Those who follow my alphabet lesson plans know, that I am a lover of theme teaching. The letter K is actually a concept, including letter recognition (I can point to the letter K.), letter naming (I can say K when I see it.) and phonics (I know that the letter K makes this sound.) Letters are concepts, not themes. In these lesson plans kites are the theme, which may even be a part of a larger theme like spring. During theme teaching learning revolves around the theme and the concepts, like the letter K, or shapes or colors are explored in relation to the theme. Skills are also practiced in relation to the theme. For example, cutting skills may be practiced during kite crafts or counting skills may be practiced as you add tails to your kites. The point is that letter K and the phonetic sound are important here but only a small part of the big picture as we learn many skills and concepts while having fun learning about kites.
All great lesson plans begin with great books.
Kite Flying by Grace Lin (Dell Dragonfly Books, 2002) is a fun story about a family that works together to build a dragon kite. It’s wonderful for this age group because it has simple sentences and many kindergarten sight words.
Phonics to explore while kites soar.
Whose name starts with the letter K? Don’t forget to talk about first names and last names. Let’s make it personal.
Now, let’s talk about other words that start with the letter K. There’s Kanga from Winnie the Pooh and of course, kangaroo, kite, kitten, and kettle too.
Teacher tip:
It is quite common for preschoolers or kindergarteners that are learning phonics to offer words that start with letter c when asked for a letter k word and vice versa. They are not yet spellers and so the important thing to point out when we get one of these answers is to say something like, “you’re right that (cake) starts with a sound just like k but we can’t add it to this list because it actually starts with c. It’s a really good guess though because these letters make the same sound, don’t they?” We never want to shut down a student that is offering a reasonable guess based on what they know. Avoid using the words “no” or “wrong” in your reply and find ways to keep your responses positive and encouraging.
Some of your student’s may not be familiar with a kettle. Bring one in and heat up some hands on learning for which they are yearning. Which brings us to the next lesson- rhyming words.
What rhymes with kite?
Rhymers will be readers. So with all your might, help young learners come up with light, night, bite,
Learning will fly with shapes, colors and counting, oh my!
During craft time, preschoolers and kindergarteners can explore the shape of a kite, a diamond. Show students how you can create a diamond shape with a single piece of paper, two pieces of paper that are triangles or even four pieces of paper that are smaller triangles. Of course, colors can be reinforced during this time too so have many options available to choose colors so that everyone’s kite will be unique.
Eating your words.
With some whole wheat or pita bread and a diamond shaped cookie cutter, kids can create kite snacks. Encourage them to decorate their snacks with two different spreads to illustrate the triangles inside the diamond. For example, try peanut butter and jelly, Nutella and marshmallow crème or hummus and guacamole.
Of course, this theme should be celebrated with a kite flying day for all.
More theme lesson plans:
Letter J is for Jack and Jill
Letter L is for Ladybugs
