The words

Tap any word to hear it. 67 of these 100 words are in the app, where each has its own sentence.

Words 1 to 25

Two versions of the first hundred circulate. This is the one published by the Utah Education Network and California State University San Bernardino. Some reproductions print words for word, called for call, and swap oil and over for am and its.

Words 26 to 50

Words 51 to 75

Words 76 to 100

The second, third and later hundreds continue the same ranking and are not reproduced here.

What the first hundred is

Fry's 1,000 Instant Words are ranked by frequency in print and grouped in hundreds, so the first hundred is not a difficulty level, it is a frequency band: these are the words a reader meets most. That is why the rank order matters here in a way it does not on an alphabetical list. A peer-reviewed article in the Texas Journal of Literacy Education makes the point sharply: thirteen words alone, a, and, for, he, in, is, it, of, that, the, to, was and you, account for roughly a quarter of the words in school texts, and a list of 100 to 200 high-frequency words makes up over half of them. All thirteen are in this band.

Five minutes a day at home

Work down the ranking, not across it. Test the first twenty-five, secure what is missing, then move to the next twenty-five, because the top of the list pays back fastest. Three to five words per session: show the card, say the word, have your child repeat it, spell it aloud, say it whole, shuffle, repeat. Judge a word learned at about one second. Start each session with a reread of the previous set. Once a band is secure, read a real page and let your child count how many of the words they got without stopping. That is a better measure of progress than a card score.

How this fits with phonics

Because the band is chosen by frequency, roughly half of it is perfectly regular and the rest is not. Get, did, him, not, up, can, then and long need no memorizing. The, was, said, one, of, who, word, come and people are where the by-heart work belongs, and usually only one or two letters in each. The federal What Works Clearinghouse practice guide puts high-frequency word teaching inside its decoding recommendation for precisely this reason, and its own example splits words into irregular and regular columns before teaching. Making that split at your kitchen table takes two minutes and saves a great deal of pointless drilling.

Practice tips

  • Go in rank order. Words one to twenty-five are worth more practice time than words seventy-five to one hundred.
  • Split each band into sound-it-out words and by-heart words before you teach it.
  • Count how many band words your child reads without stopping on a real page. That is the measure that matters.
  • Three to five words per session, with a reread of the previous set first.
  • Do not run Fry and Dolch at the same time. Pick whichever list school uses.

Related lists

  • Fry sight words: Edward Fry's Instant Words are 1,000 words ranked by how often they appear in print, taught in hundreds.
  • High-frequency words: High-frequency words are the small group of words, usually put at 300 to 500, that account for a large share of everything in print.
  • Sight word flashcards: Flashcards work for sight words when they are used on a small stack of words a child does not yet know, with a fixed routine and daily review.

Sources