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Emergent Literacy Design: Getting Ready to Eat with M

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rationale: This lesson will help children identify /m/, the phoneme represented by M. Students will learn to read /m/  and identify it in spoken words. They will learn this by the representation of a person getting excited to eat and pursing their lips together. They will practice finding /m/ in words and apply phoneme awareness with /m/ in phonetic cue reading by distinguishing rhyming words from the beginning letters.

 

Materials: Primary paper and pencil; Are You My Mother by P.D. Eastman; Word cards with MAKE, MIX, MAY, TELL, PORT, AND MOTHER; Worksheet for identifying pictures that end in /m/ (website below); Chart with tongue tickler: “On Mondays Michael's mother Mary mostly mopped.”

 

Procedures. 1: Say: Our written language is a secret code. The tricky part is learning what the letters stand for- the mouth moves we make say words. Today we are going to work on spotting the mouth move /m/. We spell /m/ with letter M. M sounds like the noise you make when you are excited to eat something.

 

2. Let’s pretend we are about to eat our favorite food. /m/, /m/, /m/.  Notice where your lips are (show lips touching each other). When we say /m/ our lips touch each other.

 

3. Let me show you how to find /m/ in the word may.  I’m going to stretch may out in super slow motion and listen for the sound /m/ makes. Mmm-ay. Slower: Mmmmm-ay. There it was! I felt my lips touch each other. It sounds like I’m excited to eat!

 

4. Let’s try a tongue twister [on chart]. “On Mondays Michael’s mother Mary mostly mopped.” Everybody say it three times together. Now say it again, and this time, stretch the /m/ at the beginning of the words. “On Mmmmondays Mmmmichael’s mmmother Mmmmary mmmostly mmmmopped.” Try it again and this time break it off the word: “On /m/ondays /m/ichael’s /m/other /m/ary /m/ostly /m/opped.”

 

5. [Have students take out primary paper and pencil]. We use letter M to spell /m/. I want you to write both a capitol m, and a lower case m. I will show you how to write it first. They children will then try on their own. I will walk around to help and monitor students.  After I put a sticker on it, I want you to make it nine more just like it.

 

6. Call on students to answer and tell how they knew: Do you hear /m/ in mansion or house? Make or tear? Mix or separate? Mop or sweep? Say: Let’s see if you can spot the mouth move /m/ in some words. Purse your lips if you hear /m/: The, monkey, may, take, muscles, from, the, moon.

 

7. Say: “Let’s look at a book. The author tells use about a bird looking for someone who’s name starts with an /m/. Can you guess who it is? Read the first few pages. Ask the children if they can think of other words with /m/. Ask them to make up a silly creature name like Mopping May Moon. Then have each student write their silly name with invented spelling and draw a picture of their silly creature. Display their work.

 

8. Show MAY and model how to decide if it is may or say: The M tells me to put my lips together, so this word is mmm-ay, may. You try some: MIX: fix or mix? FEET: feet or meet? MIND: find or mind?

 

9. For assessment, distribute worksheet. Students are to complete the partial spellings and color the pictures that end in M. Call students individually to read the phonetic cue words from step #8.

 

 

Reference: Moore, Katy. Emergent Literacy Design: “Mmmmm for Muffins”. https://sites.google.com/site/katymooreresearchbasedreading/emergent-literacy

Assessment worksheet: http://www.kidzone.ws/prek_wrksht/learning-letters/m2.htm

 

Back to the connections site: http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/connections.html

 

 

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