Dolch List of 220 Sight Words - By Parts of Speech

Edward William Dolch, Ph.D. created a list of 220 sight words which contains conjunctions, prepositions, pronouns, adverbs, adjectives and verbs. He referred to these words as “tool” or “service” words because these words are found in all reading material, regardless of the subject matter. The same cannot be said of nouns; they are directly related to a subject matter. As a result, he created a separate word list which contains 95 nouns.

Early emergent readers should focus on instantly recognizing by sight these 220 words. Dolch’s list of 220 sight words categorized based on parts of speech is listed below.

Sight Words: Conjunctions

They join words or parts of a sentence; connectors.

and

as

because

but

if

or

Sight words: Prepositions

They show position or time and can compare or contrast; locators.

about	after	at	by	down
for	from	in	into	of
on	over	to	under	upon	with

Sight Words: Pronouns

They take the place of nouns; substitutes.
They can indicate ownership and used to ask questions.

he	her	him	his	I
it	its	me	my	myself
our	she	that	their	them
these	they	this	those	us
we	what	which	who	you	your

Sight Words: Adverbs

They modify verbs (adjectives and adverbs too); describers.
When? How? How much? Where? To what extent?

again	always	around	away	before
far	fast	first	here	how
just	much	never	no	not
now	off	once	only	out
so	soon	then	there	today
together	too	up	very	well
when	where	why	yes

Sight Words: Adjectives

They describe or modify nouns (adjectives too); describers.
Describes a person, place, or thing.

a	all	an	any	best
better	big	black	blue	both
brown	clean	cold	eight	every
five	four	full	funny	good
green	hot	kind	light	little
long	many	new	old	one
own	pretty	red	right	round
seven	six	small	some	ten
the	three	two	warm	white
yellow

Sight Words: Verbs

They show action or state of being.

am	are	ask	ate	be
been	bring	buy	call	came
can	carry	come	could	cut
did	do	does	done	don’t
draw	drink	eat	fall	find
fly	found	gave	get	give
go	goes	going	got	grow
had	has	have	help	hold
hurt	is	jump	keep	know
laugh	let	like	live	look
made	make	may	must	open
pick	play	please	pull	put
ran	read	ride	run	said
saw	say	see	shall	show
sing	sit	sleep	start	stop
take	tell	thank	think	try
use	walk	want	was	wash
went	were	will	wish	work
would	write

Source: Edward William Dolch, Ph.D., Problems in Reading.
College of Education, University of Illinois, 1948.