Lesson Plan

Your Names: Anna Holcomb and Miranda Russnow

Focus of the Lesson: Concepts about Print
Grade Level: Pre-K
Standard(s): Virginia Literacy Foundation Block 5: Print and Book Awareness; The child will
demonstrate knowledge of print concepts and understand the connection between the spoken and
written word. Virginia Literacy Foundation Block 1: Oral Language; The child will develop
listening and speaking skills by communicating experiences and ideas orally.
Objective(s): The student will be able to identify the various parts of a book. They will be able
match spoken/written word to the pictures in the book. The student will be able to identify and
comment about characters and pictures within a book.

Materials:

Teacher materials:
-Any wordless picture book Example: A Ball for Daisy
-Sticky Notes (At least 1 per student)
-A writing utensil

Student materials:
-Their brains :)

Procedures:
Before the Lesson
1. Following the assessment, the teacher should pick out an appropriate wordless picture
book to read aloud with the class as a whole. In our lesson, the book selected for reading
is “A Ball for Daisy” by Chris Raschka
During the Lesson
1. Introduce wordless picture books. Begin by asking students what previous knowledge
they have about wordless picture books or “books with no words.” Following their
response, reinforce the idea that these books still tell a story, but they don’t use any
words, they use pictures.
2. Inform the students that following the initial reading of the story, they will be helping the
teacher to write in the student’s own words, their version of the story.
3. Introduce the specific book chosen. Identify the front and back of the book along with the
title of the book. Ask the students “Based on the title and the cover, what do you think
this book will be about?”
 4. Read through the book. As you read through this first time, ask the students what they
think is happening in the pictures but don’t write down any comments yet. This is just to
get their creative juices flowing.
5. After reading the story for the first time, tell the students that they will each get to “write”
one page of the story. Inform them that they will tell the teacher what they think the page
should say and the teacher will write it on a sticky note and attach it to the page.
6. Read through the book a second time, calling on the students one by one and asking them
what each page should say (one student per page). Write down their answers on a sticky
note and place it in the page, so as not to block the picture. If there are more students than
pages, have more than one sticky note for some pages and ask two different students for
those pages.
7. The teacher will conclude by telling the students that they will get to read their book
later, as students will probably have lost interest at this point, and this part of the lesson
can be done later.
After the Lesson
1. During read-aloud time, the teacher will go through the book one last time, reading the
sticky notes of the newly updated book.
2. Assess during this final read aloud. Ask questions to the students pertaining to concept of
print while reading. Focus on students who were struggling during the initial assessment,
asking them questions that they struggled with prior. Examples of questions:
a. Show me the front of the book
b. Show me the back of the book
c. Point to the title of the story (then read the title to the child)
d. Show me where we would begin reading the story
e. (As you finish reading a page), Point to a picture
f. (After reading another page), Point to a letter
g. Point to a word
h. Point to the first letter in a word
i. Point to the last letter in a word
j. Show me how I would read this page (directionality)
k. Show me an uppercase letter
l. Point to a period, what is this?
Rough Outline:
Minutes What is the teacher doing?
3 Showing the front, back, and title of
the book to the students.
8 Flipping through the book, asking
students what is happening on each
page. I.e. What is Daisy doing on
this page?
14 Starting back at the beginning of
the book, the teacher will call on
students to “write that page of the
book.” The teacher will record these
responses on sticky notes, placing
them in the book. After this, the
teacher will conclude this part of the
lesson.
8 Later in the day, the teacher will
bring out the book once more, and
will read the story, written by the
students aloud, pointing out the
cover, the back, and the title once
more.
REFLECTION
What is the student doing?
Identifying the front, back, and
title of the book.
Observing the pictures in the book
and identifying what is happening
in the book
One by one, the students will
volunteer to “write” what is
happening on a particular page.
The students will listen to their
new story and identify the parts of
the book, i.e. where is the title,
which sticky note should be read
first, which picture goes with
which note, etc.
i. Describe your student (age, grade, other observations). Be sure to state whether your student
is an emergent or a beginning reader.
Anna: My student is a 4-year-old preschool at Elon Rhodes. The observed student is an
emergent reader. She is advanced in some subjects in school, but behind in others. She speaks
both English and Spanish.
Miranda: My student is a 5-year-old preschooler who is an emergent reader. He struggles
in many different aspects of his education. It is my understanding that his family speaks Spanish
at home.

ii. How did you determine the focus of the lesson? Please include the assessment or assessments
in your document to support your discussion.
Anna: The student analyzed is an emergent reader but did exceptionally
well in her first task. In first task, picture drawing and name writing activity, the
student spent around 15 minutes drawing a picture, describing it in extreme
detail as she did it. She was able to write her name but insisted she do so at the
top of the paper, not the bottom (as that was what she did in class.) Overall, she
did exceptionally well for this task. The second activity, the concepts of print
task, the student did not do as well in. The student was able to identify pictures
as well as the front and back of the book but struggled with her
ability to point to anything related to a word or letter on the book. In
the last activity, I chose to analyze her ability to say the capital
letters provided on the document, in the order they were given in.
The student was able to get about half of the letters correct,
including those in her name. She did struggle at one point guessing
“A” for several in a row before the instructor stopped her to point
out that she had already identified that letter.
I decided that the concept of print activity was the most
difficult for her to understand, because she could not even
identify where the words were supposed to go. As an emergent
reader, understanding what words look like compared to
pictures on the book is the first step to be able to read the words on the page. It was interesting
that she could read a lot of the letters in the alphabet, and write her name, but couldn’t
distinguish between words and pictures. I think this skill could be easily developed through a
task such as the one we chose.

iii. What were your goals for this lesson?

Our objective with this lesson is to help those who are behind in the concept of print
category of their literacy skills. By these students hearing their classmates answers and
responding with answers of their own, we are hoping that they will improve their concept of
print and be able to identify the various parts of a book such as the front and back as well as
where the words are on the page and the orientation in which they need to be read.

iv. How is your lesson grounded by either the Foundation Blocks or SOLs?
Our lesson plan is grounded in two of the Virginia Literacy Foundation Blocks. Firstly,
Virginia Literacy Foundation Block 5: Print and Book Awareness. This foundation block states
that “the child will demonstrate knowledge of print concepts and understand the connection
between the spoken and written word.” Due to the nature of the lesson students will have an
easier time distinguishing between the words that they have written on the page, from the
pictures they see on the page. While this is clearly distinguished, there is still opportunity to
solidify other aspects of concept of word such as pointing to the title, front, and back of the book.
Additionally, this lesson plan is grounded in Virginia Literacy Foundation Block 1: Oral
Language, which states that “the child will develop listening and speaking skills by
communicating experiences and ideas orally.” Since the students will be writing their book
orally, through the help of their teacher, they will have to practice communicating their thought
on what is going on orally.

vii. What were you most anxious about or what concerns did you have before teaching this
lesson and why?
One of the concerns that we have about this lesson is that the kids that are more advanced
in the concept of print category will be really eager to help and overpower the kids who need
more help. While their eagerness to participate in the activity is desired, if they try to answer too
many questions and don’t give the students that are a bit behind a chance to respond, those
students may feel ignored and not gain anything from the lesson at all.

x. What do you anticipate as the next steps after this lesson?

One activity that a teacher could have their students to do following this activity is to
encourage students to write for other pictures in the classroom as well, or even around the
school. Carrying around a pad of sticky notes and a pen and writing down what the student
thinks is happening in a photo could help to reinforce the idea that pictures have meanings, and
the words on the pictures describe them.