Ashley Little

READ ALOUD LESSON PLAN

Teacher’s Name: Mrs. Donna Young

Focus of the Lesson: Phonological Awareness and Rhyme
Grade Level(s): Preschool
Standard(s): Virginia Literacy Foundation Block 3-Phonological Awareness
a) Identify words that rhyme and generate simple rhymes
Materials:
Teacher materials:
-Paper with nursery rhyme on it
-Pen
-Picture cards
-Clothes pins

Student materials:
-None

Procedures:
Minutes What is the teacher What is the student
doing? doing?
1 minutes (Introduction) Listening attentively to the
teacher
Tell the child that they will
be learning about Rhyme.
Ask if the child knows what
rhyme is

1 minute Ask if he or she knows what Listening attentively to the

rhyming is teacher

1 minute Listening attentively to the Answering the question

student asked by the teacher
 Ashley Little

3 minutes Respond to the child’s Listening attentively to the

response and formally teacher
explain rhyme. Say “Rhyme
is when two words sound
the same. An example of
two rhyming words would
be train and brain. What do
you notice about these
words? How do they
sound?”

4 minutes Present the nursery rhyme Watching and listening to

on a sheet of paper and read the teacher
it aloud
30 sec Ask the child: “Which Listening to the teacher
words sound alike?” Prompt
if necessary (i.e. “Jack and
Quick?” or “quick and
stick?”

30 sec Listening to the student Answer the teacher

1 minute Reiterate what rhyming is, Listening to the teacher
using the pen to circle the
rhyming words

2 minutes Present card game to child. Listening attentively to the

Say “Together we will say teacher
each of the words that
represent the 3 pictures on
the page. We can write the
words of the pictures above
them. Then, we will place
the clothes pin on the
picture that doesn’t rhyme
with the others
10 minutes (more or less) Watching and assisting the Doing the activity
child when needed
 Ashley Little

Rhyming Lesson Plan Rationale

I determined my focus of the lesson by looking of Mark’s literacy assessment and

reflecting on his literacy progress over the course of the semester. After reviewing my literacy

my literacy assessment of Mark, I realized that he struggled in three skills in two different areas

of literacy. He struggled with letter production (writing), letter sound production (phonological

awareness), and rhyme (phonological awareness). Of these skills, I chose to focus on and

improve Mark’s phonological awareness by focusing my lesson on the rhyme. Phonological

awareness involves “identifying and manipulating larger parts of a spoken language such as

whole words, syllables, initial consonants, and word chinks at the end of words” (Morrow, 160).

Mark is well aware of all of his letters and words that are associated with the beginning letters,

but struggles with the sounds of some. Because Mark insisted on writing a word that matched the

letter presented during the alphabet recognition task of the literacy assessment, I had the teacher

and child write the names of each of the pictures above the pictures in my lesson plan. I believe

having the written word may help with letter sound production, because Mark will visually see

the letters while paying attention to the sound they make.

My goals for this lesson are for Mark to improve his phonological awareness from using

visual and auditory techniques from a rhyming game. I believe the circling of rhyming words

will give him a visual to understand and associate the sounds between the words together. I want

Mark to become more aware of the sounds the letters make individually and together. I hope to

further excite Mark’s excitement for literacy and his knowledge about letters and sounds. My

goal is to expand Mark’s awareness and perspective on words, so he will be able to determine

rhyming words on his own the way he produces beginning sounds of words based on their

beginning letter.
 Ashley Little

My lesson meets a standard of the Virginia Foundation Blocks. The Virginia Literacy

Foundation Block 3 –Phonological Awareness says that children should be able to “successfully

detect beginning sounds in words.” This is a skill that Mark has mastered, having learned his

letters and their sounds. The standard also says that children should be able to “identify words

that rhyme and generate simple rhymes.” This lesson will help Mark identify words that rhyme

within a group of words and pictures. This skill will lead to the development of the following

skill of generating simple rhymes.

If I were conducting this lesson, I would be excited and looking forward to seeing how

Mark reacts and participates in learning and developing a new skill. Mark comes to school with

his own knowledge of his letters, and wants to demonstrate what he knows by printing his name

and verbalizing letters and sounds he recognizes. One day I asked him if he practices his letters

at home and he said yes, along with my cooperating teacher who believes he has a game that he

plays at home to learn his letters during whatever opportunity he gets. I would be looking

forward to formally introducing a new skill, as that is not done frequently in the classroom. I

believe Mark’s intrinsic motivation and excitement to use letters would cause him to pay

attention and engage in the activity.

Concerns I would have for this lesson would be that Mark would be having a rough day

and be unwilling to listen and participate. I would also fear Mark attempting the skill and not

understanding, and becoming frustrated by his misunderstanding and mistakes made throughout

the activity. Personally, I would fear Mark asking something that I would feel unsure or

uncomfortable answering and appear underprepared for the lesson. It would be difficult to help

him, as I don’t feel entirely confident in teaching skills and strategies to understand a difficult

concept for him.

 Ashley Little

I anticipate the next step after this activity would be Mark wanting to do this activity

more and more on his own. He repeats what he knows and is excited for, and I believe once he

grasps the concept that is all he will want to do for a while. After this, I think Mark would be

able to generate rhyming words on his own based off of things in the environment. For example,

he may recognize two of his classmates’ names that rhyme- Kylie and Wylie. I’m unsure when

this would occur exactly, but I believe at some point Mark would learn that not all rhyming

words are spelled the same although they sound the same. For instance the words straight and

gate sound the same and rhyme but do not have the same spelling. After learning this skill, I

think Mark would have a better sense phonemic awareness, the “ability to identify and reflect on

the smallest units of sound” (Bear, 104). I believe the manipulation of words and changing their

beginning sound might make him interested in the other parts of the words and how they sound

broken apart.

Mark is very intelligent and capable of learning this skill. His passion for letters and

learning may help his focus and understanding of this skill. I think it is amazing how intrinsically

motivated he is to learn about letters and writing, and his passion and excitement whenever we

are working together. At the beginning of the semester I was not excited to teach literacy, but he

has excited me from his excitement.

 Ashley Little

Appendix
Rhyme Example to use:

Jack be nimble,
Jack be quick,
Jack jump over
The candlestick

Rhyme cards to use: (cut each strip and present to child, have child place clothespin on picture
that doesn’t rhyme with the other two)
 Ashley Little

References

Bear, D. R. , Invernizzi, M. , Templeton, S. , and Johnston, F. (2016). Words Their Way –Word
Study for Phonics, Vocabulary, and Spelling Instruction. New Jersey: Pearson Education.

Morrow, L. M. (2015). Literacy Development in the Early Years –Helping Children Read and
Write. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education.