I Love to Eat Apples!
By: Jessica Haffarnan
Rationale: This lesson is designed to provide the child with a visible and audible sound representation in hopes of giving the child a tool to use in later reading. Getting the child to act as if they are biting into an apple would give the children recognition of the a=/a/ sound. It would also be possible to provide a symbol so the child could absorb and remember the a=/a/ correspondence.
- A graphic showing an individual biting into an apple.
-Primary paper and pencil
-Index cards with tongue twister on them: Andrew and Alice asked if Annie's active animals were angry (Wallach and Wallach's Tongue Twisters)
-Pictures of: apples, bananas, ants, rats, rabbits
-Work sheet with some pictures of things that have the /a/ sound in them such as apples, cats, and students napping. They will also contain pictures of a moon, pigs, and frogs, children will have to distinguish between the /a/ sound and other sounds.
-Copy of "A Cat Nap" from the Phonics Readers series
Importance: A=/a/ is a common correspondence which is an important starter correspondence. It will help the child build up to other phonemes.
1. Show the picture of biting into an apple.
2. Ask child if she can remember how they hold their mouth when they are biting into an apple. Discuss the a=/a/ sound.
3. See if child knows any other words that have that /a/ sound.
4. Ask child to act like they are biting into an apple every time she sees that /a/ sound.
5. Read and lay out the tongue twister and ask child to repeat the tongue twister back.
6. After saying it back, have child do gesture every time they see the /a/ sound.
7. Get out paper and pencil and ask child to write the letter "a." Explain that you start just below the fence, then go a little out and come down to the sidewalk, then go back up to just below the fence and draw a straight line down to the sidewalk.
8. Show child the pictures. Tell her that we are going to play a game, I am going to show you a picture and you tell me if you hear the /a/ sound in it, and if you do, then stretch it out for me to hear.
9. Give child sheet with pictures on it and ask child to circle the picture that has the /a/ as in biting into an apple sound. This can be used as the assessment.
Dr. Bruce Murray's website Reading Genie. http://www.auburn.edu/rdggenie/
Kathryne Clark. Max's Magic Magnets. http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/invent/clarkel.html
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