Stop signs, McDonald's, and Cheerios: Writing with environmental print
http://www.readwritethink.org/lessons/lesson_view.asp?id=949
A lesson plan for grades K–1 English Language Arts
Students read words found on everyday objects and use them to identify individual letters in this lesson that teaches alphabet recognition and initial reading skills. First, the teacher uses packaging and logos from common products to encourage students to examine the letters and words they see. Students are challenged to examine the different ways the letters sound and appear on the packaging. The teacher shares images of environmental print downloaded from an Internet search. After the teacher models how to write a caption for one of the images, the students are challenged to fill in captions for their own stapleless book. Then, students select images from a collection the teacher has already made, and they create their own original book using the images and write captions for those pictures. Readwritethink provides several extension activities and opportunities for student reflection and assessment.
North Carolina Curriculum Alignment
English Language Arts (2004)
Grade 1
- Goal 1: The learner will develop and apply enabling strategies and skills to read and write.
- Objective 1.01: Develop phonemic awareness and demonstrate knowledge of alphabetic principle:
- count syllables in a word.
- blend the phonemes of one-syllable words.
- segment the phonemes of one-syllable words.
- change the beginning, middle, and ending sounds to produce new words.
- create and state a series of rhyming words that may include consonant blends (e.g., flag, brag).
- Objective 1.01: Develop phonemic awareness and demonstrate knowledge of alphabetic principle:
- Goal 4: The learner will apply strategies and skills to create oral, written, and visual texts.
- Objective 4.04: Extend skills in using oral and written language:
- clarifying purposes for engaging in communication.
- using clear and precise language to paraphrase messages.
- engaging in more extended oral discussions.
- producing written products.
- completing graphic organizers.
- Objective 4.05: Write and/or participate in writing by using an author's model of language and extending the model (e.g., writing different ending for a story, composing an innovation of a poem).
- Objective 4.06: Compose a variety of products (e.g., stories, journal entries, letters, response logs, simple poems, oral retellings).
- Objective 4.04: Extend skills in using oral and written language:
Kindergarten
- Goal 1: The learner will develop and apply enabling strategies to read and write.
- Objective 1.01: Develop book and print awareness:
- identify the parts of books and function of each part.
- demonstrate an understanding of directionality and voice-print match by following print word for word when listening to familiar text read aloud.
- demonstrate an understanding of letters, words, and story.
- identify the title, name of the author and the name of the illustrator.
- Objective 1.03: Demonstrate decoding and word recognition strategies and skills:
- recognize and name upper and lower case letters of the alphabet.
- recognize some words by sight including a few common words, own name, and environmental print such as signs, labels, and trademarks.
- recognize most beginning consonant letter-sound associations in one-syllable words.
- Objective 1.04: Read or begin to read.
- Read or attempt to read own dictated story.
- Attempt to read/reads simple patterned text, decodable text, and/or predictable texts using letter-sound knowledge and pictures to construct meaning.
- Objective 1.01: Develop book and print awareness:
- Goal 4: The learner will apply strategies and skills to create oral, written, and visual texts.
- Objective 4.06: Write and/or participate in writing behaviors by using authors' models of language.
