Rainbow Words

Over the years I have found that next to reading everyday, students being able to identify sight words is a key component in students ability to read. At my school we do a program called Rainbow Words to help kids learn their sight words.

Rainbow words are the Dolch pre-primer and primer words divided into groups of 8 words. Each group is then given a color. Students are given the red words to start and practice those words for a week. On Friday a parent volunteer comes in and quizzes students on those words if they know them all they are given the orange words. The next week if they know all of the red and all of the orange words they are given yellow words. This continues until students have mastered all of the words. Once they are able to identify all of the words we go back through the list to see who can write them. 

When we introduce Rainbow Words we sent a letter home to parents explaining the program and why we do it. You can view that letter here.

My wonderful teaching assistant has come up with this great way of making all the sets of Rainbow words. Each sheet contains 1 word 8 times. You copy the sheet on the correct construction paper stack all the sheets for that color on top of each other and use a paper cutter to cut them apart. When done this way you make 8 sets of Rainbow words at a time then all you have to do is hole punch them.  Want to use Rainbow Words in your class? Click HERE!