Sight words
are words that good readers can recognize instantly without having to "sound
them out". Sight words are important because:
1. They make up a high percentage of the material that we read.
2. Many of them cannot be "sounded out".
3. If a reader spends too much time trying to decode words, he will lose fluency
and the meaning of the passage may be lost.
At our school,
we have divided sight words into "sets". The first set contains the
100 most common words found in children's books. The second set uses the Dolch
words, minus the 100 most common words found in the first set. The third and
fourth set are from Teaching Spelling by Gage Publishing. There are a
total of 590 words in the four sets of words.
The words in each set have been further divided into five groups of words which
we put on laminated coloured word cards and attach to a ring. The children take
these rings home to practice their words. When the child learns his words, he
returns the words to school and reads the words to his teacher. The child chooses
a small prize for every completed word ring. When a child has learned each of
the rings in a set of words, he takes a ring with all of the words in that set
home to practice. Our school administration has funded some of the prizes and
the remainder have been generously donated by parents and teachers.
A child who learns all four sets of words receives a book as a prize and is
presented with a certificate at an assembly. Children who learn by sight all
590 words will greatly improve their fluency and accuracy in reading.
For the entire list of sight words,
click here.