Why You Should Avoid the Dolch Sight Word Lists

Please, do not use Dolch Sight Words, Fry's 100 Instant Words, or any of the other standard collections of "sight words" to be memorized. The great majority of these "sight-words" are spelled completely phonetically.
Doing this is no different than using the long discredited "whole-word" method of teaching reading. Even those words that are a little trickier do have phonetic rules that they follow, or at least most of the word can be sounded out. Teaching sight words before children have a solid phonetic foundation gives them the idea that some or all words just have to be memorized. This will cause them more problems in the long run.

Sounding Out the Dolch Words

Dolch Words With Completely Easy Spellings

am, at, an, ask, and, can, cat, ran, man, had, fast, grass, hand
egg, let, get, tell, yes, ten, leg, men, red, bed, bell, well, help, best, nest, went
in, if, it, its, him, did, sit, big, six, hill, pig, will, milk, wind
on, off, top, not, got, box, hot, doll, dog, stop
us, up, cut, but, must, sun, run, just, jump
rabbit, seven, robin, upon

Dolch Words With the Key Sound Digraphs

sh - wish, fish, shall
th - this, them, then, with, that
ch - much, children
er - her, under, never, sister, after, better, letter, flower
ai - rain, chair
ee - see, green, keep, sleep, sheep, street, three, feet, tree, seed
oa - coat, boat
ue - blue
oo - look, wood, good
ou - out, ground, our, found, round
oy - toy, boy

Dolch Words With Other Common Digraphs

ay - play, day, say, way, may
ea - read, clean, eat
igh - light, right, night
ow - down, brown, now, how, cow

Dolch Words With Silent e

a_e - make, came, take, name, ate, cake, gave, game, made
e_e - here, these
i_e - nine, five, white*, like, ride, time
o_e - home, those
u_e - use

Further Reading

• Why Our Children Can't Read by Diane McGuinness
• Why Johnny Can't Read by Rudolf Flesch
• Why Johnny Still Can't Read by Rudolf Flesch