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3Sight Words
u Skilled readers have a large vocabulary of automatically recognized sight words, built through frequent reading. Struggling readers tend to have a harder time building a large sight word vocabulary (Torgesen, Wagner, & Rashotte, 1999; Boardman et al., 2008).
u Many of the most high-frequency words cannot be sounded out based on orthographic patterns (Adams, 1994). Approximately 300 high-frequency words make up about 65 percent of all written material (Fry & Kress, 2006).
u Repeated, accurate reading of the same word eventually leads to the word being stored in memory as a sight word—one that is identified automatically and without conscious thought (Torgesen, Wagner, & Rashotte, 1999; Torgesen, 2002).
u A study of middle school students with disabilities found that direct instruction in improving sight word knowledge increases isolated sight word knowledge and decreases the likelihood of inaccurately reading the sight words in text passages (Ruwe, McLaughlin, Derby, & Johnson, 2011).
u Readers learn sight words by forming connections between phonemes and the letters that represent them. These connections help readers develop the necessary word memories for automatic sight word recognition (Ehri, 1998; Bhattacharya & Ehri, 2004).
RESEARCH & EXPERT OPINION
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