Language Arts Grade Four

Unit One, Lesson One: Letter Patterns

  1. pain
  2. stain
  3. train
  4. rain
  5. drain
  6. hibernation
  7. migration
  8. oxygen
  9. climate
  10. animals
  1. lizards
  2. turtles
  3. snakes
  4. shelter
  5. water
  6. dessert
  7. desert
  8. cactus
  9. mountains
  10. arid
Alphabetizing A List of Words

Let's say that you are asked to make a list of words from the list which end with the letter s and alphabetize them. 


   STEP ONE: List the words in the list that end with the letter s:

     animals
     lizards
     turtles
     cactus
     mountains
So, that gets us the words that end with the letter s, but we still must reorder them into alphabetical order. 

   STEP TWO: Alphabetize the list:

     animals
     cactus
     lizards
     mountains
     turtles
This time let's say that you must alphabetize the words that begin with the letter d. 

    drain
    dessert
    desert
At first alphabetizing these words may seem confusing since "desert" and "dessert" appear so similar. If we compare these words letter-by-letter it is easy to place them into correct alphabetical order. Looking at second letters, "drain" is clearly the last word in alphabetical order since "r" comes later in the alphabet than "e." The difference between "dessert" and "desert" (besides that one is sweet and the other sandy) is clear at the fourth letter. The "e" in "desert" comes before the "s" in "dessert." So, now we have an alphabetized list: 

   desert
   dessert
   drain

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