I feel that to have a successful lesson, there has to be some sort of creative aspect included. My teacher creativity is very present in this daily lesson because I developed the lesson with the help of my previous kindergarten teammate. As a team, we noticed that many of our students were not starting kindergarten with any prior knowledge of letters and letter sounds. Without this knowledge, kindergarten english language arts material is very difficult for many struggling students. Knowing the letters and their sounds is essential to have the opportunity to grow as a reader and writer and to have a strong literacy foundation. The original creation of the ABC book was in a paper format that had every letter (capital and lowercase) and an object that started with that letter on it. The books letter objects also corresponded with the YouTube video/song Learning Letter Sounds by Jack Hartmann. Pairing the ABC book and the YouTube video allowed the students to learn the letters and their sounds in a fun and creative way. This lesson was very successful for me for the past two years, but every lesson can always use some tweaks to make it new/novel to catch the students attention year after year. To make it novel this year, I changed the lesson from paper to digital. This new version includes many YouTube clickable links for extra assistance. Many students enjoy using their iPad in class, so creating the book into a digital version allows them to use technology. This digital version also allows them to access it anywhere and everywhere which is new for my students because in the past, they were unable to take the book home to practice. I feel that this lesson is very effective, because it allows my students the opportunity to learn their letters and letter sounds in a fun and engaging way. Many of my colleagues still are using old methods like flashcards and tape recorders to teach letters and sounds. These methods may be effective but are not engaging for the students. I feel if the students are not engaged in learning, they will not gain deep understandings of the material. My lesson is whole because my students are learning in new ways and are using many different pedagogical strategies to learn the letters, letter sounds and things that start with each letter.
