Dolch Sight Words List

Sight words are the words that turn up most often in everything a child reads, and many of them refuse to follow the rules phonics teaches. This Dolch sight words list puts all 220 Dolch service words in front of your students at once, sorted into the five levels Edward Dolch grouped them into: pre-primer, primer, first grade, second grade and third grade. A reader who can say these words instantly, instead of stopping to sound them out, has the whole rest of the sentence free for meaning.

How to use this Dolch sight words list

Print the pages you need and keep them where you teach. Read down a column together, one word at a time, and mark the ones your reader already owns. Come back to the same page a few days later and read it again, faster. Because this Dolch word list for second grade also carries the levels above and below it, you can start a struggling reader on the pre-primer page and stretch a strong reader onto the third grade page without hunting for another resource. The type is set large on purpose, so a child can read from the chart taped to a desk, a folder or the front board.

What is Included

• 1 print-ready PDF reference list, five pages
• All 220 Dolch service words, alphabetized inside each level
• Pre-Primer chart (40 words) and Primer chart (52 words)
• First Grade (41 words), Second Grade (46 words) and Third Grade (41 words) charts
• Large, easy-to-read type for reading aloud and for word building

Three reasons this helps kids

• Instant word recognition frees up the attention a child needs for comprehension.
• Seeing the whole level on one page shows a reader exactly how far they have come and what comes next.
• Short, repeated readings of a familiar chart build confidence far faster than a long list a child meets only once.

Ideas for teachers and parents

• Highlight every word your reader says correctly, then photograph the page as a progress record.
• Call out a word and have your student build it with letter tiles or magnetic letters.
• Send a level home in a folder for one minute of reading practice each night.
• Play a quick game of I Spy on the chart: name a word, and the first reader to point to it reads the next one.
• Use a level as a word bank while your students write, so their sentences stretch past the words they can already spell.

Related Resources

• Kindergarten Sight Words U to W Worksheet
• First Grade Sight Words Bingo
• Third Grade Sight Words S to W Worksheet
• Sight Word Songs Volume 3