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Emergent Literacy Design

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M

Making Yummy Muffins with M

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Emergent Literacy Design: Making Yummy Muffins with M

By: Kathryn Stubblefield

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Rationale: This lesson will help students identify /m/, the phoneme represented by M. Students will learn to recognize /m/ in spoken words by learning a meaningful representation (Making Yummy Muffins with M), a sound analogy (mmm mmm), practice finding /m/ in words, and apply phoneme awareness with /m/ in phonetic cue reading by distinguishing rhyming words from beginning letters.

 

Materials: Primary paper and pencil; chart with "many mice are making music" tongue tickler; Tabitha’s Letter M by Tabitha R. Mathis, word cards with MAD, MEET, FIND, PARK, and MAKE; assessment worksheet identifying pictures with /m/ (URL below) and crayons.

 

Procedures: 1. Start by saying: "Our written language is like a secret code. It holds a lot of different and fun letters. The tricky part is learning what a letter tells us. A letter tells us what moves our mouths should make as we say words. Today, we're going to work on spotting the mouth move /m/. We spell /m/ with letter m. M looks like two mountain tops, side by side, and /m/ sounds like we just enjoyed a delicious treat like a muffin!

 

2. "Let’s practice together by making the noise we would make after eating a delicious treat. Let’s try it- /m/. (drag it out). Notice where your lips were when you made that sound- pressed together! Now, let’s rub our tummies while we say it like we have just eaten a delicious treat and are SO full. /m/! Perfect! Every time we say the /m/ let’s rub our tummies like that."

 

3. "Now, let me show you how to find /m/ in the word mit. Like an oven mit that we’d use to take our muffins out of the oven. I'm going to stretch mit out in super slow motion and listen for that sound of a super tasty treat (mmmmm). mmm-i-i-it. Slower: Mmmmm-i-i-ttt There it was! I felt my lips press together at the beginning of the word mit."

 

4. "Next, let’s try a tongue tickler together [on chart]. First, I have a fun story that goes along with it. When a certain princess is at home cleaning, she loves to sing while she works. Her friends, the mice, love to sing and play fun instruments along with her. So, here’s our tickler: 'many mice are making music'. Everybody say it three times together. Now say it again, and this time, stretch the /m/ at the beginning of the words. 'mmmmany mmmmice are mmmmaking mmmmusic.' Try it again, and this time break it off the word: '/m/ any /m/ ice are /m/ aking /m/ usic.'"

 

 5. “Let’s get out our primary paper and pencil! We use m to spell /m/. Let’s start our writing practice by writing a capital M. Remember, a capital M looks like two mountains, side by side. Start at the rooftop and then go down straight. Then, from the rooftop again, go down the slide and then up the slide. Finally, you finish by going down straight again. And there you have it! A capital M! I will be walking around to check off everyone’s magnificent capital M. Once I have checked you off, I want you to write a capital M five more times on your paper!”

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After this, move on and say “Now let’s try a lowercase m. A lowercase m just looks like smaller, curvier mountains. To make a lowercase m, you start at the fence and go straight down. Next, you draw one hump, and then you draw another hump! And there’s your lowercase m. I like to think about my two humps like two lips- I know it takes two lips to make my /m/ sound, so I know it takes two humps to write my m! I will be walking around to check off everyone’s marvelous lowercase m. Once I have checked you off, I want you to write a lowercase m five more times on your paper!”

 

6. Next, call on students to answer and tell how they knew: “Let’s practice listening for that sound we make when we eat a yummy treat (/m/). Do you hear /m/ in work or mine? hat or mask? time or tick? mix or stir? Map or shop? After this exercise, move on and say: “Let's see if you can spot the mouth move /m/ in some words. Rub your tummy if you hear /m/: 'The, mighty, fun, pigs, made, a, muddy, mess'".

 

7.“Now, we are going to read our letter /m/ book, Tabitha’s Letter M. We learn about lots of words that start with the letter m and have that sound of a super tasty treat (mmmmm). In this book, we’ll get to read about maps, mountains, monkeys, and SO much more! What other M words do you think we’ll hear? I guess we’ll have to read to find out!”

 

8. Next, I will show the word MAT and model how to decide if it is mat or sat: “The M tells me to rub my tummy, /m/, so this word is mmm-at, mat. You try some: MAD: sad or mad? MEET: feet or meet? FIND: find or mind? PARK: park or mark? MAKE: fake or make?” I will use the word cards to show these words.

 

9.  Finally, I will distribute the assessment worksheet. Students will color the pictures that begin with the letter m. I will call on students to read the words they discovered from their worksheet, and I will ask them to sound out phonetic cues from the words on the pictures.

 

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Reference:

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Assessment- Super Teacher Worksheet

https://www.superteacherworksheets.com/phonics-beginningsounds/letter-m_WFMNB.pdf?up=1466611200

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Tabitha R. Mathis, Tabitha’s Letter M

https://www.storyjumper.com/book/read/17914648/Tabitha-s-Letter-M#page/10

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Lindsey Hogan, “Learning L with Lollipops”

https://lch0027.wixsite.com/readingiscool/emergent-literacy

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Newman, “Learning H with Hector the Hound”

https://missannemarienewman.wixsite.com/portfolio/early-literacy

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Bailey Sartin “Making a Mess with M”

https://sartinbailey27.wixsite.com/mysite/about

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Bruce Murray, “Brush Your Teeth with F”

https://murraba.wixsite.com/lessondesigns2018/emergent-literacy

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Sue Dickson, “Handwriting Lessons – Sing, Spell, Read, & Write”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvJ_Chw0Ugg

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