Lesson Plan

Lesson Focus: Concepts About Print 

Grade Kindergarten, 25
Level/Number of
Students:

Time Duration: 29 minutes

Prior Assessment: We noticed that a few students were having difficulties holding their
books the correct way and with concepts relating to tracking print while
reading independently.  

Standards: ELD: Part I: Interacting in Meaningful Ways

1. Exchanging information and ideas with others through oral
collaborative conversations on a range of social and academic
topics. 
 
CCSS: Demonstrate understanding of the organization and basic features
of print.
a. Follow words from left to right, top to bottom, and page by
page.
b. Recognize that spoken words are represented in written
language by specific sequences of letters.
c. Understand that words are separated by spaces in print.
d. Recognize and name all upper- and lowercase letters of the
alphabet.

Objective:  Students should be able to demonstrate correct directionality of print (i.e.;

words are read from left to right, top to bottom, page by page) and that
letters make up individual words on the page.  

Purpose: Through this lesson students will learn to develop concepts about print
that will enable them to become emergent readers. 

Materials and The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything, illustrated by
Resources: Megan Lloyd, written by Linda Williams (big book if possible), pointer,
easel, pocket chart, pictures of the clothing items in the book and pumpkin
head that correspond with the sentence strips
Instructional Sequence:
Introduction: (2min)   
The teacher calls students to sit down on the reading rug. The teacher is sitting down in the
chair ready to read but has the big story book turned upside. She tries to read the book and asks
the students, “Am I holding the book the wrong way?” Students respond yes, and after a few
attempts the teacher turns the book around and places it correctly on the easel.   

Body of Lesson (15 min): Shared Reading 

The teacher explains that it’s October and Halloween is coming up soon and she’s going to
read them one of her favorite stories. Then, she points to the Big Book on the easel and reads
the title, “The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything”. She points to the author
and then the illustrator to remind students where these are located on the cover of the book.
Next she poses the question, “Have you ever been afraid of anything on Halloween?” A few
students respond with a thumbs up or down. She points to the book cover again and asks the
students to predict what they think might be scary in this story based on the picture from the
cover of the book. Students see the cover of the giant pumpkin head following the old woman.
Students turn and talk to their assigned reading partners to share their predictions. The teacher
then asks for a few volunteers to share with the class what they discussed with their partner. 

The teacher then begins to read the story and when she comes to the “spooky” parts of the
story, she slows down and reads them in a suspenseful way. She is tracking the individual
words of the story with her pointer, modeling left the right, then sweeping down to the
beginning of the next line of the story.

Each time she gets to the part of the story where the little old lady suddenly stops in the road,
the teacher puts her hand out to motion stop. Each time the old lady stops she encounters
something in the middle of her path. The first thing she encounters are two big shoes and in the
story the shoes went CLOMP, CLOMP. To demonstrate the meaning of CLOMP, CLOMP the
teacher stomps on the floor as she says the action word. Students are encouraged to join in with
the teacher acting out the action words as they are repeated in the story.

   

Check for Understanding (throughout the lesson)

 During the introduction, check that students are able to recognize correct book
orientation. (Book handling skills)  
 During read-aloud:
1. When teacher reads action words, have students demonstrate their understanding by
acting out the action. (When the shoes go CLOMP, CLOMP students stomp their feet) 
2. When the teacher asks students, “How many words are on the page, count with your
fingers?’ (BOO, BOO).  Students hold up two fingers like the teacher. Then the teacher
asks, “What letter does BOO start with?’ Students chorally respond, “B”.
 
Assessment (10 min) Kinesthetic Activity- Using a pocket chart and sentence strips with
corresponding pictures the teacher will ask students questions about book directionally,
tracking print, letter recognition, and the number of words in each sentence.  
The teacher adds the corresponding pictures and the individual words in the pocket chart to
form the first sentence as she reads them, “Two shoes go Clomp, Clomp.”

T: “Where do we start when we try to read this sentence from the story?” Students say at the
beginning of the line. (teacher demonstrates directionality and tracking print with a pointer as
she reads the sentence from left to right: “Two shoes go CLOMP, CLOMP”) 
S: The whole class then mimics the teacher by using  their pointer fingers to show
directionality and tracking print. 
T: As the teacher re-reads the sentence, “Two shoes go CLOMP, CLOMP,” she acts out the
action words by stomping her feet. Students can join in on the action. The teacher then points
to the letter C in CLOMP and asks students what the first letter is in the word. (demonstrating
letter recognition)
S: Students all chorally say the letter “C”. 
T: The teacher then asks, “How many words do you see in this sentence, “Two shoes go
CLOMP, CLOMP.”   
Students are instructed to hold up one finger for every word they see. The teacher demonstrates
first with her fingers counting the words as she reads them and asks students how many fingers
she is holding up at the end. The teacher counts a total of 5 words and explains to students that
is how many words are in this sentence. The teacher then asks students to try it themselves.  
S: Then students hold up fingers as the teacher points to and re-reads each word in the first
sentence on the pocket chart. (demonstrating the number of words in the sentence).

The teacher will practice the same concepts about print with one or two  more sentences on the
pocket chart to reinforce the lesson with the students.

Closure (2 min) 
T: “Today we learned how to read a fun Halloween story together as a class and we learned
how to hold the book the right way, which direction we read the pages in a book, and how to
count the words in each sentence or on a page. Tomorrow we’ll have a chance to re-read the
book and practice acting out the story again”.

Transition to Recess:
1. Students are sitting criss cross applesauce with their hands nicely in their laps on the
circle time carpet.
2. The Teacher randomly calls out letters that she pulls from a hat and if the student's first
name begins with that letter then they can quietly get up from the carpet and line up to
go outside for recess.        

Next Steps:
1. The next day re-read, The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything, to
reinforce the concepts about print from the previous lesson and have students act out
action words with the teacher as she reads the story. 
 2. Then students will re-read the sentences so far on the pocket chart from the day before,
and the teacher will have them practice letter recognition and counting words in the
sentences. The teacher can include a punctuation lesson at this time; that a capital letter
is used at the beginning of a sentence and a period ends the sentence. Then the teacher
can continue to add more sentences with action words from the story that students can
use to practice with the same concepts of print (directionality, tracking print, letter
recognition, and counting number of words in each sentence). 
3. The teacher can then remove the pictures on the side and pass them out to student
volunteers to match them with their corresponding sentence to check for understanding.
            This picture match can be done several times so that all of the students can get a turn.
4. The pocket chart can remain up all week and the teacher can continue to revisit the
concepts of print with the students. Students can participate in other activities using the
pocket chart such as a close reading exercise to fill in the now very familiar action
words missing at the end of a sentence, like CLOMP, CLOMP.

Accommodations: If students are still having difficulties with these concepts: 

1. Struggling readers can benefit from having the teacher reteach concepts, letters,
and skills that are still lacking. By using a variety of concrete examples to explain
a specific concept or task. (reteaching directionality ideally should be done one-on-
one with struggling students incorporating kinesthetics like having students guide
the teachers fingers over the words as they’re being read)  
2. Teachers can provide ELL students with different visual, auditory, kinesthetic,
and tactile techniques such as writing letters in the sand or using clay to create
letters to practice letter recognition.
3. Allow students having difficulties with letter recognition access to educational
websites such as abcmouse.com or education.com to further their understanding
of concepts of print.
Modifications: