Bang the Bongos with B
Emergent Literacy
Rationale: This lesson will help children identify /b/, the phoneme represented by B. Students will learn to recognize /b/ in spoken words by learning a sound analogy (bang the bongos) and the letter symbol B, practice finding /b/ in words, and apple phoneme awareness with /b/ in phonetic cue reading by distinguishing rhyming words from beginning letters.
Materials: Primary paper and pencil; chart with “Bary bent below blue bubbles”; Bill Martin Jr’s Bill Martin Jr, Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?; word cards with
BAND, TAKE, BOY, BRIGHT, and SEND; assessment worksheet identifying pictures with /b/ (URL below).
Procedures: 1. Say: Our written language is a secret code. The tricky part is learning what letters stand for and as we say our words our mouth moves. Today we're going to work on learning and recognizing the letter b making the /b/ sound. We spell /b/ with letter B. The letter B looks like a bongo, and /b/ sounds like banging on drums.
2. Let’s pretend to bang a bongo, /b/, /b/, /b/. [Pretend to be banging a drum.] What is our mouth doing when we make our drum sound? Notice how our lips push together and then blow out air.
3. Let me show you how to find /b/ in the word scab. I am going to stretch scab out in and say it in super slow motion. Listen for my bongos. ssscc-aaaaabbbb. Slower: ssss-cccc-aaa-bbb. There it was! I felt my lips touch when we said /b/. Bango /b/ is in scab.
4. Let’s now try a tongue tickler! (on chart: “Bary bent below blue bubbles ”) Bary’s mom is blowing a lot of bubbles everywhere. Bary doesn’t want the bubbles to pop, so he does his best to avoid popping the bubbles. I want you to now say our tongue tickler: “Bary bent below blue bubbles.” Now this time when you say it, stretch the /b/ out in the words. Bbbary bbbent bbbelow bbblue bbbubbles. Now when you say it say the letter /b/ then the rest of the word, “/b/ ary /b/ ent /b/ elow /b/ lue b/ ubbles.
5. [Have primary paper and pencil for the student.] We use the letter b to spell /b/. Lower case b looks like a drumstick. Let’s write the lowercase letter B. Start at the rooftop, and draw a line straight down to the sidewalk. Then, go from the fence and make a backward c to the sidewalk. After I give you a sticker, practice 7 more just like that one.
6. Call on students to answer and tell how they knew: Do you hear /b/ in bake or late? pot or bat? blame or hand? Say: Now, let’s see if you can spot the mouth move of /b/ in some words. Bang your bongo if you hear /b/: The, bouncy, ball, rolled, down, the, big, street, before, bowling, practice.
7. Say: Let's look at the book Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See. We are introduced to a bunch of animals. We want to know what they see. What kind of animals do you think we’ll see and will they tell us what they are looking at? After we have read our book we will read it again and look for the /b/ sound. Say: Every time we hear the /b/ sound, let's pretend to bang our bongos. Then ask them to write out a silly name for an animal with their own invented spelling and draw a picture of their animal however they picture it.
8. Show BAND and model how to decide if it is band or hand: The b tells me to bang my bongo, /b/, so this word is bbb-and, band. You try some: BOY: boy or toy? TAKE: bake or take? BRIGHT: bright or fight? SEND: bend or send?
9. For assessment, distribute the worksheet. Students color the pictures that begin with F. Call students individually to read the phonetic cue words from step #8
References:
Bill Martin Jr, Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?
Assessment Worksheet: https://twistynoodle.com/my-letter-b-book-2-worksheet/
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