The Alphabet of Coins

Summary

Students will use letter and sound relationships of initial consonants to complete sentences that follow a given repeating pattern. These sentences will be based on coin terms found on the U.S. Mint Coin Classroom website.

Objectives

  • Students will use letter and sound relationships of initial consonants.
  • Students will complete a sentence that follows a given repeating pattern.
  • Students will identify and write the initial consonant in a given word.
  • Students will learn about coins and the history of money.

Subject Area

  • History & Government

Grades

  • K
  • 1st
  • 2nd

Class Time

  • Total Time: 0-45 Minutes minutes

Materials

  • Internet access
  • The U.S. Mint Coin Classroom website: http://www.usmint.gov/kids
  • Children's books about coins and money
  • Language Arts journals
  • Grade level appropriate picture story paper

Lesson Steps

Primary students love looking for patterns. This lesson allows students to create sentences while following a pattern and to learn about coins and the different resources on the U.S. Mint's Coin Classroom website.
  1. Explain to the students that they will each be creating one page of an alphabet book. Their page will follow a 3-sentence pattern like these:
    • Dana found a dime.  Dime begins with the letter D. A dime is worth ten cents.
    • Eddie found an Eagle. Eagle begins with the letter E. An eagle is on some U.S. quarters.
    • Frank found five cents. Five begins with the letter F. A nickel is worth five cents.
  2. Assign each student a letter of the alphabet. As a class, look through the U.S. Mint Coin Classroom website. As students look through the information, each student can be looking for words (nouns) that begin with their letter. (You may wish to develop a list of age-appropriate words for your students to read, rather than exploring the extensive coin glossary, which may not meet their needs. You may also choose to bring in sets of circulating coins for your students to inspect to help in their selection of coin terms.)
  3. Have each student find a fact about the word they found. Students can record their word and fact in their journal.
  4. Create and post a sample to show the class the pattern they will need to follow.
  5. Have your students write their sentences in their journals. Help your students proofread their writing if desired.
  6. Once all sentences have been reviewed, have your students rewrite and illustrate their sentences on the picture story paper.
  7. When the students have completed their page, assemble the classroom book and place it in the classroom library.

Differentiated Learning Options

  • Students can research and create their pages with an older student buddy.
  • Add the list of coin terms that your students generate to spelling lists or on your class "Word Wall." This will reinforce the sound patterns that your students have learned, and will help them when using these terms in future writings.

Assess

Evaluate the individual pages to see whether the students have met the lesson objectives.
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Common Core Standards

Discipline: Language Arts Domain: RF.K Reading: Foundational Skills Grade(s): Grade K Cluster: Print Concepts Standards:
  • RF.K.1. Demonstrate understanding of the organization and basic features of print.
    • Follow words from left to right, top to bottom, and page by page.
    • Recognize that spoken words are represented in written language by specific sequences of letters.
    • Understand that words are separated by spaces in print.
    • Recognize and name all upper- and lowercase letters of the alphabet.
Discipline: Language Arts Domain: RF.K Reading: Foundational Skills Grade(s): Grade K Cluster: Phonological Awareness Standards:
  • RF.K.2. Demonstrate understanding of spoken words, syllables, and sounds (phonemes).
    • Recognize and produce rhyming words.
    • Count, pronounce, blend, and segment syllables in spoken words.
    • Blend and segment onsets and rimes of single-syllable spoken words.
    • Isolate and pronounce the initial, medial vowel, and final sounds (phonemes) in three-phoneme (consonant-vowel-consonant, or CVC) words.1 (This does not include CVCs ending with /l/, /r/, or /x/.)
    • Add or substitute individual sounds (phonemes) in simple, one-syllable words to make new words.
Discipline: Language Arts Domain: RF.K Reading: Foundational Skills Grade(s): Grade K Cluster: Phonics and Word Recognition Standards:
  • RF.K.3. Know and apply grade-level phonics and word analysis skills in decoding words.
    • Demonstrate basic knowledge of one-to-one letter-sound correspondences by producing the primary sound or many of the most frequent sounds for each consonant.
    • Associate the long and short sounds with the common spellings (graphemes) for the five major vowels.
    • Read common high-frequency words by sight (e.g., the, of, to, you, she, my, is, are, do, does).
    • Distinguish between similarly spelled words by identifying the sounds of the letters that differ.
Discipline: Language Arts Domain: RF.K Reading: Foundational Skills Grade(s): Grade K Cluster: Fluency Standards:
  • RF.K.4. Read emergent-reader texts with purpose and understanding.
Discipline: Language Arts Domain: RL.1 Reading: Literature Grade(s): Grade K Cluster: Range of Reading and Level of Text Complexity Standards:
  • RL.1.10. With prompting and support, read prose and poetry of appropriate complexity for grade 1.
Discipline: Language Arts Domain: RF.1 Reading: Foundational Skills Grade(s): Grade K Cluster: Phonological Awareness Standards:
  • RF.1.2. Demonstrate understanding of spoken words, syllables, and sounds (phonemes).
    • Distinguish long from short vowel sounds in spoken single-syllable words.
    • Orally produce single-syllable words by blending sounds (phonemes), including consonant blends.
    • Isolate and pronounce initial, medial vowel, and final sounds (phonemes) in spoken single-syllable words.
    • Segment spoken single-syllable words into their complete sequence of individual sounds (phonemes).
Discipline: Language Arts Domain: RF.1 Reading: Foundational Skills Grade(s): Grade K Cluster: Phonics and Word Recognition Standards:
  • RF.1.3. Know and apply grade-level phonics and word analysis skills in decoding words.
    • Know the spelling-sound correspondences for common consonant digraphs.
    • Decode regularly spelled one-syllable words.
    • Know final -e and common vowel team conventions for representing long vowel sounds.
    • Use knowledge that every syllable must have a vowel sound to determine the number of syllables in a printed word.
    • Decode two-syllable words following basic patterns by breaking the words into syllables.
    • Read words with inflectional endings.
    • Recognize and read grade-appropriate irregularly spelled words.
Discipline: Language Arts Domain: RF.1 Reading: Foundational Skills Grade(s): Grade K Cluster: Fluency Standards:
  • RF.1.4. Read with sufficient accuracy and fluency to support comprehension.
    • Read grade-level text with purpose and understanding.
    • Read grade-level text orally with accuracy, appropriate rate, and expression on successive readings.
    • Use context to confirm or self-correct word recognition and understanding, rereading as necessary.
Discipline: Language Arts Domain: RL.2 Reading: Foundational Skills Grade(s): Grade K Cluster: Fluency Standards:
  • RF.2.4. Read with sufficient accuracy and fluency to support comprehension.
    • Read grade-level text with purpose and understanding.
    • Read grade-level text orally with accuracy, appropriate rate, and expression on successive readings.
    • Use context to confirm or self-correct word recognition and understanding, rereading as necessary.
Discipline: Language Arts Domain: RL.2 Reading: Foundational Skills Grade(s): Grade K Cluster: Phonics and Word Recognition Standards:
  • RF.2.3. Know and apply grade-level phonics and word analysis skills in decoding words.
    • Distinguish long and short vowels when reading regularly spelled one-syllable words.
    • Know spelling-sound correspondences for additional common vowel teams.
    • Decode regularly spelled two-syllable words with long vowels.
    • Decode words with common prefixes and suffixes.
    • Identify words with inconsistent but common spelling-sound correspondences.
    • Recognize and read grade-appropriate irregularly spelled words.

National Standards

This lesson plan is not associated with any National Standards.