EEK! It’s almost Halloween!
A Beginning Reading Lesson
Rationale: This lesson teaches children about the long vowel correspondence ee = /E/. 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 ee. They will learn a meaningful representation (an excited child on Halloween saying EEK!), they will spell and read words containing this spelling in a Letterbox lesson, and read a decodable book that focuses on the correspondence ee = /E/.
Materials: Graphic image of a child excited on Halloween; cover-up critter; whiteboard or smartboard Elkonin boxes for modeling and individual Elkonin boxes for each student; letter manipulatives for each child and magnetic or smartboard letters for teacher: e, s, m, t, d, p, w, k, h, r; list of spelling words on poster or whiteboard to read: see, keep, teeth, pet, street, green; decodable text: Lee and the Team, 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 e, like bet, and today we are going to learn about long E and the double e signal that is used to make E say its name, /E/. When I say /E/ I think of an excited child saying, “EEK! It’s almost Halloween! [Show graphic image].
2. Say: Before we learn about the spelling of /E/, we need to listen for it in some words. When I listen for /E/ in words, I hear ee say its name /E/ and my lips spread out big from side to side and don’t open up much from up to down, almost like a smile. [Make vocal gesture for /E/.] I’ll show you first: keep. I heard ee say its name and I felt my lips spread out and make a big smile. There is a long E in keep. Now I’m going to see if it’s in fed. Hmm, I didn’t hear ee say its name and my lips didn’t make that big smile. Now you try. If you hear /E/ say, “EEK! It’s almost Halloween.” If you don’t hear /E/ say, “That’s not it.” Is it in screen, pain, boat, ear, tube, and week? [Have children smile big when they feel /E/ say its name.]
3. Say: Now let’s look at the spelling of /E/ that we’ll learn today. One way to spell /E/ is with the letters ee. [Write ee on the board.] What if I want to spell the word greet? “My sister wanted to greet all of her friends that came over!” Greet means welcoming or saying hi in this sentence. To spell greet in letterboxes, first I need to know how many phonemes I have in the word so I stretch it out and count: /g//r//E//t/. I need 4 boxes. I heard that /E/ just before the /t/ so I’m going to put an ee in the 3rd box. The word starts with /g/, that’s easy; I need a g. Now it gets a little tricky so I’m going to say it slowly, /g//r//E//t/. I think I heard /r/ so I’ll put an r right after the g. I have one empty box now. [Point to letters in boxes when stretching out the word: /g//r//E//t/.] The missing one is /t/ = t.
4. Say: Now I’m going to have you spell some words in letterboxes. You’ll start out easy with two boxes for see. See is something you look at, “I see your purple shirt that you are wearing.” What should go in the first box? [Respond to children’s answers]. What goes in the second box? 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 /E/ and don’t forget to put two ee’s where you hear that. Here’s the word: keep, I want to keep the red pen; keep. [Allow children to spell words.] Time to check your work. Watch how I spell it in my letterboxes on the board: k – ee – p and see if you’ve spelled it the same way. Try another with three boxes: teeth: I brush my teeth every morning and night; teeth. [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 /E/ in it before you spell it: pet; I love my pet dog. Did you hear /E/ in that? Why not? Right, because it’s a short e so it just has one e. We spell it with our short vowel e. [volunteer spells it on the front board.] Now let’s try 4 phonemes: street; Look both ways before you cross the street. One more then we’re done with spelling: green; my favorite color is green. 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 street on the top and model reading the word.] First I see there’s a double ee; that’s my signal that the vowel will say its name. There’s the vowel ee. It must say /E/. 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.] /s//t/ = /st/ + /r/ = /str/. Now I’m going to blend that with /E/ = /strE/. Now all I need is the end, /t/ = /strEt/. Street; 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 /E/: ee. Now we are going to read a book called Lee and the Team. This is a story of a boy named Lee who is on a baseball team. Lee and his baseball team are late to one of the biggest baseball games of the year. They are all really nervous they won’t make and, and don’t know what to do. Let’s pair up and take turns reading Lee and the Team to find out if the team makes it to their big game. [Children pair up and take turns reading alternate pages each while teacher walks around the room monitoring progress. After individual paired reading, the class rereads Lee and the Team aloud together, and stops between page turns to discuss the plot.]
7. Say: That was a fun story. What happened to Lee when they were almost late to the game? Right, they ran into a bee. Did they make it to their game? Right, they ran and were not going to be late. Before we finish up with our lesson about one way to spell /E/ = ee, 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 ee word fits best to make sense of this very short story. First try reading all the words in the box, and 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:
Moore, Katy. “Eeeeek! That’s scary!” https://sites.google.com/site/katymooreresearchbasedreading/beginning-reading-lesson-1.
Murray, Gerri. Oh, I didn’t know! http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/doorways/murraybr.htm
Cushman, Sheila. Lee and the Team. Educational Insights: Carson, CA. 1990
Name: ________________________________
Directions: Fill in the blanks to the story.
1. The boys name was _______.
2. Lee saw a ________.
3. The team leaned on a _______.
4. Lee and his team _______ to the bee.
Words:
flee bee tree Lee
