Lesson Plan of Digraphs, Trigraphs and Silent Letters English Grade IV

Lesson Plan of Digraphs, Trigraphs and Silent Letters

English Grade IV

Students’ Learning Outcomes

·         Articulate words containing digraphs, trigraphs and silent letter.

Information for Teachers

·         Digraph - A grapheme comprising two letters that creates just one sound (phoneme).

·         A trigraph (from the Greek: τρεῖς, treîs, "three" and γράφω, gráphō, "write") is a group of three letters used to embody a single sound or a mixture of sounds that does not agree to the written letters combined.

·         Graph is a single letter making single sound.

·         Digraphs have two letters making one sound. E.g.  ph, sh,  th,  ch, etc.

·         Trigraphs have three letters making one sound. E.g. tch, ght, ugh, etc.

·         In digraphs, consonants or vowels join together to form a blend, which makes a single sound, also called phoneme. For example, p and h combine to form ph, which makes the /f/ sound as in the word photo (consonant digraph), ‘o’ and ‘u’ combine to form ‘loud’, vowel digraph.

·         Digraphs can be used at the beginning (initial), middle or end (final) of a word.

·         This lesson will focus on articulating digraphs (initial, middle and final positions) for vowels and consonants.

Material / Resources

Flashcards of graphs, chart or poster of words with digraphs in the initial, middle and final order, Draw these pictures on chart or make separate flashcards. Don’t cut these out. Bring some of these objects to class.

Worm up activity

·         Write this tongue twister on the board “She sells sea-shells on the sea shore”.

·         Challenge the students to try to say it correctly at a fast speed, for fun.

·         Tell the students that phonemes ‘s’ and ‘h’ have single sounds but we join them together to get a single sound as in ‘shell’.

·         Remind them that there are many such pairs of phonemes that make a new sound.

Development

Activity 1

·         Write consonant digraphs in initial, middle and final position (e.g. thin, father, mother, sheep, chick, cloud, teeth, cheat, fish, dish, photographer, chin, chicken, on the board.

·         Now call different students and ask them to identify digraphs and underline them with colored chalk.

·         Also ask the students to pronounce that digraphs loudly for the whole class.

·         Correct the pronunciation of the words according to their spelling/sounds/phonics.

Activity 2

·         Write the following vowels digraphs on the board.

(oa, ow, ou, aw, au,  er,  ir, ur, ee, ea, oo, ie, ue, ai, oi).

·         Pair up the students.

·         Give each pair one digraph. Repeat the digraph if there are more students.

·         Ask all pairs of students to write words with this alphabet in middle and final positions in their notebooks.

(Expected response:  Boat, blow, cow,  soup,  pour,  saw,  caught,  sister,  bird,  seed,  meat,  food,  pie,  blue,  again,  point)

·         When students have written their words, ask them to read aloud to each other.

·         Call a few students to come forward and pronounce the words.

·         Correct the pronunciation of the words according to their spellings/sounds/phonics.

Activity 3

·         Paste the chart of words with pictures on the board.

·         Now ask different students to pronounce the words. Draw the chart into a poster or you can have separate flashcards for each.

·         Add more pictures and words for more practice.

Ch	Sh	Th	Ph	-ch	-sh
Chain Chair Chance Chapter Cheap Cheek Chess Chew Chicken Children Choice Chop Cheese	Shade Shadow Shake Shape Share Sheep Shell Shelf Shine Shirt Shoot Shop Shot Shoulder	Than That Teir Them Father Mother Therefore They These There Those	Phoenix Phone Phonetic Phonic Phonology Photography Photograph	Much Touch Such Church Search Reach Bleach Hutch Crunch	Fish Crush Blush Mash Crash Clash Bush Trash Flash Flush Smash

Sum up / Conclusion

·         Conclude the lesson by repeating the identification of digraphs.

·         Remind them that sometimes two alphabet make one sound. Ask them for some examples of such words.

Assessment

·         Assess students’ understanding when they make words and pronounce them.

·         Assess their understanding while doing activity 1, 2, and 3.

·         Focus must be laid on proper pronunciation.

·         See the students’ book of digraphs after two weeks and then regularly to ensure that they add more words.

Follow up

·         Ask students to write the names of three objects and two animals, which contain the digraph they have learnt in the lesson.

Extension practice:

·         Some common consonant digraphs are: ch,  ph,  th,  sh,  etc.

·         Some common vowel digraphs are : oa,  ow,  ou,  aw,  au,  er,  ir,  ur,  ee,  ea,  oo,  ie,  ue,  ai,, oy,  ay,  ew. Last three have consonants but sound as vowels.

·         You can’t teach all these digraphs in two lessons.

·         You must practice  words with these digraphs throughout the year in different  lesson whenever new words are taught to improve students’ vocabulary and pronunciation.