Free Printable Dolch Data Forms — Checklists

Free Printable Checklists for Each of the Dolch Grade Levels.

The first step teaches sight words to children with disabilities is to take a baseline of students' reading vocabulary. Start with the "pre-primer" word list, and stop when students' performance falls below 60 percent accuracy of the words in a grade level list. Using the Dolch Flash Cards, you can simply place the incorrectly read words in one pile, and the correctly read words in another pile and complete the checklist from the two stacks.

Once you have created a baseline for your student's sight vocabulary, pull the Dolch Flash Cards you need and begin to teach them.  Teaching should probably include:

• Start with the irregular spellings, like the, is, etc. that appear frequently in text.
• Create opportunities for students to read the unfamiliar words in sentences, perhaps even helping them dictate a sentence.
• Search Reading A-Z for the sight words you are using, and give students opportunities to read them and use the words in context.
• Create games, like Memory, where the student will match pairs of words. 

The words in activities, such as I provide here: Dolch Cloze Activities.  These free printables provide practice for reading the high-frequency words in context.

The Checklist/Data Sheets

• Pre-primer checklist/data sheets.
• Dolch Primer checklist/data sheets.
• Dolch First Grade checklist/data sheets.
• Dolch Second Grade checklist/data sheets.
• Dolch Third Grade checklist/data sheets.

Data Collection

These checklist/data sheets make data collection pretty straightforward: all you need to do is to record the student's responses as you flip through each level's flashcards.  You might also present the cards in mixed order and place words that are read in one stack, the words that are not read in the other stack, then record the words later.  The checklist/data sheets are in alphabetical order to help you identify the words quickly.

Sample IEP Goals

 When given the Pre-primer Dolch High-Frequency Words on Flashcards, Jimmy Student will correctly read 80% in three out of four consecutive trials as implemented by special education teacher and teaching staff.

Given the First Grade Dolch High-Frequency Words on Flashcards, Linda Pupil will correctly read 32 of 41 words (80%) in three out of four consecutive trials as implemented by special education teacher and teaching staff.

When presented with the Third Grade Dolch High-Frequency Words on Flashcard, Liza Pupil will correctly read 80% of words in out of four consecutive trials as implemented by special education teacher and teaching staff.