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Emergent Literacy Design 

Bounce the Ball with Letter B

Beach Ball
Beach Ball

Rationale: This lesson will help children identify /b/, the phoneme represented by B. students will learn to recognize /b/ in spoken words by learning a meaningful representation (bouncing a ball) and the letter symbol B, practice finding /b/ in words, and apply phoneme with /b/ in phonetic cue reading by distinguishing rhyming words from beginning letters.

Materials: Primary paper and pencils; bouncing balls to represent letter B; tongue twister chart with “Brad bakes big batches of brown butter bread”; drawing paper and crayons; Dr. Seuss’s ABC (Random House 1963); word cards with BALL, BOP, BAKE, BILL, BIN; assessment worksheet identifying pictures with /b/.

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Procedures:

1. Say: Today we will be learning about the letter /b/. The tricky part of our language is learning what each letter stands for, and what moves the mouth makes when we say words. Today, we are going to work on spotting how the mouth moves when we say the /b/. We spell /b/ with the letter B. When we say /b/, it sounds like a bouncing ball.

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2. Let’s bounce the balls Miss Young gave you on our desks. Listen to the balls when they bounce and you will hear /b/, /b/, /b/. When we say /b/, our lips come together, and then come apart to push air out of our moth.

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3. Let’s figure out how to find /b/ in the word club. I’m going to stretch out the word club in slow motion. When I do, I want you to listen for the bouncing ball sound /b/. Clll-u-u-u-b-b-b-b. Slower: Clll-u-u-u-b-b-b-b-b-b. Did you hear it at the end? I felt my lips touch and then come apart to push out air to say /b/. I can hear the ball bounce /b/ in club.

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4. Now let’s try a tongue twister (see chart). Brad works at a bakery. At the bakery he bakes bread. Here is our tongue twister: “Brad bakes big batches of brown butter bread.” Now let’s say it three times together. Now, let’s say it again, but this time lets stretch out the /b/ at the beginning of the words. “Bbbbrad bbbakes bbbig bbbatches of bbbbrown bbbbutter bbbbread.” Good job! Now let’s say it again, but this time break the /b/ off of the word: “ /B/rad /b/akes /b/ig /b/atches of /b/rown /b/utter /b/read.”

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5. [Have the students take out primary paper and pencil]. We use the letter B to spell /b/. The letter B looks like the wings on a butterfly. Let’s write the lowercase letter b. Start just below the rooftop, then draw a straight line all the way down to the sidewalk. Lift your pencil, and then draw a backwards c at the fence. Let me see everyone’s b. Once I put a B stamp on your paper, draw nine more b’s just like the first one.

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6. Call on students to answer the questions, then let them tell you how they knew. Say: Do you hear /b/ in pay or ban? blue or red? grow or broom? see or bail? bounce or flower? Let’s see if you can spot the mouth move /b/ in some words. Pretend to bounce your ball when you hear /b/: blow, draw, kick, bake, bird, go, brown, fast, butter.

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7. Say: “Let’s look at a book about the alphabet. In this book Dr. Seuss names things that make the bouncing /b/ sound. Read pages 6 and 7, stressing the /b/ sound. Is there anything at home that has the letter b in it? Write the name of that object and draw a picture of it. I will then display the students’ work as documentation pieces.

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8. Show BOP and model how to decide if it is bop or mop: the B reminds me of the bouncing ball sound, /b/, so the word is bbb-op, bop. Now, let’s try some: BALL: ball or call? BOP: cop or bop? BAKE: rake or bake? BILL: bill or ill? BIN: tin or bin?

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9. I will then hand out the assessment worksheet. Students will draw lines connecting the words that start with the letter /b/  to their pictures. After this, I will individually call on the students to read the phonetic cue words from step 8.

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References:

Assessment Worksheet: https://twistynoodle.com/draw-a-line-from-the-picture-to-the-correct-word-worksheet/

Dr. Seuss’s ABC, Dr. Seuss, Random House Books, 1960.

https://sites.google.com/view/casenyoungemergeldesign/emergent-literacy-design

Insights

http://wp.auburn.edu/rdggenie/home/classroom/insights/

Sarah Jane Brock, Fishing Frenzy.

http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/voyages/brockel.html.

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