Improve reading by learning how to teach sight words using a research-based method. Perfect for teachers working with the Fry words.
With limited time to teach reading, it makes sense to focus on teaching words students will encounter frequently.
Enter: the Fry Words.
Dr. Edward Fry developed a list of the most commonly used words in reading materials for grades 3-9. Fry called the words on his list “instant words” because kids should learn to recognize them quickly. You’ll also hear them called “sight words” and “high-frequency words.”
How common are these words?
The first 25 Fry words make up about a third of all written material. The first 100 words make up about half of all written material, and the first 300 words account for about 65% of all written material. (Kress & Fry, 2016)
When kids can read a lot of the most common words, they are able to read text more fluently. When kids read fluently, they have an easier time comprehending what they read.
So, effective sight word instruction leads to better reading comprehension. (McArthur et al., 2015)
That’s a big deal!
Clearly, skill with sight words is important.
That means teachers must know how to teach sight words effectively.
What is the Best Way to Teach Fry Words?
The Traditional Method of Learning Sight Words –
Fry felt that the sight words should be learned through rote memorization. Kids would look at the words, be told what they said, and remember them. Teachers followed this advice for many years.
Unfortunately, this technique is not effective for many children.
We know that kids learn new words by turning letters into sounds and then blending the sounds into words. Going through this “sounding out” process helps kids to store the word in their memory for future reading. (see orthographic mapping).
Fry’s process of looking at a word, being told what it says and memorizing it steps around the sounding out (or orthographic mapping) process.
A New Method
Instead of teaching all sight words through memorization, a better approach is to integrate phonics when possible (2014, Ehri).
Phonics and Sight Words
All words are made up of letters and letter patterns that are either simple or challenging.
Simple letter patterns make their expected sounds. They are easy for kids to sound out. These are words like “just,”man”, or “set.”
Challenging patterns are not easy to sound out. They are either:
- irregular – they don’t make the expected sound (like the ai in “said”)
- inconsistent – the pattern has more than one sound it can make (like ow in “cow” or “snow“)
- unfamiliar – a phonics pattern the student hasn’t learned yet
Words can have all simple patterns, all challenging patterns, or a mix of simple/challenging.
Most of the Fry words have at least some simple patterns that can be sounded out. There are just a few Fry words that are made of only challenging patterns and must be learned through rote memorization.
Simple Fry words can be learned through phonics (or sounding-out).
For mixed simple/challenging pattern words, point out the patterns that must be memorized and use phonics to decode the rest.
Only the words that are not decodable at all will have to be learned solely through memorization.
You might be thinking, “Wait! Sight words are supposed to be memorized so students can read them quickly. We don’t want them to stop and sound these words out every time.”
That’s true. All of the sight words should eventually be memorized for fluent reading.
Fortunately, typically developing readers can commit words to memory after one to four repetitions of sounding them out (Reitsma, 1983).
Attention to Challenging Patterns
Learn sight words becomes more efficient when we help students differentiate the simple from the challenging letter patterns. This helps them see where to concentrate their memorization energy.
You can probably modify sight word activities you already do to bring a focus to challenging patterns.The pictures below show ways to draw students’ attention to the parts of the word they may need to memorize.
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You might be thinking, “Wait! Sight words are supposed to be memorized so students can read them quickly. We don’t want them to stop and sound these words out every time.”
That’s true. All of the sight words should eventually be memorized for fluent reading.
Fortunately, typically developing readers can commit words to memory after one to four repetitions of sounding them out (Reitsma, 1983).
If you’re ready to incorporate phonics into sight word instruction, you’ll need a simple lesson plan that you can use again and again.
An Effective Sight Word Lesson Plan
This lesson plan works for words with simple, challenging, and mixed simple/challenging patterns.
The goals of this lesson are to
- help students connect sight words to known phonics patterns
- point out patterns that must be memorized
For this lesson, students need either a recording page or a whiteboard.
- Listen – Say the word out loud. The word is “new,” as in “I have new shoes.”
- Make blanks – Students create a blank for each sound that they hear (in this case two blanks for /n/ /oo/).
- Fill in letters – Students write down the letters on the blanks that they think are needed to make each sound.
- Check the spelling – Give students the real spelling and have them compare with their spelling guess.
- Mark any patterns that need to be memorized.
- Record any other known words with the same pattern.
This is what the student records:
**Note: The ew pattern is considered decodable. I chose to mark it in this lesson because it’s less familiar for young students and there are many letter patterns that can potentially make the /ew/ sound (oo, ui, u_e). Memorizing the ew pattern as part of this sight word lesson will support students in more advanced phonics instruction later in the year.
Watch the video to see this lesson in action:
If you’re ready to improve reading by building phonics into your sight word instruction, I’ve designed a year-long resource just for you!
Save time – Plans and activities ready to go for the whole year
Teach effectively – lessons and activities based on research
Improve reading – lots of opportunities to achieve mastery with sight words
Find out more here:
Sight Word Activities for 1st Grade
Sight Word Activities for 2nd Grade
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References
Kress, J. E., & Fry, E. B. (2016). The reading teacher’s book of lists. Jossey-Bass, a Wiley brand.
(2014) Orthographic Mapping in the Acquisition of Sight Word Reading, Spelling Memory, and Vocabulary Learning, Scientific Studies of Reading, 18:1, 5-21, DOI: 10.1080/10888438.2013.819356
McArthur, G., Castles, A., Kohnen, S., Larsen, L., Jones, K., Anandakumar, T., & Banales, E. (2015). Sight word and phonics training in children with dyslexia. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 48, 391-407. doi:10.1177/0022219413504996
Reitsma, P. (1983). Printed word learning in beginning readers. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 36, 321-339.
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