EMERGENT LITERACY DESIGN
Emergent Literacy Design
Popping Popcorn with P
Rationale: This lesson will help children identify /p/, the phoneme represented by P. Students will learn to recognize /p/ in spoken words by learning a meaningful representation (popping popcorn) and the letter symbol P, practice finding /p/ in words, and apply phoneme awareness with /p/ in phonetic cue reading by distinguishing rhyming words from beginning letters.
Materials: Primary paper and pencil; chart with “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.”; Dr. Seuss’s Hop on Pop (Random House, 1963); Words cards with HOP, POT, PIN, PLAY, AND PUFF; Assessment worksheet and crayons [worksheet link in the references].
Procedures: 1. Say: Our written language is a secret code. The tricky part is learning what letters stand for- the mouth moves we make as we say words. Today we’re going to work on spotting the mouth move /p/. We spell /p/ with letter P. /P/ sounds like popcorn popping.
2. Let’s imagine we are popping popcorn. Let’s make the popping sound the popcorn makes, /p/,/p/,/p/. [Pantomime popping by moving hands into a tight fist then spreading them out to reveal your palms.] Do you notice what happens to your lips? (Lips come together.) When we say /p/, we blow air out when our lips move apart.
3. Let me show you how to find /p/ in the word mop. I’m going to stretch mop out in super slow motion and listen for the sound of the popcorn popping. Mmm-o-o-p. Slower: Mmm-o-o-o-p-p-p. There it was! I felt my lips come together then when they came apart I blew air. I can feel the popping popcorn /p/ in mop.
4. Let’s try a tongue twister [on chart]. Peter lived on a farm. He loved to help his mom pick peppers. “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.” Everybody say it three times together. Now say it again, and this time, stretch the /p/ at the beginning of the words. “Pppeter Pppiper pppicked a pppeck of pppickled pppeppers.” Try it again, and this time break it off the word: “/p/ eter /p/ iper /p/ icked a /p/ eck of /p/ ickled /p/ eppers.”
5. [Have students take out primary paper and pencil.] We use letter P to spell /p/. Let’s make a capital P. Draw a line from the sidewalk all the way to the rooftop. Then make a loop at the rooftop and go all the way around and connecting it to the fence. Let’s write the lowercase p. Draw a line from the bottom of the ditch to the fence. Then make a loop at the fence and go all the way around to the sidewalk. I want to see everyone’s p. After I put a check on it, I want you to make six more like it.
6. Call on students to answer and tell how they knew: Do you hear /p/ in jump or walk? Corn or peas? Lift or drop? Clap or cheer? Bag or purse? Say: Let’s see if you can spot the mouth move /p/ in some words. Pop the popcorn is you hear /p/: The, woman, with, the, purple, purse, painted, a, picture, in, the, park.
7. Say: “Let’s look at an alphabet book. Dr. Seuss tells us about crazy characters and situations in “Hop on Pop.” Read page 1 and 2, drawing out /p/. Ask the children if they can think of other crazy situations that start with /p/ like purple penguins played, or princess peach hoped. Have them spell the crazy situations on primary paper. Display their work.
8. Show HOP and model how to decide if it is hop or hot: The P tells me to pop the popcorn, /p/, so this word is hhh-op, hop. You try some: POT: pot or cot? SIN: pin or sin? PLAY: play or clay? CUFF: puff or cuff?
9. For assessment, distribute the worksheet. Students are to draw lines from each of the pigs to a picture that begins with the sound /p/. Then allow students to color the pictures. Call students individually to read the phonetic cue words from step #8.
Reference:
“Brush Your Teeth with F” by Dr. Bruce Murray
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/sightings/murrayel.html
Assessment worksheet: http://www.kidzone.ws/kindergarten/p-begins1.htm
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/horizons.html
