Miss Megan's Lesson Designs

Rationale: This lesson teaches children about the long 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 spelling o. They will learn a meaningful representation (doctor asking a child to say o, o, o), they will spell and read words containing this spelling in a letterbox lesson, and read a decodable book that focuses on the correspondence o= /o/.

Materials: Graphic image of doctor holding a tongue depressor; cover-up critter; whiteboard or smartboard Elkonin boxes for modeling and individual Elkonin letterboxes for each student; letter manipulatives for each child and magnetic or smartboard letters for teacher: b, l, o, p, t, s, r, n, g, c, h, k, f; list of spelling words on poster or whiteboard to read: blob, plot, strong, pop, splotch, crock, frog, crop, hop; decodable text Doc in the Fog, 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 short vowel words with a, like tap, and today we are going to learn about short o. When I say /o/ I think of a little boy opening wide for his doctor to check his throat [show graphic image].

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 the sound /ohh/ and my lips make a wide o shape like this, similar to a yawn. [Make vocal gesture for /o/.] I’ll show you first: hot. I heard o say /ohh/ and I felt my lips make a wide o [make a circle motion around open lips]. There is a short o in hot. Now I’m going to see if it’s in slope. Hmm, I didn’t hear o say /ohh/ and my mouth wasn’t open like a yawn. Now you try. If you hear /o/ say, “oh, oh, oh.” If you don’t hear /o/ say, “That’s not it.” Is it in stop, rain, pants, cot, nose, pots? [Have children make a circle motion around their open lips when they feel /o/ say /ohh/.]

3. What if I want to spell the word stop? “If I stop petting the puppy, he will rub his head on my hand.” Stop means to quit in this sentence. To spell stop in letterboxes, first I need to know how many phonemes I have in the word so I stretch it out and count: /s//t//o//p/. I need 4 boxes. I heard that /o/ just before the /p/ so I’m going to put an o in the 3rd box. The word starts with /s/, that’s easy; I need an s. Now it gets a little tricky so I’m going to say it slowly, /s//t//o//p/. One more before the /o/, I think I heard /t/ so I’ll put a t right after the s. I have one empty box now. [Point to letters in boxes when stretching out the word: /s//t//o//p/.] The missing one is /p/.

Now I’ll show you how I would read an /o/ word. [Display poster with stop on the top and model reading the word.]  I’m going to start with the o; that part says /o/. Now I’m going to put the beginning letters with it: s-t-_-p, /sto/. Now I’ll put that chunk together with the last sound, /sto-p/. Oh, stop, like “My teacher asked me to stop.”

4. Say: Now I’m going to have you spell some words in letterboxes. You’ll start out easy with two boxes for ox. An ox is a kind of cow with horns, “Our teacher read us a Western story about a cowboy and an ox.” You’ll need three letterboxes for the next word. Listen for the beginning sound to spell in the first box. Then listen for /o/. Here’s the word: not, I will not run in the race on Sunday.; not. [Allow children to spell remaining words, giving sentences for each word: rot, rock, spot, mop, and pot.] 

5. Say: Now I am going to let you read the words you’ve spelled. [Show the words rot, rock, spot, mop, and pot, the extra words stove and frost, and the pseudoword prog. 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. Now we are going to read a book called Doc in the Fog. This is a story of a wizard named Doc who can turn objects into different things. He has so much fun with his magic wand, it gets him into trouble! Let’s read Doc in the Fog together, stopping between page turns to discuss the story. [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 Doc in the Fog aloud together, and stops between page turns to discuss the plot.]

7. Say: Before we finish up with our lesson about one way to spell /o/ = o, I want to see how you can solve a reading problem. Read each sentence with the missing word and choose from the list above which and if an /o/ word can complete the sentence. Reread your answers to see if they make sense. [Collect worksheets to evaluate individual child progress.]

Resources:

Assessment worksheet: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B0SPeY_PyGOodUNoaU0wSjhYdXc/edit

Doc in the Fog by Shelia Cushman; Educational Insights, Carson CA, 1990

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

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