Singing Ahh
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Rationale: This lesson teaches about the short vowel correspondence o=/o/. In order to be able to read, children must learn to recognize the spellings that map word pronunciations. In this lesson, children will learn to recognize, spell and read words containing the short vowel o. They will learn this by opening their mouth like singer when they sing ahh. They will spell and read words with this spelling in a letterbox lesson and read a decodable book that focuses o the correspondence o=/o/.
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Materials: Image of people singing, cover-up critter, smartboard, individual letter boxes for each student, letters: s, o, c, k, t, p, h for each student, words on poster: sock, hot, top, cost, text A Hot Spot, assessment worksheet
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Procedures:
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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 short vowel a (like in hat) and e (like in get) Today we are going to learn about short o that says ahhh in the /o/. When I say /o/ I like to think of a group of people all singing out ahhh. (Show picture of people singing)
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Say: Before we learn the spelling of /o/, we need to listen for it in words. When I am listening for /o/ I listen for the ahh sound whenever my mouth makes a circle like this. (Show what your mouth looks like as you are saying /o/.) Watch how my mouth looks as I say /o/ in hop. You hear the ahh sound because there is an o in the word hop. Whatabout in the word get? Nope, we don’t hear ahh and our mouths don’t make a circle. Let’s try out some other words and if you hear ahh hold up a big O with your arms. (Use words map, pot, rock).
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Say: Now let’s look at the spelling of /o/ that we’re learning today. To spell /o/ we start at the dotted line make a circle that goes down to our full line and goes all the way back to the dotted line at the beginning. (Write /o/ on primary paper guidelines on the board and show video of o being written). What if I want to spell the word sock? “My dog stole my sock!”. To spell sock in letterboxes, first stretch the word and let’s count /s/ /o/ /ck/ and we will need 3 boxes. In the first box, we’ll put s because first we hear /s/. After that I hear /o/ so we will put an o and then you hear k which is made up of /ck/ so they go inthe last boxes.
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Say: Now, let’s spell some words in our letterboxes. We will start out with the word top.
Who in here can top? (Let students point to the very top of their heads while saying top) So, what letter should go in our first letterbox? (Let students put the letter in the first box) Now what should go in our second letterbox? (Give time again and let them put the second letter in the letterbox) What goes in the last letterbox? (Give time for students to complete spelling dog in their letterbox, check the work and move on) Now, we are going to do another word. Remember to listen for the different word parts and for /o/ when you hear ahh. The next word is hot. “It is so hot today”. You will need three letterboxes again. (Give students time to work on their own and then say) Watch how I spell it in my letterboxes h-o-t. (Check work and move on) Now let’s try a 4-phoneme word. The word is cost, “How much does that cost?”. Listen for the ahh sound and put cost into your letterboxes. (Give students time to put the letters in their letterboxes and check them).
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Say: Now, I am going to let you read the words we’ve spelled, but first I am going to show you how I would read a tough word. (Show word sock and model reading the word). The first thing I see is the o in this word. When I read this word, the o will sound like /o/. Let’s use our cover up critter to get the first part. (Uncover and blend /s/ and then blend it with the vowel /o/) Now I am going to finish the end and blend /do/ with /ck/ which makes dock. Now, it’s your turn! (Students read words together. Give students a chance to read the words and call on students to model how to blend the word together).
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Say: You all have done such a great job reading and spelling our new short vowel /o/. Now we are going to read a fun book called A Hot Spot. This story starts out with mom being very hot while she’s doing yard work out in the sun. Dad, Jan and Tim all try to help mom get cool, but then Tim does something that doesn’t help!! What did Tim do and what will happen to Tim now? To find out, let’s pair up and take turns reading the book. (Pair students up and make sure that they are alternating back and forth between pages) Now that we have all read, let’s come back together and we will read the story all together. (While reading, stop and talk about what is happening in the story).
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That was such a fun story! What part did you think was the funniest? (Let students share to each other what they liked the most). You all have done so good today learning about /o/. Before we finish, let’s do a worksheet to see how well we know o=/o/. (Students get handout of worksheet and complete individually and then worksheet will be pulled up on the board to be completed interactively as a whole group).
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Resources:
Murray, Bruce and Geri. A Hot Spot.
Caroline Douglas, Open Up For The Dentist: https://czd0051.wixsite.com/mysite/beginning- reading
Assessment Worksheet: https://www.liveworksheets.com/worksheets/en/English_Language_Arts_(ELA)/Phonics/Short _Vowel_Sound_O_hf784672ga
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