How it works
- Choose a list: one of the five Dolch levels, or your own words.
- Leave out any words your class already knows by tapping them.
- Pick practice pages, flash cards or both, and a handwriting style for tracing.
- Download one PDF: a page for every word, then the cards to cut out.
Five steps on every page
Each practice page works through one word the same way, so children soon know what to do on their own: read the word in big print, trace it, write it twice, find it among words that look alike, and spell it letter by letter in boxes. The “circle every” puzzle uses words of a similar length from the Dolch lists, so children have to look at every letter.
The Dolch sight word lists
Edward William Dolch published his list of 220 “service words” in 1936, drawn from the books children read at the time. The words are still the backbone of many North American reading programs. Here is every word, by level:
Pre-primer (40 words)
a, and, away, big, blue, can, come, down, find, for, funny, go, help, here, I, in, is, it, jump, little, look, make, me, my, not, one, play, red, run, said, see, the, three, to, two, up, we, where, yellow, you
Primer (52 words)
all, am, are, at, ate, be, black, brown, but, came, did, do, eat, four, get, good, have, he, into, like, must, new, no, now, on, our, out, please, pretty, ran, ride, saw, say, she, so, soon, that, there, they, this, too, under, want, was, well, went, what, white, who, will, with, yes
First grade (41 words)
after, again, an, any, as, ask, by, could, every, fly, from, give, going, had, has, her, him, his, how, just, know, let, live, may, of, old, once, open, over, put, round, some, stop, take, thank, them, then, think, walk, were, when
Second grade (46 words)
always, around, because, been, before, best, both, buy, call, cold, does, don't, fast, first, five, found, gave, goes, green, its, made, many, off, or, pull, read, right, sing, sit, sleep, tell, their, these, those, upon, us, use, very, wash, which, why, wish, work, would, write, your
Third grade (41 words)
about, better, bring, carry, clean, cut, done, draw, drink, eight, fall, far, full, got, grow, hold, hot, hurt, if, keep, kind, laugh, light, long, much, myself, never, only, own, pick, seven, shall, show, six, small, start, ten, today, together, try, warm
Provincial curriculum links
- BC KRecognizing some familiar words, including names and print in the world around them, such as signs.
- BC Grade 1–3Identifying familiar and “sight” words, alongside decoding with phonics.
- ON Grade 1–3Word-level reading is taught explicitly and systematically in the Foundations of Language strand (2023).
The Dolch lists are American, and neither Ontario’s nor BC’s curriculum sets out a sight word list, so Canadian schools and boards often use their own high-frequency word lists. Choose My own words to match yours.
Pointing out the regular letters in a word like said (the s and the d) before working on the tricky middle fits the explicit, phonics-first approach of Ontario’s 2023 Language curriculum, and BC’s pairing of sight words with decoding. Three or four new words a week leaves time for both.
Summarized in our own words from BC English Language Arts (K–3) and The Ontario Curriculum, Grades 1–8: Language (2023).
