What are Red Words?
Orton-Gillingham Red Words are certain words that are phonetically irregular or non-decodable. Students have to memorize these words by heart. There are around 500 red words in English. In K-2 texts, students can find up to 200 non-decodable words. Some educators and curriculum creators call these words ‘unfair’.
As these words are irregular, they create difficulties in reading comprehension, reading speed, and fluency. That’s why teachers should pay extra attention to irregular words.
OG Red Words are not divided into fixed lists like Fry or Dolch Words. That means that schools and teachers create their lists for students.
A bit of history behind the Red Words
There is a list of only 160 common irregular words in the Orton-Gillingham Manual. Back in the 1920s, Dr. Samuel Torrey Orton, an enthusiastic neurologist and pathologist, and Anna Gillingham, a psychologist and talented educator, formulated a new innovative approach to teach students with dyslexia and other reading issues. 
Anna Gillingham compiled their findings and research on reading difficulties into a set of materials. Much later, together with Bessie Stillman, she arranged the materials into a logical system and scientific book named Gillingham Manual. That is where 160 Red Words come!
The multisensory, direct, systematic, individualized, and structured approach (the Orton-Gillingham Approach/ OGA) is the best way to teach Red Words to students with learning difficulties.
My Work on Red Words Resources
As there is no fixed list of irregular words, I had to create my lists. I divided all 160 words into ten lists according to length and frequency. I tried to group visually and phonetically similar words, for example, such-much, gone-done, folk-yolk, talk-walk, some-come, give-live, etc. That’s how my own Red Words lists appeared in my resources.
Last year I was a full-time teacher, so it took me eight long months to create Red Words Worksheets and Extra Activities. Worksheets include four pages to drill each red word. Students trace, build, finish, circle, and find only one red word at a time. Then Extra Activities appeared. These are tasks where ten words are mixed. Here students color by code, unscramble, circle, search, etc.
A bit later, I created the Spelling Dictionary, flashcards, bookmarks, board games, summer review worksheets, simple sentence fluency worksheets, Write the Room, etc.
