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GULP A SODA WITH /g/

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An Emergent Literacy Design Lesson

 

Rationale:

This lesson will help children identify /g/, the phoneme represented by G.  Students will learn to recognize /g/ in spoken words by learning a sound analogy (gulping soda) and the letter symbol G, practice finding /g/ in words, and apply phoneme awareness with /g/ in phonetic cue reading by distinguishing rhyming words from beginning letters. 

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Materials:

  • Primary paper and pencil

  • Blank paper (copy paper to draw on)

  • Chart with “Gary’s grandpa got a grey goat”

  • PowerPoint—you will create your own (bullets are in slide order)

    • Animated G and someone gulping a drink

    • Tongue tickler “Gary’s Grandpa Got a Grey Goat”

    • Animation of writing capital G and lowercase g

    • Slides with the words GET, GIVE, GOAT, GROWL, GOOD, and GAME.

  • Goodnight Gorilla by Peggy Rathmann

  • Assignment worksheet

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Procedures:

  1. Say: Each letter in our alphabet is different.  Our mouths move differently to each sound that represents each letter.  Today we are going to learn what our mouth does when we say /g/.  We spell /g/ with the letter G.  Watch as I say /g/.  Your turn!  You say /g/. 

  2. Let’s pretend to gulp some soda, /g/, /g/, /g/ (pretend to put a drink to your mouth and gulp it).  When you say /g/, is your mouth open or closed? (open so you can gulp your soda).  When we say /g/, we push air out, while having our tongue on the roof of our mouth for a short time. 

  3. Let me show you how to find /g/ in the word bug.  I am going to stretch bug out in super slow motion.  Listen for the gulping sound while I do it.  B-u-u-g-g-g.  Slower: Bbb-u-u-u-u-g-g-g-g.  There it was!  I heard the gulping sound!  Gulping /g/ is in bug.

  4. Let’s try a tongue tickler (on chart).  Gary’s Grandpa Got a Grey Goat.  Gary to got to go see his grandpa at the farm.  There is a garden, a gate, and lots of grass.  His grandpa is the guy who loves animals.  He just got a new animal.  Gary’s grandpa got a grey goat.  Everybody say it three times together.   Now say it again, and this time, stretch the /g/ at the beginning of the words.  “Gggary’s gggrandpa gggot a gggrey gggoat.”  Now this time, separate the parts of the word.  Say the /g/ first then the rest of the word.  “/g/ ary’s /g/ grandpa /g/ ot a /g/ rey /g/ oat.”

  5. (Have the students take out their primary paper and pencil).  We use the letter G to spell /g/.  To make an uppercase G, make a big C and make a line towards the center.  To make a lowercase g, start by making a lowercase a.  Keep moving the line from the fence to the ditch and curl over.  Let me see everyone’s g.  When I have seen it, make nine more just like it. 

  6. Do you hear /g/ in grass or mud?  Red or green?  Go or stay?  Grab or take?  Say: “Let’s see if you can spot the gulping sound /g/ in some words.  Pretend to gulp a soda if you hear /g/ in this sentence: Grace giggled when she got the great present from Garrett. 

  7. Say: Let’s read a book with /g/.  Today, we will be reading Goodnight, Gorilla by Peggy Rathmann.  In this book, the zookeeper is going around and saying goodnight to the animals.  He gets to the gorilla, but the gorilla does not want to go to sleep yet.  He takes the zookeepers keys and follows him around the zoo.  He lets out each animal as the zookeeper says goodnight.  They all follow the zookeeper back to his house.  What do you think will happen?  Will the animals sleep in the zookeeper’s house?  We’ll have to read to find out!

  8. Show GET and model how to decide if it is get or bet.  The G tells me to gulp my soda, /g/, so this word is ggg-et, get.  You try some:  GIVE: give or live?  GOAT: goat or boat?  GROWL: growl or bowl? GOOD: good or hood? GAME: game or same?

  9. For the assessment, distribute the worksheet.  Students trace the letter ‘G’, find the G, color a goat, write ‘goat’, and draw something that begins with ‘G’.

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References:

"Kicking Karate with a K" by Caroline Whitehead

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Assignment Worksheet: https://preschoolmom.com/wp-content/uploads/PMom/AlphabetLetterofWeek/G.pdf

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Book: Rathmann, Peggy. Goodnight, Gorilla. Puffin Books, 2000.

 

 

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