Rationale: Phonemic awareness and letter recognition directly
correlate with children's success in reading, spelling, and
writing endeavors. Children can recognize phonemes not only
through spoken word, but also through mouth movements and vocal
gestures. This lesson, "Vacuuming Up Violets," exposes children
to the written letter "v" in order to enhance their letter
recognition skills and the phoneme /v/ in order to enhance their
phonemic awareness. - Phoneme (/v/) picture of vacuum - Chart
paper with tongue twister written on it ("Victor gave Val
violets for Valentine's Day.") - Primary paper (one per child) -
Pencil (one per child) - Decodable text, Vin and Val - Chart
paper with lyrics to "Do You Know the Valley Man?" song -
Chalkboard or whiteboard for class-wide activity - "Color the
Pictures" assessment worksheet
(http://www.kidzone.ws/kindergarten/v-begins2.htm) 1. Introduce
the lesson. Tell the students, "Today, we are investigators.
When you see writing, it's like a secret code. Now we are going
to b