’ll show you first: dome. I heard o say its name and I felt my lips make a little o [make a circle motion around pursed lips]. There is a long O in dome. Now I’m going to see if it’s in tool. Hmm, I didn’t hear o say its name and my lips didn’t scrunch up together and make a round little o. Now you try. If you hear /O/ say, “Homer with the nose.” If you don’t hear /O/ say, “That’s not it.” Is it in bow, chain, stamps, tote, nose, eyes? [Have children make a circle motion around their pursed lips when they feel /O/ say its name.]

 

3. Say: Now let’s look at the spelling of /O/ that we’ll learn today. One way to spell /O/ is with the letter o and a silent e at the end of the word to tell me to say O’s name. [Write o_e on the board.] This blank line here means there is a consonant after o, and at the end of the word there is a little silent e. What if I want to spell spoke? “If I spoke to the baby quietly, she’d stop crying.” Spoke means to say something in this sentence. To spell spoke in letterboxes, first I need to know how many phonemes I have in the word, so I stretch out and count :/s//p//O//k/. I need 4 boxes. I heard that /O/ just before the /k/ so I’m going to put an o in the 3rd box and the silent e outside the last box. The word starts with/s/, that’s easy; I need a s. now it gets a little tricky so I’m going to say it slowly /s//p//o//k/. I heard the /p/ right after the /s/.

 

s    p    o    k    e

 

 

4. Say: Now I’m going to have you spell some words in letterboxes. You’ll start with two boxes for ode. An ode is a kind of poem or song, “My teacher read us a long ode right before nap time.” What should go in the first box? [Respond to children’s answers]. What goes in the second box? What about silent e, did you remember to put it outside the boxes? I’ll check your spelling while I walk around the room. [Observe progress.] You’ll need three letterboxes for the next word. Listen for the beginning sound that goes in the first box. Then listen for /O/ and don’t forget to put the signal silent e at the end, outside the boxes. Here’s the word: rose, I picked a red rose today, rose. [Allow children to spell words.] Time to check your work. Watch how I spell it in my letterboxes on the board: r—o—s—e and see if you’ve spelled it the same way. Try another one with three boxes: vote; I had to vote today. [Have volunteer spell it in the letterbox on the front board for children to check their work. Repeat this step for each new word.] Next word. Listen to see if this word has /O/ in it before you spell it: sock; try and help me match this sock. Did you need a silent e? Why not? Right, because we don’t hear o say its name. We spell it with our short vowel o. [volunteer spells it on the front board.] Did you remember to spell /k/ with a ck? Now let’s try 4 phonemes: stove; the stove held two dishes. One more then we’re done with spelling, and this time you need five boxes: stroke; If I stroke the kitten, she’ll purr. Remember to stretch it out to get this tough word.

 

5. Say: Now I am going to let you read the words you’ve spelled, but first I’ll show you how I would read a tough word. [Display poster with stroke on the top and model reading the word.] First I see there’s a silent e on the end; that’s my signal that the vowel will say its name. There’s the vowel o. It must say /O/. I’m going to use a cover-up to get the first part. [Uncover and blend sequentially before the vowel, then blend with the vowel.] /s//t/ = /st/ + /r/ = /str/. Now I’m going to blend that with /O/ = /strO/. Now all I need is the end, /k/ = /strOk/. Stroke; that’s it. Now it’s your turn, everyone together. [Have children read words in unison. Afterwards, call on individuals to read one word on the list until everyone has had a turn.]

 

6. Say: You’ve done a great job and reading words with our new spelling for /O/=o_e. Now we are going to read a book called Rose’s Birthday. This is a story about a mole named Rose who is excited about her birthday. She gets a letter in the mail from her friends who want her to come skating with her. Rose gets on the bus to go to her friend’s house; lets read more to see what happens. We can pair up and take turns reading Rose’s Birthday to find out what happens next. [Children pair up and take turns reading alternate pages each while teacher walks around the room monitoring progress. After individual paired reading, the class rereads Rose’s birthday aloud together, and stops between page turns to discuss the plot.]

 

7. Say: That was a neat story. What happened on Rose’s birthday? Right, her friends surprised her and they went skating for her birthday. They gave her a bracelet and had cake. Before we finish up with our lesson about one way to spell /O/ = o_e, I want to see how you can solve a reading problem. On this worksheet, we have pictures and words. Your job is to match to correct word to the matching picture. Make sure to go back over your answers. [Collect worksheets to evaluate individual child progress.]


 

Resources:

 

Decodable text: https://www.readinga-z.com/book/decodable.php?id=43

Assessment worksheet:http://www.education.com/worksheet/article/long-o-words/

 

https://sites.google.com/site/mscordovasmanycuriosities/mrs-mcgee-s-research-based-reading-lessons/beginning-reading

http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/

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