Sight Word Activities

One of the most common activities that kindergarten and first-grade teachers send home is “Work on sight words.” but for a lot of parents, they don’t know what that might look like in their home.  I love teaching in a class, but one of my favorite jobs I have ever had was tutoring struggling readers. Working one on one allowed me to create creative, engaging activities for these children who had already decided that they weren’t readers; it took some seriously awesome sight word games and activities to convince them otherwise. Some of these sight word activities would work in a group setting, but they are perfect for the home too. 9

 

Not sure which sight words to use? I would suggest you ask your child’s teacher for a word list or at least the level they are presently at. If you have no guidance from your child’s teacher, you can find lists here for sight words and here for high-frequency words.  Recent research suggests that if we can decode ( sound it out) a sight word we should still teach our children to do that, followed by practice and memorization to work on recognizing the word by sight for fluency. To learn more about the difference between sight words and high-frequency words which gets somewhat technical, and why sight words are important this post explains it well if you are interested. This list of sight word activities can be used for both sight words and high-frequency words.

 

Sight Word Games And Activities For Home

Sight Word Jars  – build those words!

Listen & Find – Where the Wild Things Are – Sight Word Game & Free Printable – This is such a fun game, and I made it with my favorite book. If you don’t love the book, that’s fine! Check out the post and see how the game works and make your own with your child’s favorite book.

Roll & Read Sight Words  – this is a flexible sight word game that can be used for so much more than sight words.

Sight Word Water Balloon Game  – this is hands down the best sight word game ever.

“My word” bedtime reading game  – this was a popular game at our house during bedtime reading for many years.

Sight Word Scavenger Hunt  – get moving and learning with this game

Sight Word Dominoes & Speed Racer Game – this is a family favorite, and we haven’t really put it away since I made it when my now 3rd grader was in kindergarten. It’s even more fun now that two kids can play, and by fun, I mean the smack talk is insane.

Conversation Hearts – this is easy to adapt for sight words.

Outdoor Sight Word Hunt with Duplo. Make those “baby Lego” (that’s a direct quote from a child who shall remain anonymous and not my personal view of these rad blocks) work for your growing family. Use a sharpie to write the words on and dry-erase marker to erase the sharpie when you are done. Yes, yes, that works! This is one of my favorite homeschool sight word activities.

This sight word game is simple, but that’s perfect for the insanity going around us right now. Use a pencil if you want to use the same post-its over and over.