Reading Lesson #2

Reading Lesson Plan # 2

Rationale (What evidence do you have that your focus students need to learn this skill/strategy?): My mentor teacher told me that these students are getting much better at sounding out words, but they need more practice with blends. The students have almost mastered isolating sounds in the word as well as sounding out words they don’t recognize, but they get hung up when it comes to “R blends” and “L blends.”
Objective for this lesson (performance, condition, criteria): Students will be required to identify the different blends, say the sound they make, as well as recognize words that contain the blend at the beginning of the word. Students will have to participate individually and in unison depending on the instructions.
Materials & supplies needed: index cards with blends written on them, the two different blends worksheets from havefunteaching.com, pencils

Procedures and approximate time allocated for each event 
• Introduction to the lesson: I will start by telling the students that we are going to practice recognizing the beginning sounds of a word. I will explain that sometimes more than one letter can be used to create a beginning sound. I will also explain that being able to recognize these sounds will help them when they read or write. I will say: “We are going to do a few activities to help you with reading and writing. We are going to practice reading the beginning of words, but the words we will be using will have blends at the beginning, meaning you will have to blend more than one letter together to make the beginning sound.” (2 minutes) 

• OUTLINE of key events during the lesson: First, I will start the lesson by showing the students 3 index cards with the blends I want them to learn. For the first part, they will be shown the blends CR, DR, and BR. I will lay the cards down one at a time and ask the students individually if they know what sound those letters make when they are put together. After we have identified the sounds, I will show the cards one at a time and have the students say in unison what the sounds are. After I see that the students know the sound that each blend makes, I will move on to the second part. At the start, I will say, “Who can tell me what the two letters are on the card?” “What sound do these letters make when you put them together?” Once we have established the sounds, I will say, “Now I am going to hold up the cards one at a time and we are going to say the sounds together. By the end, we should be able to do it pretty fast.” I will also make my behavior expectations very clear by saying, “If I call on one of you, that means that the other two should not speak or give away the answer.”

For the second part, I will pass out a worksheet that has 8 different pictures on it. Below each picture, there is a spot for the student to write which blend the word starts with. Students will get their own worksheet, but we will work together. Calling on the students one by one, I will ask them what the picture is. They will be required to say what the picture is and identify the sound at the beginning of the word. Then, I will have them write CR, DR, or BR under each picture, depending on what the word is. I will make sure each student writes the correct blend under the word. I will say, “These worksheets have pictures on it that have these blends at the beginning of the word. Our job is to say what the picture is and identify which blend is at the beginning of the word. After we figure that out, we are going to write it underneath the word so we don’t forget.”
Then, I will repeat both activities again, but with three different blends: PL, BL, and CL.
 (15 minutes)

• Closing summary for the lesson: I will have to students recall the 6 different blends that we learned and what sounds they make. Once we are finished with the activity, I will tell the students to put these worksheets in their box and refer back to them for reading and writing if they have trouble again. (2 minutes)

Ongoing-Assessment: I will ask my mentor teacher if the students have been doing better with their reading/writing in regards to using blends, especially the blends that I taught them. Next time I do a reading group with these students, I will informally assess their progress by looking for blends in the books they read and seeing how well they have mastered the blends.

Adaptations: In this lesson, I want to put a lot of emphasis on calling on the students to answer me. If I open up my questions to all three students, I know my quiet student, Ali, will not participate as much. If I call on the students individually, they must participate in order for me to move on to the next student. Hopefully by working with the same couple of students throughout the whole year, Ali will open up more and be willing to participate. I will also make my behavior expectations very clear so that Jordan will not misbehave.