Let’s practice finding letters we know by looking for them in a sentence. Remember, a sentence is a group of words that gives us information or tells us what to do. A sentence can also ask a question.

[Write the following sentence on a chart or whiteboard. Read each word as you write the sentence:

When we move, we will go to a new center.]

We want to find lowercase letter i in our sentence.

[Display letter I card. Point to the lowercase i on the card.

Encourage a volunteer child to look for and point to the lowercase letter i in the sentence as you display the letter I card.]

What sound does the letter I make?

Yes! Letter I says /i/. Let’s together say the sound of the letter I: /i/.

[Repeat the above procedure with the letter v.]

Now let’s read a book!

[See Week 3, Day 1 of Language/Literacy for a description and examples of how to approach today’s book reading. Key aspects are summarized below:

• Display book cover and encourage children to discuss what the book might be about.
• Explain that reading a book is a good way to learn new words. We will talk about some words each time we read the book this week. Remind children of the “Words We Understand” chart.
• Read title of book as you point to each word. Point to and say the names of the author and illustrator.
• Introduce and provide child-friendly descriptions of two novel words included in today’s book. Write words on the chart as you point to and say each again.
• Point to the first text word and explain this is where we begin reading the book. Read the book verbatim. Pause to discuss words, events, or characters that seem confusing to children. Point to and describe illustrations directly related to book text.
• After reading the book, engage children in recalling main parts of the book and novel words emphasized today:
  • What is our book about?
  • Who were the main characters?
  • What happened first? What happened next?
• Engage children in a brief discussion of novel words emphasized today. Display and discuss book pictures that pertain to each word.
  • What does each word mean?
  • How was each word used in today’s book?]

Offer the Week 3, Day 3 activity to review making groups of 1–4 items.

Engage children in finding groups of 2, 3, and 4 items in your classroom as part of a book reading.

Introduce and read the book. After reading the book, talk with children about past or current classroom activities or features that connect to groupings of items described in the book. Example: mixing three colors of paints. Then invite approximately one-third of the children in your classroom to find or make a group of two items in your room. Invite each child to describe his/her grouping. Refer to book examples of a group of two items, if appropriate. Repeat this process with a different one-third of children in your room for a group of three items, and again with the last one-third of children in your room for a group of four items.

Today we will learn about airplanes. We know that airplanes move through the sky.

Have you ever flown in an airplane? What is it like?

Many things that fly have wings. Birds have wings. Many insects have wings.

An airplane has wings and an engine and flies through the air. Another word for airplane is plane. Airplanes can move people and things from one place to another place faster than cars and trucks.

Airplanes use runways for starting and stopping their trip. A runway is a long strip of land used by airplanes for taking off and landing. Large airports have many runways.

Different kinds of planes do different kinds of jobs. Last week we talked about passenger trains. The big job of a passenger train is to move people and their things from one place to another place.

[Display picture of exterior of passenger plane. Point to wing and passenger windows when you describe each.]

The passenger plane is made to carry people. This is a picture of a passenger plane. A passenger plane has the same job as a passenger train.

What do we see in this picture of a passenger plane? (wings, wheels, small windows)

[Display picture of interior of passenger plane. Point to seats, storage area, windows, and aisle when you describe each.]

A passenger plane has seats for people to sit in during their trip. There also are spaces for people to put bags and other things. People use seat belts to keep safe while riding in a passenger plane.

[Display picture of exterior of cargo plane. Point to windowless sides of plane and window at front of plane when you describe each.]

A cargo plane carries items from place to place. Some cargo planes can even carry a car or a truck.

A cargo plane does not have windows on the sides of the plane. There are windows in the front of the plane for people who fly the plane.

[Display picture of interior of cargo plane.]

This is a picture of the inside of a cargo plane. The items it carries are tied down in the plane so they do not move around when the plane is moving.

[Display two pictures side by side: exteriors of passenger plane and cargo plane.]

Let’s compare the passenger plane and the cargo plane.

• What things are similar in these two airplanes? (wings, wheels, tail, window in front for pilots)
• What things are different in these two airplanes? (passenger plane has windows on sides)

Airplanes carry people or items in the sky. There are different kinds of airplanes. A passenger plane carries people. A cargo plane carries things.

We are learning some different ways to tell a story. Today we will talk about how to use puppets to tell a story.

We can use puppets as the characters in a story. We know a character is a person or an animal (or creature) in a story or book. We also know that a puppet is a kind of doll that we make move.

A while ago we heard the story Goldilocks and the Three Bears. There is a Papa Bear, a Mother Bear, and a Baby Bear in the story. We pretended to imitate the voices of the three bears. We know that imitate means to sound like or look like someone or something else. We tried to make our voices sound like the voices of the three bears.

Let’s imitate the three voices again. First, let’s say “I’m Papa Bear” using the voice of a Papa Bear.

[Lead children in using a deep, Papa Bear voice. Then support children in using Mother Bear (“I’m Mother Bear”) and Baby Bear (“I’m Baby Bear”) voices.]

We are going to use puppets to tell the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. We will use our voices and a special kind of puppet (called a finger puppet) to help us act out the story.

[Display character finger puppets.]

A finger puppet is a puppet that we put on our finger.

[Place a finger puppet on your finger.]

We will use the finger puppets and our voices as I read the story. Let me show you.

[Read a small section of the story while using a finger puppet and the voice for the character.]

I moved my finger puppet of (character name) and used my voice to sound like (character name) when I told the story.

Now we will try it together.

[Invite children to choose one finger puppet character and place it on their finger.]

When we read the story, we can move our finger puppets and change our voices to pretend the characters are talking.

[Encourage each child to use his/her finger puppet character as you tell the story. As you come to a part of the story where a character speaks, encourage children with a finger puppet for that character to hold up their finger puppet and say the line while changing their voice to sound like the character.]

We can use puppets to be the characters in a story. There are many different kinds of puppets. Today we used finger puppets to talk and move like the characters in the story Goldilocks and the Three Bears.