admire the acrobats
Admire the Acrobats
Objective
Associate the uppercase letter A and lowercase letter a with the short /a/ sound as in mat, cat, and can.
Lesson Plan
Target Words:
- app
- admire
- acrobat
- admission
- avenue
- accident
- advise
Materials:
- Video of acrobats performing*
- Letter cards*
- Phone graphic*
- Word blending cards*
- Writing practice page*
*Items included below.
State and Model the Objective
Tell the children that they will pretend to admire an acrobat and then read and write words that start with the letter A and make the short /a/ sound as in apple, act, animal, and acrobat.
Literacy Activities
Admire the acrobats
- Explain to the children that when you admire someone or something, you think they are great.
- Show the children a YouTube clip of acrobats so that they get an idea of what an acrobat does, and encourage them to applaud for the acrobats.
- Write the uppercase letter A and the lowercase letter a on the whiteboard.
- While emphasizing the target sound A, write admire and acrobat on the board and point out that both begin with the letter A sound.
Letter A tickets
- Scatter the letter cards around the room.
- Tell the children that they will be going to an acrobats show, but in order to get in they will have to have to find a letter A card to use as their ticket.
- Have the children search the room for letter A letter cards.
- Every time a child finds the letter A, have the child emphasize the A sound as he or she says, “I found an A ticket for the /a/, /a/, acrobat show!”
Find Acrobat Avenue
- Tell the children that in order to find Acrobat Avenue, they will have to ask an app on their pretend phones.
- After the children have found Acrobat Avenue, let the children use the A ticket to be admitted to (enter) the show.
- Make comments such as, “If you have your A ticket, I’ll admit you to the acrobat show on Acrobat Avenue.”
- Point out that the words avenue, app, and admit start with the letter A while emphasizing the short A sound.
- Let the children admire the acrobats as they watch the YouTube clip again (optional).
Turn your A into an acrobat
- Have the children write the letter A on a sheet of paper, then let them take turns pretending their letter A is an acrobat.
- Have the children use their As to do flips and tricks all while saying things like, “Admire the acrobat,” or “Look at the active acrobat.”
- Remind the other children who are watching that they need to act like a good audience and admire the acrobat performing.
- Have the children stack the A acrobats.
More Practice
Identify, blend, and manipulate sounds
- Have the children wear the letter cards as name tags.
- Have the children walk around the room to find other children to make a word with, and have both children say the word they made out loud.
- With word blending cards, have the children make new words by changing the vowel or either of the consonants:
- Change the beginning sound: pat → mat; ran → fan
- Change the ending sound: man → mat; bat → bag
- Change the middle sound: sat → set; pan → pen; pat → pot; lag → log
Write the target letter
- Help the children write the uppercase letter A and the lowercase letter a.
- Write words on the board that start with the /a/ sound (e.g., acrobat, apple, ant, animal), then have the children draw pictures of them on their paper.
Read More
Standards
SEEL lessons align with Common Core Standards. Please see the standards page for the code(s) associated with this lesson.
http://education.byu.edu/seel/library/
69280
Admire the Acrobats