State the Objective
Tell the children that they will dip and dunk the letter D in dirt as they recognize and name the uppercase letter D and lowercase d.

Literacy Activities
Dip and dunk Ds

• Fill one shallow dish with dirt and the other with water. 
• Write and name the uppercase and lowercase letters D and d.
• Help the children write D and d on small pieces of paper while saying the /d/ sound.
• Allow the children to put their Ds in plastic bags.
• Show the children how to dip, dunk, or let their Ds dig deep in the dirt.
• Say, “D loves to dip, dive and dig in dirt.”
• Comment on how the D dug down deep in dirt and got dirty.
• Let the children drop dirt on the D.

Dunk, drip, and dry D

• Show the children how to dip and dunk the D in the water to clean it.
• Let the D drip and then dry the D with a paper towel.
• Make comments:
  • “Dirty D gets dipped and dunked!”
  • “D drips dirty water.”
  • “Dry the D!”

Discover D

• Write words from the activity without the letter D (e.g., _rip, _ry, _ip, _unk, _irt). 
• Have the children fill in the D in each word as they say, “/d/, /d/, /d/, D!”
• Read each word and have the children repeat.