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Sight Words and Word Walls

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Sight words

Sight words are words

___________ word list is one commonly used list of sight words

Words appear on the list in order of _____________________ in children’s texts

Most common words first

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Characteristics of Sight Words

Three main characteristics– _________________________________– _________________________________– _________________________________

Dolch has 3 lists of 100 words (4 X 25) Words usually taught in groups of 5 or 10

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Why Learn Sight Words

First list of 25 makes up _____ of early written material

First list of 100 makes up____of early written material

When children quickly build a sight vocabulary they get an enormous boost in ability to read

____________________________________________________________________________________

The more often a reader stops to figure out a word, the less he understands a passage

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How to Teach Sight Words

There are many ways to teach sight words; this is only one example of how a teacher might systemically introduce sight words

Example

Grade one class

This week’s new words are

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Monday

Five new words posted on board

Teacher ____________________________________________________________________________________

“Find the word that starts with p”

“Find a word that ends with a /t/ sound”

“Can you find another word that ends with a /t/ sound?

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Sight Word Homework

This week’s five words go home on Monday night in each student’s agenda

Monday – _________________________– Print each word with different colour crayons

Tuesday– ___________________________ (draw a box around

contour) Wednesday

– ___________________________ (child builds words from letter cards sent home at beginning of semester)

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Thursday– __________________________ (child prints

each word five times)

Plus– After Christmas child prints a sentence with one

of the words (different word each night)

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At School

Teacher regularly talks about the words during the week

____________________________________________________________________________________

E.g. Today is Pizza Day. I want to eat pizza. On Friday class has spelling dictation (teacher says

the word and child has to write them but can use words on board as reference

Then words are posted on classroom word wall

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For Some Children…

For most children, these activities will be enough for them now to have these words as sight words ( they know them on sight)

For some children, much more repetition will be necessary and children will not learn these sight words as quickly

Other ___________________________ must be done to help a child build a sight vocabulary

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More ________________________ of previously learned words will also be necessary

Be able to describe a variety of hands on activities you could do with a small group of children who are having difficulty learning sight words. (see text)

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Word Walls

A word wall is a ____________________________________________________________________________

These words are a reference for children when they are writing a story (they are not able to use a dictionary yet)

Example– W w– when– who – want– we– went– was

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Word Walls

Words on word walls are _________________ and other words that teacher knows children often use in their writing (example, under P, the word Peterborough might appear for children who live in this city)

If a child is writing a sentence and doesn’t know how to spell a word, he thinks about how it starts and then checks that list.

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This helps the child become more __________________________________ and gets them used to consulting a source other than an adult.

Word walls are usually ________________________________________________________________________

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Working with Word Walls

Teachers / EAs need to work with word walls and the children to get them using the word wall

Today we might look at the “w’ list– Find a word that ends with the /t/ sound.– Find a word that rhymes with me.– Find a word …..

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________________________________________________________________________

Also, when asked by a child how to spell a word, check yourself to see if a word is on the word wall. (e.g. went)

If it is, ask “What sound do you hear at the beginning of the word? What list should we look at?

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Ask questions until the child is able to locate the word

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What To Do If a Child Asks You How to Spell a Word

________________________________________________________________________– Word wall– Sound it out (if it is phonetic)– Look on a map

Try to help the child figure out how to find the word rather than just telling them the word– ________________________________________

______________________________________

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Tell the child the word when-

Tell the child the word when– It will be hard to find (primary children haven’t yet

learned good dictionary skills)– ________________________________________

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