def count_word(sentence): words = [] word = "" for character in sentence: if character.isalnum() or character == " ": word += character.lower() else: if word.strip("'"): words.append(words.strip("'")) word = "" if word.strip("'"): words.append(word.strip("'")) result = {} for word in words: result[word] = result.get(word, 0) + 1 return result