[Display letter V card.]

What is the name of this letter? What sound does the letter V make?

Letter V says /v/, just like in “vehicle.” /v/, /v/, vehicle. Let’s together say /v/, /v/, vehicle.

Now let’s spend some time with our book.

[See Week 3, Day 5 of Language/Literacy for a description and examples of how to approach today’s book reading. Key aspects are summarized below:

• Display book cover. Explain that we have read our book two times this week. Each time we read the book we learn something new. Point to and say title of book. Engage children in describing what they remember about the book:
  • What is our book about?
  • Who were the main characters in our book?
  • What happened first? What happened next?
• Point to and say the names of author and illustrator. Point to where to begin reading.
• During the reading, pause on pages that include a word defined in the prior two readings of the book. Ask or remind children what the word means. Also pause during the reading to define the 2–3 words identified for today’s session, using the following approach:
  • Read the sentence with the novel word. Identify the novel word.
  • Repeat the sentence in which the word is used.
  • Define the novel word and connect the definition to the book.
• After the book reading, write the 2–3 words targeted for today on the chart and engage children in a discussion of each word, using one or more of the following strategies:
  • Ask children to describe a picture related to the word.
  • Define a word without naming it and ask children to identify the word.
  • Encourage children to think about a novel word or phrase in another context.
• Explain that different types of things happened in our book. Facilitate a discussion of children’s interpretations of events and/or characters in the book, especially events or characters related to one or more words defined this week. See Week 3, Day 5 for examples.]

Offer the Week 3, Day 1 activity to review forming groups of two and three.

Engage children in making groups of “candles” (crayons) for pretend birthday cakes.

Give each child 10 crayons and one small plate. Explain that we will pretend the crayons are candles that each of us will put into groups for pretend birthday cakes. Our plate is a pretend cake. Demonstrate putting two crayons in a vertical (or horizontal) position on a plate. The group of two candles is for a child who is turning two years old.

Lead children in making a group of five candles on their plate for celebrating a five-year-old child’s birthday. Repeat with a different number to reinforce children’s understanding of how to make a group.

If children readily make groups you specify, add challenge by having children make a group of candles for any age they individually choose—up to 10 years. Invite each child to tell how many pretend candles they have put on their pretend cake. An additional option is to encourage children to pretend we are celebrating two children’s birthdays at the same time. Each child wants his/her own cake. Specify ages of each child, or encourage children to do so. If a second plate is not available for each child, children can form a second group of crayons outside of the plate for the second pretend cake.

We are learning about transportation. We know there are different ways to move from one place to another place.

A bus is one way people can move from one place to another place. A bus can carry lots of people from one place to another. We learned that there are different kinds of buses.

• What is one kind of bus we learned about? (school bus, touring bus, accessibility bus)

[Display picture of the bus a child names.]

• What can you tell us about this bus? 

We learned that tricycles and bicycles are other ways we can move from one place to another place.

[Display pictures of tricycle and bicycle.]

• A tricycle and a bicycle both have pedals. What part of our body do we use with pedals? (feet, legs)
  
• A tricycle and a bicycle both have handlebars. What do we do with handlebars when we ride a tricycle or bicycle? (hold on with our hands, point to where we want to go)
• How are tricycles and bicycles different? (number of wheels, location of pedals)

[Display picture of motorcycle.]

• How is a motorcycle different than a bicycle or tricycle? (it has a motor)

[Display pictures of passenger and freight trains.]

Trains are another kind of transportation. We talked about two different kinds of trains.

• What can you tell us about a passenger train?
• What can you tell us about a freight train?

[Display classroom book prepared on Day 4.]

Yesterday we made a book about a freight train. Each of us drew one kind of railroad car and included some items the car could carry.

Let’s talk about some of the items and railroad cars shown in our class book.

[Encourage children to describe what they see. It is not necessary for each page to be discussed or for each child to discuss his/her page.]

We are learning a lot about transportation. This week we talked about buses, bicycles, tricycles, motorcycles, and trains.

Offer the Week 19, Day 5 activity to review how cows are a source of milk.

Support children in understanding that goats can be a source of milk.

Open the session by reminding children that most of the milk people drink comes from cows. Use illustrations in From Grass to Milk (Start to Finish: Food) to briefly review how milk from a cow is safe for us to drink and is brought to a store where it can be bought. Also remind (or ask) children that dairy foods, such as yogurt, come from milk.

Explain that some people cannot drink milk from cows. They need milk from a different animal. Display the cover of Goats (Farm Animals). Explain that our book will tell us some things about goats. Point to pictured items that are described in the text, such as a goat’s horns and beard. Invite children to say “bleat!” together. Point out that the pizza being eaten by the pictured boy has lots of cheese, which is a dairy food. Use pictures at the end of the book to discuss book information of interest to children, such as how milk can be taken from a goat, a goat’s horns, and what grain looks like. Help children connect the topic of goats to their experiences and to prior attention to goats in your room.