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Puppies Say /h/ when they are “/h/-/h/-/h/-ot”

An Emergent Literacy Lesson

 

Rationale: Students being taught this lesson will learn how to recognize the phoneme /h/, or, H by drawing a comparison between the sound a dog or puppy makes when he is hot and the sound H makes when pronounced /h/ in spoken words. Students will become aware of the /h/ in words by deriving several of his or her own words using the /h/ sound and will also learn to write the representative letter H in upper and lower case.

 

Materials:

-Labeled primary paper and a pencil

-Large poster with alliterative tongue-tickler displayed in large font that reads “Henry the healthy hound happily hurried home."

-mirror

-Large flip chart

-Flip chart markers

-Oversized index cards with words for assessment printed on them (heart, hand, help, shape, cake, Christmas, Halloween, foot, head, soft)

-Smart Board or Projection screen

-Copy of Harry the Dirty Dog

Zion, Gene. Harry the Dirty Dog. New York: Harper and Bros, 1956. Print.

 

Procedures:

1. [INTRODUCE THE PHONEME]: There are many sounds we can use to make a word or even a sentence. When we squish all of those sounds together, they make more sense because they help us share what we know and what we are trying to say. The things you tell your friends only make sense when they are made up of many “chunks” of sound, like /h/ for example. Those sounds are represented by letters that you have seen before. Think about it- could you say the word “hot” without /h/? Of course not! You MUST know the sound /h/ and the letter H to say “hot.” We are also going to learn how to write the letter H (which helps us read and write the sound /h/) in both lower and upper case.

 

2. [ASK STUDENTS]: "Do you have a dog at your house? Does your dog live outside or inside? If he lives outside, I bet you have seen him pant before! Do you know what panting means? Did you know that dogs cannot sweat, so they have to get rid of their body heat by sticking out their tongues and making the /h/ sound? Everyone get on your hands and knees on the carpet and pretend you are a big dog. Put your hands in front of your mouths and say /h/-/h/-/h/. Do you feel your breath on your hand? That must mean you are making the /h/ sound! That is the sounds that puppies make when they are /h/-/h/-h/-ot"

 

3. [MODEL /h/ FOR STUDENTS]: “Can you watch me say /h/? I will say it slowly. What does my mouth look like, and what do you think my mouth feels like when I make this sound? My mouth is open and my tongue is resting right behind my teeth. My chest also moves down a little. If I hold this mirror up to my mouth when I say /h/ (holds mirror in front of lips in preparation of pronunciation), the glass gets all fogged up! Now, tell me, do you all hear /h/ in heart or brain? Hotel or motel? Hate or love?”

 

4. [PULL OUT TONGUE TICKLER POSTER]: “Let’s practice the /h/ sound together! Listen to this silly tongue twister you can tell your friends when they are learning the /h/ sound. It’s all about Henry the Hound who got lost in his neighborhood, heard his master call for dinner, and hurried home in a flash:

 

Henry the healthy hound happily hurried home.

Say it three more times. The last time, stretch out the /h/ in each word so that you can really hear it! And remember what it sounds like.”

 

5. [TELL STUDENTS TO TAKE OUT PRIMARY PAPER AND A PENCIL]: “Next we will learn to write the letter H that makes the /h/ sound so that we can use it when we are writing words and messages. Everyone practice little H: Bounce the ball from the rooftop down to the sidewalk, then bounce around to the fence and back to the sidewalk. For big H, Draw two the sides of the railroad track from the rooftop down wo the sidewalk, then connect the sides with a line along the dashes. Everyone should practice by drawing H in uppercase and lowercase, three times each. (Teacher should demonstrate letters on Smart Board, projection screen, overhead, etc.

 

 

6. [INTRODUCE BOOK HARRY THE DIRTY DOG WITH /h/ SOUND]: “Boys and girls, we are going to read one of my favorite books now! The cool thing is that there are many words that contain the /h/ sound we have been talking about in this story about a spotted dog named Hhary who hhates baths. When you hear the /h/, can you pant like a dog? I should hear my whole class of pretend puppies panting when I say the /h/ sound! (If there are confident students in the classroom, you could have each of them read a page to classmates and try to emphasize the newly identified phoneme.

 

7. [INTRODUCE A NEW GAME TO STUDENTS TO REINFORCE UNDERSTANDING]: 10 students will hold up oversized index cards with words on them which may or may not contain the /h/ phoneme. During each round, the teacher will start a timer and will give students 10 seconds to run to a friend holding a card containing the /h/ sound (teacher will start each round by pronouncing the word on each card, as students probably still need phonetic cues and most likely cannot read words off cards with any speed.) Students who don’t make it to an “/h/ buddy” in time are out… sort of like musical chairs. One buddy who is not holding a word containing /h/ will sit down in each round, until finally only students holding words with /h/ remain. Then, they too will be asked to sit down one by one, until only ONE student is left holding a card with the /h/ sound represented. Similar to musical chairs, the last student left competing for that /h/ buddy wins the game.

 

8. Class-wide Assessment: [SHOW STUDENTS THE GIANT FLIP CHART AND ENCOURAGE CLASS-WIDE PARTICIPATION]: “Wow! My students are great learners! Let’s try to come up with our own words that use the sound /h/.” Students will sit in a circle on carpet or floor and each child will contribute a word containing the /h/ phoneme. Instructor will write each student’s word on the flip chart, then have the rest of the class say the word and identify the /h/ phoneme. By the end of the activity, the flipchart will be filled up with /h/ examples and it can be hung in the classroom and learner understanding will be assessed.

 

Individual Assessment: At the end of the class-wide assessment, have the children come up to teacher’s desk one at a time to take an oral quiz on the /h/ phoneme:

       1.) Do you hear /h/ in heat or cold?

       2.) Do you hear /h/ in ham or turkey?

       3.) Do you hear /h/ in corn dog or hot dog?

       4.) Do you hear /h/ in stomach or head?

       5.) Do you hear /h/ in helmet or bat?

       6.) Do you hear /h/ in reading or history?

 

References:

 

Malone, Megan: Pant like a Dog with H

http://mem0089.wixsite.com/lessondesigns

 

Zion, Gene. Harry the Dirty Dog. New York: Harper and Bros, 1956. Print.