What are the high frequency words?

From looking at the above statisics, some teachers argue that it is important for your child to learns Sight Words because these are the words that are most frequently used in the English Language and they therefore provide an essential starting point for learning to become a confident reader. Indeed in many schools, a student's reading level is estimated by having them identify the Dolch Basic Sight Words. The number of words recognized is the basis for assigning his/her equivalent reading level.

No. OF DOLCH WORDS RECOGNIZED		ESTIMATED READING LEVEL
0 - 75		Pre-primer
76 - 120		Primer
121 - 170		1^stGrade
171 - 210		2^nd Grade
Above 210		3^rd Grade

I think there needs to be some caution in teaching sightwords. If you look at the list below, you can see that many of the words can be sounded out phoneticaly.

Here is a list of the High Frequency Word Lists:

Preprimer	Primer	First	Second	Third
a	all	after	always	about
and	am	again	around	better
away	are	an	because	bring
big	at	any	been	carry
blue	ate	as	before	clean
can	be	ask	best	cut
come	black	by	both	done
down	brown	could	buy	draw
find	but	every	call	drink
for	came	fly	cold	eight
funny	did	from	does	fall
go	do	give	don't	far
help	eat	going	fast	full
hers	four	had	first	got
I	get	has	five	grow
in	good	her	found	hold
is	has	him	gave	hot
it	he	how	goes	hurt
jump	into	just	green	if
little	like	know	its	keep
look	must	let	made	kind
make	new	live	many	laugh
me	no	may	off	light
my	now	of	or	long
not	on	old	pull	much
one	our	once	read	myself
play	out	open	right	never
red	please	over	sing	only
run	pretty	put	sit	own
said	ran	round	sleep	pick
see	ride	some	tell	seven
the	saw	stop	their	shall
three	say	take	these	show
to	she	thank	those	six
two	so	them	upon	small
up	soon	then	us	start
we	that	think	use	ten
yellow	there	walk	very	today
you	they	where	wash	together
	this	when	which	try
	too		why	warm
	under		wish
	want		work
	was		would
	well		write
	went		your
	what
	white
	who
	will
	with
	yes

Here are some high frequency words printables which include:

Sight Word Bingo printables, which come with printed sentence strips for practice using these words in context.
Word Search Puzzles which include all the Dolch sight words.
Dolch Flash Cards for the high frequency words & Record Chart

However, if you are teaching synthetic phonics then encourage your child to sound out the words where necessary rather than guess the sight word.

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High Frequency Words - Amazing Facts!