Imagine there are some words you see so often, you just know them instantly, like recognizing your friends’ faces. Those are sight words!

They are like the building blocks of reading. Kids learn to recognize these words “on sight” without having to sound them out letter by letter. This helps them read faster and smoother, because they don’t have to stop and figure out each word.

Think of it like this: when you see the word “the,” you don’t need to say “T-H-E” in your head, you just know it’s “the.” This lets you focus on understanding the whole sentence instead of getting stuck on individual words.

Here are some key things about sight words:

• They are very common words that appear often in books, stories, and everyday writing.
• They can be tricky to sound out because they don’t always follow the usual spelling rules (like “said” or “the”).
• Knowing them helps kids become confident readers who can understand sentences and stories better.