Draw and Write Together: “Ryan Reads”

  • index cards (large)
  • marker
  • paper
  • "Rr" pictionary (children made from Day 2)
  • “Ryan Reads poem chart

MA Standards:

Foundational Skills: RF.PK.MA.3.a: Link an initial sound to a picture of an object that begins with that sound and, with guidance and support, to the corresponding printed letter
Foundational Skills: RF.PK.MA.2.c: Identify the initial sound of a spoken word and, with guidance and support, generate several other words that have the same initial sound

Head Start Outcomes:

Literacy Knowledge/Alphabet Knowledge: Recognizes that the letters of the alphabet are a special category of visual graphics that can be individually named.
Literacy Knowledge/Print Concepts and Conventions: Understands conventions, such as print moves from left to right and top to bottom of a page.

PreK Learning Guidelines:

English Language Arts/Reading and Literature 7: Develop familiarity with the forms of alphabet letters, awareness of print, and letter forms.
English Language Arts/Reading and Literature 14: Recognize and supply rhythm and rhyme in poetry.
English Language Arts/Reading and Literature 8: Listen to, identify, and manipulate language sounds to develop auditory discrimination and phonemic awareness.

Draw and Write Together: “Ryan Reads”

© Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Department of Early Education and Care (Jennifer Waddell photographer). All rights reserved.

ELA Focus Skills: Letter Recognition, Phonological Awareness, Vocabulary

Display the “Ryan Reads” poem chart. Highlight the last word in each of the first three lines of stanza one (rabbits, rings, rainbows).

  • Then place a blank index card on each of the "r" words. Tell children that they will write their own version of the poem by having Ryan read about three new things beginning with the letter "r."
  • Display the labeled pictures children made for the mini-dictionary of things beginning with the letter "r." Repeat the words with children. Have children choose an "r" picture-word to  dictate, write, or draw at the end of each line. Then point to the words as you read the new poem with the three new picture words.
  • Read the poem again and have children clap out the syllables to the "r" words they inserted. 

Take It Further: Choose one line to repeat, such as “Ribbons, raspberries, and rain,” and point to each letter "r" at the beginning of each word. Have children say the sentence with you, faster and faster. Say, Wow, my tongue gets all twisted up when I say the words faster and faster. Does your tongue get all twisted up?  Explain that sentences like this, with lots of words beginning with the same sound, are called “tongue twisters.”

Adaptation: Invite older children to use the picture/word cards to create alliterative sentences of their own. Read their sentences with them, faster and faster.

Ryan Reads
Ryan reads about rabbits.
Raisins, radishes, and rings.
Refrigerators and rainbows,
Roosters, and rockets and things.

Ryan reads about rhinos,
Ribbons, raspberries, and rain.
Reindeer, raccoons, and robots,
Then reads about rabbits again!

Ryan really likes to read,
It’s his favorite thing to do,
And Robbie and Ronda, his rabbits,
Like it when Ryan reads, too!

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