Letter Aa Lesson 4 26 Letters in 26 Days

Today my class learned all about the letter Aa.  They entered the room and began coloring Allie Alligator and the six "a" pictures.  My students have desks, so when they finish coloring, they place all six cards into a zip lock bag. Both the puppet and bag go into their desks.  I have several activities they may select including reading books or getting their STEM/Reading bin.  I am slowly introducing technology.  I was super excited because today I was able to pull a few students over for assessments while they colored.  My kindergarteners are learning their morning routine!

The picture shows the daily materials for letter Aa. 

Click Here to see a video preview of my 26 Lessons in 26 Days TPT Unit

My daily lesson plan looks something like this:

7:55 - 8:45 - Students enter the classroom.  They color their puppets and 6 pictures that begin with the letter of the day.  (Today was Allie Alligator.)

8:45 - 9:10- We meet as a whole group.  We begin at desks singing the daily letter song to the tune of Old MacDonald.

This instrumental version of the song goes perfectly with our verses.  When the song is finished, we place everything in our desks and come to the carpet for two alphabet songs.  We dance to Who Let the Letters Out by Dr. Jean and The Alphabet Song by Jack Hartman.  We touch the sky and say the letter. Touch our shoulders and say the picture name. Touch the ground as we say the letter sound. Then we touch our shoulders again to say the picture name.  There are three times we get to play our air guitars in The Alphabet Song.  It is a work out.  The movements are from Dr. Jean's Phonercise song.  After our songs we quickly review meeting time rules. I do a daily read aloud.  During our read aloud we do some Think-Pair-Share or Mirror Teaching from Whole Brain Teaching.  Today we did Mirror teaching for the role of the author and illustrator.  If you haven't looked at Whole Brain Teaching, I highly recommend it.  Of course our book was Ten Apples Up on Top.

Click here for a link to Whole Brain Collaborative Teaching

I play another phonics song and the children transition back to their seats.  This song is Alphabet Lane from Sing Spell Read and Write.  After the song we go over the stations and seatwork.  During our 26 letter lessons seatwork is making their letter hat and coloring their My Aa Book.

9:15 We begin station rotations.  Each group meets with me for about 20 - 30 minutes.  We take an hour break for special areas and snack at 10:00.  At my table the students:
1.  Match Capital and Lower Case Letters.
2.  Match a beginning sound picture to each letter.
3.  Build words with the 5 letters of the week.
4.  Read their My Aa Book.
5. Practice writing the letter of the day.
6. Build and write a sentence from their My Aa Book.

Click Here for a Free Video Showing my Small Group Lesson

The other two stations are seatwork (Coloring hats and books) and literacy stations (Rhyming, Word Work, Letters, Letter Sounds, and Writing/Vocabulary)

11:40 - We do our math meeting which includes more songs and numerous math skills.  I try to hit all of the math domains: Counting and Cardinality, Operations and Algebraic Thinking, Numbers and Operations in Base Ten, Measurement and Data, and Geometry daily.

12:00 - Lunch and Recess

12:55 - 2:00 Afternoon Rotations which include:

1.  Meeting with the teacher for a math lesson

2.  Working on Technology

3.  Play Centers and STEM Activities

Some afternoons I change things up a bit.  For example, today I had the students color an apple instead of doing a math lesson with me.  Then I called three students over at a time to do their Chapter 1 math test.

This art project is part of my Memory Book Unit in TPT.

Click Here for My Memory Book Unit

Tomorrow I am going to meet with the other three students in each group.  The assignment tomorrow will be to glue objects onto the letters we learned this week.  Back when we used to do a letter a day, we always glued Apple Jacks onto letter Aa, cotton balls or Cookie Crisp Cereal onto letter Cc, sequins or stars onto letter Ss, buttons or butterflies onto letter Bb, and macaroni onto letter Mm.  I still love these great fine motor activities.  Therefore, we will do a collage of all five letters at one time.  Check back tomorrow to see how it turns out!

2:00 Clean Up/Pack Up

2:15 Closing Meeting

2:30 Walk to Buses

Each day the children are showing me new skills they are acquiring.  Today one child wrote his name for the first time.  Another child made it through lunch without vomiting, and another shared her red crayon.  It is all the little things, and the not so little things that make kindergarten full of amazing adventures.  Check back to see how our week ends.