Stay Sneaky Says the Snake
Emergent Literacy
Rationale:
This lesson will
help children identify /s/, the phoneme represented by S. Students will
learn how to recognize /s/
in written and spoken words by learning the meaningful representation, doing a
slithering hand motion and saying 'sssssss'. Students will practice this skill
by doing the hand gesture every time they hear or read /s/ in a given word list.
Materials:
primary paper and pencil, Bear Snores On by Karma Wilson, word list with
bake, sold, steak, dent, town silly, stop hurry, sit, mad snow, trap, assessment
worksheet identifying pictures with /s/ (URL link below)
Procedures:
1. Say:
"Did you know our written language is a secret code? It is very important to
learn this code to learn the sound of each letter in the code. Today we are
going to learn that the letter S makes a /s/ noise and learn a fun hand gesture
to help remember the symbol."
2. "Now
let's make the /s/ sound. The /s/ sound sounds like a snake slithering, so every
time we hear the sound in a word we are going to put our hands together and
slither them like a snake." After demonstrating the motion and having the
students do it a few times while saying 'sneaky snake' tell them they are very
good at learning this new sound.
3. "Now
let's figure out what our mouth is doing when we are saying this letter. Do you
feel your tongue as you say 'snake' very slowly? Your mouth is stretched out
wide and your tongue is pushed forward to make a hissing noise like a snake! Say
'SSSSSSSS-nake'. Can you feel your mouth stretched and tongue pushed forward?
That is how we make the /s/ noise!
4. "We
are going to learn a tongue twister together to better learn the symbol sound of
S. 'Silly Sally the Snake was Sore on Saturday.' Now, let's all say it together
and slither our hands like snakes when we hear the /s/ sound. 'ssssssilly
ssssssally the ssssnake wasssss ssssssore on sssssaturday' good job! Now, we are
going to say the tongue twister together a few more times to really hear that
/s/ sound.
5.
Have the students take out a piece of paper and their pencils in order to
practice writing the s. "Now that we know what the letter S sounds like we need
to practice writing the letter so we can recognize it on paper!" Write a big
letter S on the board so all the students can see it. "The letter S not only
sounds like a snake, but it looks like a snake too! That should make it easy for
you to recognize it! I want you to all write a lowercase s on your paper. To do
that, you start at the belt of mr.bear and make a tiny c about halfway down to
the boots. Then you swing the c back around the other way to finish the lower
case s. Once you have written your s raise your hand and I will come stamp your
paper and you can sit at your seat and write 5 more little s's on your paper."
6. "We
have now learned to write S on our papers! I need everyone to come sit on the
carpet so we can go through a list of words and make our slithering hand gesture
whenever we hear /s/ in words. I am going to say 2 words and hold up a card with
the word on it and I want you to listen really good to see which word has the
/s/ sound in it or recognize the S symbol and repeat it back to me while doing
your slithering snake hand motion. Ready? 'do you hear /s/ in bake or sold?
Steak or dent? Town or silly? Stop or hurry? Sit or mad? Snow or trap?"
7. "You
guys are great at hearing the /s/ noise! We are going to read a short book now.
Whenever you hear the sound we have been practicing 'sssssss' I want you to do
the new hand motion we learned that looks like a snake! Our book is called:
Bear Snores On by Karma Wilson.
8.
Book talk:
One by one, different animals and birds find their way into Bear's cozy cave.
They make different kinds of snacks and treats to keep themselves from being in
the cold. But even after they make all of their yummy snacks, bear continues to
snore! Let's read and find out what happens when bear wakes up to a cave full of
uninvited friends.
9. After
reading the book I will have the students head back to their seats in order to
do a worksheet for assessment that will show just how well the students have
learned the new sound/symbol. The worksheet
http://www.kidzone.ws/kindergarten/s-begins1.htm is simple enough for this
level of students.
References:
Assessment worksheet:
http://www.kidzone.ws/kindergarten/s-begins1.htm
Murray,
Bruce. Teaching Letter Recognition.
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/letters.html
Wilson,
Karma. (2002). Bear Snores On. New York: Simon & Schuster.