For students applying to grades 2–4.
What the test asks, 100 words to know, and how to study the rest.
The Primary levels — Primary 2, 3 and 4, for students applying to grades 2, 3 and 4 — have no separate vocabulary section. Unlike the Lower, Middle and Upper Levels, there is no Verbal Reasoning section with synonym questions. Vocabulary is tested inside the Reading section, where some questions ask what a word means in the passage. A child who knows the word, and can tell its meaning from the sentence, answers those quickly and has more time for the rest of the passage.
Primary Level words are the vocabulary of early chapter books and grade-school lessons: “ability”, “absorb”, “abnormal”. They name everyday actions, feelings and qualities — words a young reader meets in a story or a science lesson and needs to understand from the sentence around them.
A sample from the Primary list (the “Basic” level in the app and on this site), each with a definition and an example sentence. Every word links to its own page with pronunciation, synonyms, translations and a practice question.
or save it as a PDF from the print dialog.
100 words with definitions and example sentences · woodlogos.net/isee/vocabulary/primary-level/
The full Primary list is studied one word at a time: start a study session (choose “Basic”).
There are no Primary practice tests on this site — the Primary test has no synonym section to practise. The best practice is the words themselves: start a Basic study session and learn each word with its sentence. When your child moves up to the Lower Level, the ISEE practice tests show the Verbal Reasoning format.
For the whole test — levels, scoring and how to prepare — see the ISEE guide. Other levels: ISEE Lower Level vocabulary · ISEE Middle Level vocabulary · ISEE Upper Level vocabulary.
The ISEE Primary levels, for students applying to grades 2–4, test vocabulary inside the Reading section, through questions about what a word means in a passage; there is no separate synonym section. Primary Level words are the vocabulary of early chapter books and grade-school lessons: “ability”, “absorb”, “abnormal”. They name everyday actions, feelings and qualities — words a young reader meets in a story or a science lesson and needs to understand from the sentence around them.
Primary 2: 18 questions in 20 minutes (plus a short Auditory Comprehension section). Primary 3: 24 questions in 28 minutes. Primary 4: 28 questions in 30 minutes. Vocabulary questions are part of the Reading section; there is no separate vocabulary section at the Primary levels.
There is no official ISEE word list. The iSEE Vocab Primary list (called “Basic” in the app) has nearly 2,500 words chosen for this level; students who work through a list of that size, with example sentences, are well prepared for the vocabulary the test uses.
The Lower Level (grades 5–6) adds a separate Verbal Reasoning section with synonym and sentence completion questions; at the Primary levels, vocabulary is tested only through the reading passages.
Read together every day and stop at new words: ask what the word means from the sentence before looking it up. Learn each word with its example sentence — Primary questions ask what a word means in a passage, not in isolation. Keep sessions short: ten new words at a time, reviewed the next day, sticks better than a long list once a week.