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I Ate a Piece of Cake!
Beginning Reading
By: Kaitlyn Barnes

 

Rationale: This lesson teaches students about the long vowel correspondence a_e=/A/. For students to be able to read, they must learn to recognize the spellings that map out the pronunciation of words. This lesson will teach children how to spell, recognize, and read words that have the spelling correspondence a_e. They will learn a meaningful representation (I ate a piece of cake), they will spell and read words containing the spelling a_e=/A/ in a letterbox lesson, and they will read a decodable book that incorporates the correspondence as well.

 

Materials:

  • Picture of a cake

  • White board (one for each student and one for the teacher)

  • Letterbox squares made from construction paper (one set for each student)

  • Letter tiles for students (students can share these)

  • Letters needed: a, b, c, e, h, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, z

  • List of words on white board to read: ate, maze, rake, shape, plane, brake, scrape, cake

  • Decodable book: “Late Kate”

 

Procedures
1. Teacher says: “In order to become expert readers we need to learn the code that tells us how to pronounce words. We have already covered short vowels, such as a, e, i, o, and u. Today, we are going to learn about the long “a” and silent “e”. The silent “e” is what allows “a” to say its name! When a_e is in a word, it reminds me of a time I ate a yummy piece of cake! What is your favorite flavor of cake? Now, we are going to bake a cake all together!

 

2. Teacher says: “Before we start learning about the spelling of /A/, we need to practice hearing it in some words. When I am listening for the /A/ sound in words, I hear the “A” say its name “/A/,” and my mouth makes a shape like this (Make the vocal gesture for /A/). My tongue stays behind my bottom teeth, and it allows me to let out the long /A/ sound. This time, watch me say a word. I am going to show you by saying the word: . Didn’t you hear “a” say its name in the word ? I also felt my mouth move to make the “a” sound. This means that there is a long “a” in cake. Now I am going to see if I hear the long “a” in another word: car. I don’t think I heard “a” say its name, did you? That means that there is not a long “a” in car. Now it’s your turn to try! If you hear /A/, say “I ate a piece of cake!” If you do not hear the long /A/, say “No, I did not eat a piece of cake.” Is the long “a” in

 

3. Teacher says: “Now let’s look at the spelling of /A/. A way to spell /A/ is by using the letter “a” and the signal “e” at the very end of the word. This silent “e” lets me know that I need to say “A’s” name. (Put a_e on the board). This blank line between the “a” and “e” means that there is a letter in between them (a consonant). Let’s look at an example. What if I want to spell the word “The plane was flying high in the sky.” If I wanted to spell in my letterboxes, I would have to figure out how many phonemes there are in the word. I will sound out the word by stretching it out. I know that the word starts with /p/, so that means I need a “P” at the beginning. I am going to say it again but very slowly: /p/ ---/l/--- /a/--- /n/--- /e/. It sounds like there is an /l/ sound after the /p/ sound, so I will put an “l” right after the “p” in the letterboxes. Since we already have our long “a” and silent e in their correct places, I am missing one more letter. If we listen closely, I think that sound is /n/ which means that we are missing the letter “n” from the word

 

 

4. Teacher says: “Now I’m going to have you spell some words in letterboxes! You will start with some shorter words beginning with ate. We will use two boxes for ate. We use ate to talk about the past tense of eat. You can use it in a sentence by saying, “We ate hotdogs for dinner last night.” Think about the word ate, what do you think should go in the first box? (Respond accordingly to the students answer). What do you think goes in the second box? Do you all remember the silent “e”? Where do you think that should go? Does it need to go outside of the letterboxes, or does it also go in a letterbox? I will check what you all have put on your papers (walk around room and check every student’s work). Now, you will need to add one more letterbox for this word. Remember to listen for the sound that will go at the beginning of the word. Then listen for our /A/ sound and then put the silent signal e at the end of the word, outside of the boxes. The new word we are going to look at is maze. Have any of you ever completed a maze? It is a lot of fun to go through a maze! Now let’s spell it. “I walked through a corn maze with my friends.” (Give students enough time to spell it.) Now let’s check our work! Watch how I spell maze in my letterboxes on the board. (Model on white board), M---a---z---e. Did you spell it the same way? Let’s try another one with three letterboxes. This word will be rake. “I have to rake up all the leaves in the yard.” (Give the children time to try to spell the word). Time to check our work. (Have a student volunteer to spell it using the letterboxes on the board). (Repeat this step for each new word), Now we have a new word. Let’s listen to see if this word says /A/ in it before we spell it. This word is big. (Say it in a sentence) “I have a big dog.” Do you think we need the silent signal e at the end of this word? No. Why not? This is because we spell big with the short vowel “i”. (Have one student volunteer to spell big on the board). Now, let’s try a word with 4 phonemes and 4 boxes: brake. “You must hit the brake when stopping at a stop sign!” Remember, you can stretch out any of the words to help you figure them out.”

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5. Teacher Says: “Now I’m going to let you read the words that you’ve spelled. First, I am going to show you how I would read a tricky word. (Show the board with the word scrape on top and model reading it). First, I see there is a silent e on the end. That is my signal that “a” will say its name. The vowel in the word is “a”, so it must be /A/. I am going to use my cover up critter to get the first part. (Uncover and blend sequentially before the vowel, then blend the vowel). /s/+/c/+/r=/scr/. Now I am going to blend that with /A/, this will give me /Scra/. Now all I need to finish the word is the end. At the end it is /p/, which makes it say= /scrape/. Scrape, that is the word! Now I want you to try. We are all going to say the words together!” (Have the children read the words together. Afterwards, call on individual students to read one word on the list until every student has had a turn.)

 

6. Teacher says: “All of you have done an outstanding job with reading words with the vowel correspondence /A/, which is a_e. Now, we are going to read a book called “Late Kate.” In this story, there is a girl named Kate who never wants to be late. She races to be the winner in sports, and she even races in her baking. Will she be able to race in everything she does? Let’s read the book and see what happens! I am going to put you in groups of two and you will take turns reading “Late Kate.” (The teacher will put children into pairs. While students are reading, the teacher will walk around monitor their progress. After everyone has finished their shared reading, the class will read “Late Kate” together.

 

7. Teacher asks questions about “Late Kate”: What did Kate do at the baseball game? What did she stop and do while baking? Why do you think Kate never wants to be late? (The whole class will discuss the questions and answers together). Now to finish up our lesson on a_e=/A/, we are going to complete worksheet. On this worksheet, there is a word bank with words that have a_e=/A/ and a=/a/ as well. Read each word very carefully and if it makes the a_e=/A/ sound, write it inside the acorn. If the word makes the a=/a/ sound, write it inside the apple. (After all students are finished, the teacher will correct the worksheets and evaluate each student on their progress).

 

References:

https://mwh0025.wixsite.com/mwh0025/beginning-reading

Worksheet: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Short-A-vs-Long-A-WorksheetAssessment-3002076?st=c4861b81ed3c67e5a87bc7cce6f78442

Book: “Late Kate” by Suzanne I. Barchers

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