Kick with K
An Emergent Literacy Design
By Lauren Dallas
Rationale:
This lesson will help children identify /k/, the phoneme represented by K. Students will learn to recognize /k/ in spoken words by learning a sound analogy (kicking) and the letter symbol K, practice finding /k/ in words, and apply phoneme awareness with /k/ in phonetic cue reading by distinguishing rhyming words from beginning letters.
Materials:
Primary paper and pencil; chart with "Kids kick the king’s kite."; drawing paper and crayons; Dr. Seuss's ABC (Random House, 1963); word cards with KICK, KEY, PIG, KITTEN, BALL, and KID; assessment worksheet identifying pictures with /k/ (URL below).
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 /k/. We spell /k/ with letter K. K looks like it’s kicking, and /k/ sounds like you kicking a door.
2. Let's pretend to kick with our leg, /k/, /k/, /k/. [Pantomime kicking leg out] When we say /k/, the back of our tongue touches the roof of your mouth, and the tip of your tongue goes down behind your lower teeth.
3. Let me show you how to find /k/ in the word snake. I'm going to stretch snake out in super slow motion and listen for my toothbrush. Sss-n-a-a-kkk-e. Slower: sss-n-a-a-a-kkk-e There it was! I felt my teeth touch my lip and blow air. Kicking /k/ is in snake.
4. Let's try a tongue tickler [on chart]. There is a king that the children do not like. The king has a kite, so the kids kick his kite since they think he’s mean. Here’s our tickler: "Kids kick the king’s kite." Everybody say it three times together. Now say it again, and this time, stretch the /k/ at the beginning of the words. "Kkkids kkkick the kkking’s kkkite." Try it again, and this time break it off the word: "/k/ ids /k/ ick the /k/ ing’s /k/ ite.
5. [Have students take out primary paper and pencil]. We use letter K to spell /k/. Capital K looks like it’s kicking its leg out. Let's write the lowercase letter k. Start just below the rooftop. Start by making a little line straight down. Then, start up top and make a diagonal line into the straight line and then do the same thing downwards. I want to see everybody's k. After I put a smile on it, I want you to make nine more just like it.
6. Call on students to answer and tell how they knew: Do you hear /k/ in kind or mean? Kid or child? Help or kick? Work or fun? Skin or bone? Say: Let's see if you can spot the mouth move /k/ in some words. Kick your leg out if you hear /k/: The, kind, kid, skipped, kissing, his, mom, goodnight.
7. Say: "Let's look at an alphabet book. Dr. Seuss tells us about a lot of different words that all start with K!" We’ll read this page, drawing out /k/. Ask children if they can think of other words with /k/. Ask them to make up a silly creature name like Kappy-Kallie-Kenny, or Kelly-Kangaroo. Then have each student write their silly name with invented spelling and draw a picture of their silly creature. Display their work.
8. Show Kite and model how to decide if it is kite or bite: The K tells me to kick, /k/, so this word is kkk-ite, kite. You try some: KID: kid or mid? BIRD: kurd or bird? KIND: kind or mind? KISS: hiss or kiss? HILL: kill or hill?
9. For assessment, distribute the worksheet. Students color the pictures that begin with K. Call students individually to read the phonetic cue words from step #8.
Reference:
Sydney Chapman, Hiss Like a Snake with S
