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Slimy, Slithering Snake S

An Emergent Literacy Design

By Maggie Cox 

 

Rationale:

This lesson will help children identify /s/, the phoneme represented by S. Students will learn to recognize phoneme, /s/, by learning a representation of a slithering snake and the letter symbol, S, practice finding /s/ in words, and apply phoneme awareness with /s/ in phonetic cue reading.

 

Materials:

Primary paper, pencil, and crayons; poster of “Some snakes seem to slither slowly” tongue tickler; J. Gordon’s Six Sleepy Sheep (Puffin Books, 1991); word cards with SAT, SAD, SEEM, and SEND; assessment worksheet

 

Procedures:

  1. Say: The alphabet is like a secret code. In order to read words, we have to learn what each letter stands for by learning the different sounds they can make. When we make the letter sounds, called phonemes, our mouth moves a certain way. Let’s look at the letter S. S looks and sounds like a slimy, slithery, snake. Watch my mouth as I make a snake sound like S. What shape does it make when I say /s/?

  2. Can you sound like a snake? Let’s so our best snake interpretation and put our hands together and slither them back and forth while sounding like the letter S. Do you notice how your mouth feels when you say /s/, /s/, /s/? Your lips are apart, but your teeth are together, and you blow air out between your top teeth and lower lip.

  3. Now, I’m going to see if I can hear /s/ in the word mask. I’m going to stretch out mask in very slow motion and listen for a slithering snake. Mmm-a-a-a-sss-k. Slower: Mmmmm-a-a-a-a-ssssssss-k. There it was! I felt my teeth touch and air blow past my bottom lip when I said /s/ in mask.

  4. Let’s try a tongue twister [see poster]. “Some snakes seem to slither slowly.” Everybody say it three times together. Let’s say it again, and this time, stretch the /s/ at the beginning of the words. “Sssssome sssssnakess ssssseem to sssssslither sssslowly.” Let’s say it one more time, and this time let’s say /s/ separately from the rest of the word: “/s/ ome /s/ nakes /s/ lither /s/ lowly.”

  5. [Have students take out primary paper and pencil]. We use letter S to spell /s/. Capital S looks like the daddy snake and lowercase S looks like the baby snake. Let’s draw the baby lowercase snake first. We’re going to put our pencil just below the fence and make a c. Then, we’re going to keep our pencil going and make a backwards c at the sidewalk. Now, let’s make the uppercase, daddy snake by starting with our pencil just below the rooftop and make a c that goes to the fence, just like before. Now, we’re going to keep drawing and make that backwards c that goes from the fence to the sidewalk. I’m going to walk around and see if everyone’s S’s look like snakes. While I’m doing that, I want you to work on writing 5 more uppercase S’s & 5 more lowercase S’s.

  6. Ask students if they hear /s/ sun or cloud. Sand or mud? Go or stop? First or third? Say: Let’s see if you can spot the mouth move /s/ in these words. Slither your hands like a snake if you hear /s/: The, silly, slimy, snail, crawled, into, the, sunshine.

  7. Say: “Now we’re going to read an alphabet book about six sleepy sheep who try using /s/ to fall asleep. How in the world do they do that? [Read book]. So, how did the sheep use /s/ to help them fall asleep? They tried slurping soup, telling stories, singing, and what else? I want you to come up with one other way these sheep could try to fall asleep using the letter S and draw a picture describing it.

  8. Show SAD and model how to decide if it is sad or mad: The S tells me to slither like a snake /s/, so I know that this word is sss-a-a-a-d, sad. You try some: SAT: sat or mat? SEEM: seem or team? SEND: send or mend?

 

Assessment:

Students complete worksheet by coloring the pictures of objects that begin with S and practice writing the letter to complete the words.

 

References:

Faculty and students at Auburn University, Hand Gestures for Phonemes,             http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/gestures.html

 

Gordon, J. (1991). Six sleepy sheep. New York: Puffin Books, 24.

 

Johnson, Jacquelyn, Breath Like a Dog With "H", https://sites.google.com/site/jjreadinglesson/home/breather-like-a-dog-with-h

 

Assessment Worksheet: http://www.kidzone.ws/kindergarten/s-begins2.htm

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