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The Importance of Learning Sight Words
Reading is all about constructing meaning from text. The meaning is
derived from what readers bring to the text as well as what they
discern from the text. That meaning is dependent on the rapid,
automatic, and effortless recognition of words. According to Patricia
Cunningham in Phonics They Use, “In order to read and write fluently
with comprehension and meaning, children must be able to automatically
read and spell the most frequent words. As the store of words they can
automatically read and spell increases, so will their speed and
comprehension.”
Readers need to recognize each word as quickly and effortlessly as
possible so that they can pay attention to the more mentally demanding
task of understanding what they are reading. “When children at an
early age learn to recognize and automatically spell the most
frequently occurring words, all their attention is freed for decoding
and spelling less frequent words and more importantly, for processing
meaning.” (Cunningham, 2000)
Ways to Practice Sight Words
1. Rice tray-Say and spell:
• Read through each sight word- For unknown sight words-
• Have the child repeat the sight word
• Have the child trace the letters of the word in the rice. As they
trace the letters they should be naming the letters in the word
out-loud. Repeat this activity with any sight word that is unknown.
2. Play coin toss - words on floor - children take turns to toss a
coin onto a word and say that word.
3. Play Hangman using the word card words.
4. How quickly can you find a certain word in individual reading books.
5. Play dominoes using same end letter/ beginning letter.
6. Circle letters within words using whiteboard marker on laminated
word cards.
7. Circle smaller words within words using whiteboard marker on
laminated word cards.
8. Place word cards in alphabetical order.
9. Around the World Words – flash a word – first player to say word
out of that pair moves on to the next person to make a pair and
an-other word is flashed, etc, etc.
10. Play ‘tic tac toe, here I go, where I stop I do not know’ -
children say the word that you stop on...
11. Play stepping stones - place words on the floor and children walk
over them saying the word as they go to get to the other side of the
stream.
12. Make words using playdough.
13. Make words using letter tiles -scrabble pieces.
14. Make words using magnetic letters.
15. Beat the clock - How many times can a word be written in 1 minute etc.
16. Children write their words in list form and then write over the
words 2 or more times using different colors to create rainbow words.
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