Oh, That’s What That is?

 

Rationale: This lesson teaches children about the long vowel correspondence oa = /O/. In order to be able to read, children must learn to recognize the spellings that map word pronunciations. In this lesson children will learn to recognize, spell, and read words containing the spelling oa. They will learn a meaningful representation (confused girl saying Oh?), they will spell and read words containing this spelling in a Letterbox lesson, and read a decodable book that focuses on the correspondence oa = /O/.

 

Materials: Graphic image of confused girl saying “oh?”; cover-up critter; whiteboard, Elkonin boxes for modeling and individual Elkonin boxes for each student; letter manipulatives for each child and magnetic or smartboard letters for teacher: b, o, a, t, c, c, h, r, s, l, f, g; list of spelling words on poster or whiteboard to read: boat, coach, roast, loaf, goal, goat, oat; decodable text: The Smoke Scare, and assessment worksheet.

Procedures:

1. Say: In order to become expert readers we need to learn the code that tells us how to pronounce words. We have already learned to read short vowel words with o, like stop, and today we are going to learn about long O and the oa signal that is used to make O say its name, /O/. When I say /O/ I think of a funny little confused girl saying, “oh? That’s what that is!” [show graphic image].

 

2. Say: Before we learn about the spelling of /O/, we need to listen for it in some words. When I listen for /O/ in words, I hear o say its name /O/ and my lips make a little o shape like this. [Make vocal gesture for /O/.] I’ll show you first: coat. I heard o say its name and I felt my lips make a little o [make a circle motion around pursed lips]. There is a long O in coat. Now I’m going to see if it’s in hop. Hmm, I didn’t hear o say its name and my lips didn’t make that round little o. Now you try. If you hear /O/ say, “Oh, That’s What It Is.” If you don’t hear /O/ say, “That’s not it.” Is it in roam, kiss, sunk, bone, slow, socks? [Have children make a circle motion around their pursed lips when they feel /O/ say its name.]

 

3. Say: Now let’s look at the spelling of /O/ that we’ll learn today. One way to spell /O/ is with the letter o and a signal a after the o to tell me to say O’s name. [Write oa on the board.]. When we see oa, we know to say /O/! What if I want to spell the word load? “Mom made us load up all the grocery bags to take in to the house.” Load means to carry in this sentence. To spell load in letterboxes, first I need to know how many phonemes I have in the word so I stretch it out and count: /l//O//d/. I need 3 boxes. I heard that /O/ just before the /d/ so I’m going to put an o in the 2nd  box. The word starts with /l/, that’s easy; I need an l. Now it gets a little tricky so I’m going to say it slowly, /l//O//d/. I think I heard /l/ so I’ll put it right at the beginning before the /O/. Now I think I hear a /d/ sound like someone knocking at the door. /d/, /d/, /d/. Yes, load is exactly how you spell it!! Great job listening to what sounds you heard in the word, load.

 

4. Say: Now I’m going to have you spell some words in letterboxes. You’ll start out easy with three boxes for loan. A loan is something that is borrowed, “Our teacher loaned out pencils during the test.” What should go in the first box? [Respond to children’s answers]. What goes in the second box? What about the silent a after the o, did you remember to put it after the o? I’ll check your spelling while I walk around the room. [Observe progress.] You’ll need three letterboxes for the next word. Listen for the beginning sound that goes in the first box. Then listen for /O/ and don’t forget to put the signal silent a after the o. Here’s the word: boat, I went to the lake this weekend and rode a boat. [Allow children to spell words.] Time to check your work. Watch how I spell it in my letterboxes on the board: b – o – a – t and see if you’ve spelled it the same way. Try another with three boxes: roast; My mom made roast for lunch, roast. [Have volunteer spell it in the letterbox on the front board for children to check their work. Repeat this step for each new word.] Next word. Listen to see if this word has /O/ in it before you spell it: block; be careful not to knock over your classmates’ blocks. Did you need a silent a after your o? Why not? Right, because we don’t hear o say its name. We spell it with our short vowel o. [volunteer spells it on the front board.] Did you remember to spell /k/ with a ck? Now let’s try 4 phonemes: coach; My dad has always been my soccer coach. Remember to stretch it out to get this tough word.

 

5. Say: Now I am going to let you read the words you’ve spelled, but first I’ll show you how I would read a tough word. [Display poster with throat on the top and model reading the word.] First I see there’s a silent a after the o; that’s my signal that the vowel will say its name. There’s the vowel o. It must say /O/. I’m going to use a cover-up to get the first part. [Uncover and blend sequentially before the vowel, then blend with the vowel.] /t/ /h/ = /th/ + /r/ = /thr/. Now I’m going to blend that with /O/ = /thrO/. Now all I need is the end, /t/ = /thrOt/. Throat; that’s it. Now it’s your turn, everyone together. [Have children read words in unison. Afterwards, call on individuals to read one word on the list until everyone has had a turn.]

 

6. Say: You’ve done a great job and reading words with our new spelling for /O/: oa. Now we are going to read a book called The Smoke Scare. This is a story about a boy named Ben. Ben had to wake up early for school just like you do every morning. Except this morning, he didn’t want to get out of bed. As he was rushing to get ready, he realized he didn’t have a coat and that he had left his in the boat. Ben ran to the boat and found his cat, Scat, and his dog, Lad. What happened when Ben got to the boat? Did he find his coat? Or did he find something else? We’ll have to read to find out!

 

7. Say: That was a fun story. What was the Smoke Scare? Right, Ben’s house caught on fire. What did Nate think was in the boat? Yep, it was his coat! Before we finish up with our lesson about one way to spell /O/ = oa, I want to see how you can solve a reading problem. On this worksheet, we have some words missing. Your job is to look in the box of word choices, and decide which oa word fits best to make sense of this very short story. First try reading all the words in the box, then choose the word that fits best in the space. Reread your answers to see if they make sense. [Collect worksheets to evaluate individual child progress.]

 

 

Resources:

Murray, G. (2004) The Smoke Scare.

Assessment worksheet

 

 

 

Return to Travels Index