Elvira Dimas
Syllabication
Objective
The student will be able to read and divide words that follow the VCV long vowel pattern into
syllables.
VA SOL
English 5.8 The student will edit writing for correct spelling.
ACEI Standards
2.1 Reading, Writing, and Oral Language- Candidates demonstrate a high level of competence in
use of English language arts and they know, understand, and use concepts from reading,
language and child development, to teach reading, writing, speaking, viewing, listening, and
thinking skills and to help students successfully apply their developing skills to many different
situations, materials, and ideas.
I meet this standard by understanding the rules of syllabication and their importance to the
reading elements such as fluency, comprehension and spelling. With these skills, I am making
students aware of strategies useful in becoming better readers and writers.
Materials
SmartBoard
Interactive notebook
Note worksheet
Sentence strips
White paper for flip dictionary
Crayons/colored pencils
Preassessment
I preassessed my students with a quiz. The quiz listed words following a different syllabication
rule. They were instructed to divide each words into syllables. They were preassess on
suffix/prefix pattern, double consonant pattern, VCV long vowel pattern, VCV short vowel
pattern, VV pattern, and compound word pattern. They have been instructed in the past so this
preassessment was to decide which ones we needed to review.
VCV long e pattern data:
Os 1 / 4
Kev 1 / 4
R1/4
H3/4
E1/4
EmB 0 / 4
Ken 1 / 4
Ja 2 / 4
F3/4
Ze 0 / 4
Za 0 / 4
Ced 2 / 4
Jo 1 / 4
Col 2 / 4
Al 1 / 4
S4/4
Ro 2 / 4
Jar 0 / 4
W2/4
G0/4
My data shows me that more than half of the class struggles with VCV long vowel word
patterns.
Introduction (3 minutes)
How many of you have watched Mary Poppins? (Students raise hand). Great! Then I’m
sure you have heard of the word Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (written on the board).
Because it’s written on the board, it’s easy to spell it out, but imagine if it wasn’t on the
board. How difficult would that be! That is why syllabication is useful; so we can become
better readers and better spellers.
Instruction and Activity
Model (10 minutes)
Students will have a t-chart worksheet to fill in during my lesson. We won’t divide that
word into syllables just yet. First I want you all do divide two words for me. On your sheet
of paper, I want you to divide open.
I will give them a minute to divide the words.
Alright! Let me pick a stick and have that person come up and divide the word for us.
I expect them to divide it like op*en or o*pen.
Like other words that follow syllable patterns, believe follows one specific syllable rule, it is
called the VCV long vowel pattern. Students will fill this in their t-chart. The VCV long vowel
rule states that you will divide before the consonant because the vowel is long. Looking at
believe, what part of the word is VCV with a long vowel sound? ope!
Right so according to our rule where would we divide the syllables? After the o!
Correct! Now let’s fill in the rule for VCV long e patterns: when the sound of the vowel is
blank, you divide blank the consonant. They will answer while we read it.
Guided Practice (3 minutes)
Now it’s time for a challenge! On your desk you have a slip of paper. On that slip of paper,
there is a sentence. Your task is to read the sentence and find a word that follows the VCV
long vowel pattern. When you are done I want you to raise your hand and I will call you up
to write it on the board. This will be done silently.
We will go over them.
Independent Practice (10 minutes)
You all are so awesome! These are great examples to add to your notes. Once you have
added three examples to your worksheet you can glue it into your interactive notebook.
Our final activity is an important one! Like I mentioned before, one of my student teacher
friends needs your help. They are also studying syllables with similar rules. We have been
working on our mini dictionaries for them. As this our final rule, we need to add it to our
dictionary to make it complete!
Students have been adding these rules with examples and illustrations in a mini dictionary form.
Closure (2 minutes)
These mini dictionaries look fantastic boys and girls! I’m sure second grade will enjoy
them! Like we’ve learned, syllabication and these rules are helpful for us to read and spell
big and new words to make us better readers and writers. I’m so proud of you to help
second grade become better readers and writers as well!
Accommodations
With my lower readers (Za, G, Ja), I will accommodate by selecting appropriate vocabulary
words in their sentence strip. As well as for my higher readers (H, W, S, Ro), I will challenge
them by adding more difficult words in their sentence strip.
Because Ze is a student learning English, I will add a supplement with the difference between
short and long vowel sounds by using pictures of examples that begin with each different sound.
Assessment
I will administer a word division worksheet the following day during centers. This worksheet
will contain words that follow the rules we learned and reviewed this week.
During this lesson, I will make sure I emphasis the importance of syllabication. Because it is a
dry skill, students may not see the bigger picture in dividing words into syllables when reading
and writing. For this, I will use appropriate examples, such as words they may not be familiar.
That way we can break the word into syllables and experience the need of syllabication. I will
give explicit directions. I have to remember that though they are 5th graders, they still need
explicit directions to grasp the concept and application of syllabication. To achieve this I will
give clear instruction of what the skill is, give appropriate examples, and give clear directions for
the activity part.
Learning Evidence
The learning objective is that the student will be able to read and divide words that follow the
VCV long vowel pattern into syllables. To achieve this objective, I gave students a word division
worksheet in which their task was to divide the words in to syllables, according to the rule.
VCV long e pattern data:
Os 6 / 8
Kev 6 / 8
R5/8
H7/8
E8/8
EmB 7 / 8
Ken 6 / 8
Ja 8 / 8
F7/8
Ze 5 / 8
Za 6 / 8
Ced 8 / 8
Jo 6 / 8
Col 6 / 8
Al 5 / 8
S8/8
Ro 8 / 8
Jar 6 / 8
W6/8
G6/8
According to my data, the whole class could divide words that followed the VCV long vowel
sounds. They were eight words following that rule and everyone divided more than half of them
correctly. Before, students were not able to divide words that followed the VCV long vowel
sound. After noting the long vowel sounds and explaining the rule when dividing words with that
pattern, student were able to experience dividing word that fit the rule and made sense when
dividing it out loud. More exposure would be something I would keep trying to implement for
the next few days, because though they were able to correctly divide a lot of the words, they did
not divide them all correctly. As I proceed to teach stress in syllables, I plan to review this rule
and use words that follow this word pattern to also examine how stress becomes important in
syllabication.
Reflection
During this lesson, I really tried to monitor my way of teaching the skill. As fifth graders, they
are higher-level thinkers and teaching such a dry skill was difficult to make entertaining and
engaging. I feel as if I did engage all students. I tried to hook them with a fun way to understand
the importance of syllabication. From there, I used appropriate words to further the use of
syllabication. Aside from this lesson, I mentioned syllabication during reading and fluency
lessons. Before testing for winter Fountas and Pinnell reading levels, I stated how syllabication
can help students read unfamiliar words to improve fluency. Behavior management was not a
problem for I used the implemented system of points for rewards. I felt that the differentiated
sentences helped student become more familiar with words that follow the VCV long vowel rule
as they discussed their division of the words with their partners. As interactive as they were with
their partners, the students were interactive with me as I gave examples of words they practiced
dividing and they discussed their answers. One thing I would change about the lesson would be
to find a bigger challenge for students to apply the rule. I could have brought short stories or an
article with words that they may not have been exposed. This way they could have applied the
rule in to reading the word and knowing what the word meant if they had heard it in the past.