English and Language for Kids
Strong language skills help you read, write, speak and understand the world. These lessons explain grammar, spelling, punctuation, vocabulary and writing styles with clear examples, so you can practise each idea and check what you know with a quiz.
All 125 English and Language topics
Nouns
A noun names a person, place, thing or idea: teacher, Paris, apple, happiness.
Verbs
A verb is an action or state word: run, think, is.
Adjectives
Adjectives describe nouns: a tall tree, a red car, a funny joke.
Synonyms and Antonyms
Synonyms have similar meanings (big/large).
Punctuation
Full stops end statements, question marks end questions and commas separate parts of a sentence.
Similes and Metaphors
A simile compares using "like" or "as": as fast as a cheetah.
Prefixes and Suffixes
A prefix goes at the start of a word (un-happy), a suffix at the end (care-less).
Writing Paragraphs
A paragraph has a topic sentence, supporting details and a closing sentence.
Spelling Tricks
Use tricks like "i before e, except after c" and break long words into syllables.
Storytelling
A story has a beginning, middle and end, with characters, setting, and a problem that gets solved.
Pronouns
A pronoun replaces a noun so we don't repeat it.
Adverbs
An adverb describes a verb, telling how, when or where something happens.
Conjunctions
Conjunctions join words or sentences.
Prepositions
Prepositions show the position or relationship of one thing to another: in, on, under, beside, between.
Articles
A, an and the are articles.
Singular and Plural
Singular means one and plural means more than one.
Past, Present and Future Tense
Tense tells when something happens.
Contractions
A contraction joins two words and replaces missing letters with an apostrophe.
Apostrophes
Apostrophes show belonging (the dog's bone) and replace missing letters in contractions.
Homophones
Homophones sound the same but have different meanings and spellings, like there/their/they're, to/too/two and see/sea.
Idioms
An idiom is a phrase whose meaning isn't the literal words.
Alliteration
Alliteration repeats the same starting sound in nearby words: 'Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.' It makes writing fun and…
Onomatopoeia
Onomatopoeia words sound like what they describe: buzz, splash, boom, meow, sizzle.
Personification
Personification gives human qualities to non-human things: 'The wind whispered' or 'the sun smiled down'.
Rhyme and Poetry
Poems use rhythm, rhyme and imagery to express feelings.
Haiku
A haiku is a Japanese poem with three lines of 5, 7 and 5 syllables.
Fables
Fables are short stories with animals that teach a lesson, called a moral.
Fairy Tales
Fairy tales are magical stories with characters like princesses, giants and witches, and often start with 'Once upon a time'.
Using a Dictionary
A dictionary lists words alphabetically with meanings, spelling and pronunciation.
Alphabetical Order
Alphabetical order arranges words by their first letter, then the second, and so on.
Main Idea
The main idea is what a text is mostly about.
Reading Comprehension
Good readers understand what they read by asking questions, predicting, summarising and visualising.
Letter Writing
A letter has a date, greeting (Dear…), body paragraphs, a closing (Yours sincerely) and your name.
Persuasive Writing
Persuasive writing tries to convince the reader using clear opinions, reasons, facts and strong words.
Syllables
A syllable is a beat in a word.
Compound Words
A compound word joins two words to make a new one: sun + flower = sunflower, foot + ball = football.
Hello in Many Languages
People around the world speak thousands of languages.
Commas
A comma is a small mark that shows a short pause in a sentence.
Question Marks
A question mark goes at the end of a sentence that asks something.
Capital Letters
Capital letters are used at the start of sentences, for names of people and places, and for the word I.
Quotation Marks
Quotation marks show the exact words someone said or wrote.
Colons and Semicolons
A colon introduces a list, an explanation or an example.
Hyperbole
Hyperbole is an exaggeration used to make a point strongly, not to be taken literally.
Oxymorons
An oxymoron puts two opposite words together to create a special meaning, such as deafening silence or bittersweet.
Puns
A pun is a joke that plays on words with more than one meaning or sounds similar.
Sentence Types
There are four main sentence types: statements tell, questions ask, commands tell someone to do something, and exclamations show strong…
Subject and Predicate
Every complete sentence has a subject, which is who or what does the action, and a predicate, which tells what the subject does or is.
Direct and Indirect Speech
Direct speech repeats someone's exact words inside quotation marks.
Simple, Compound and Complex Sentences
A simple sentence has one main clause.
Narrative Writing
Narrative writing tells a story with a beginning, middle and end.
Diary Writing
A diary is a personal record of your thoughts and experiences, written in the first person.
Word Families
A word family is a group of words that share the same root or base, such as play, player, playful and replay.
Root Words
A root word is the main part of a word that carries its core meaning.
Silent Letters
Silent letters are letters that are written in a word but not pronounced, such as the k in knee or the b in lamb.
Blends and Digraphs
A consonant blend is two or three consonants that each keep their sound, such as bl in black.
Vowels and Consonants
Vowels are the letters a, e, i, o and u, and they make an open sound.
Skimming and Scanning
Skimming means quickly reading to get the main idea of a text.
Summarising
A summary is a short version of a text that includes only the main points in your own words.
Book Reviews
A book review shares your opinion of a book, describing what you liked, what you did not like and whether others should read it.
Limericks
A limerick is a funny five-line poem with a rhyme pattern of AABBA.
Acrostic Poems
An acrostic poem uses the letters of a word down the side as the first letter of each line.
Sonnets
A sonnet is a poem with 14 lines, often written in iambic pentameter with a set rhyme scheme.
Legends
A legend is a traditional story that may be based on real people or events but includes exaggerated or magical details.
Proverbs
A proverb is a short, wise saying that gives advice or shares a truth.
Tongue Twisters
A tongue twister is a phrase that is hard to say quickly because of similar sounds.
Interview Skills
An interview is a conversation where someone asks questions to learn about another person.
Question Words
Question words like who, what, where, when, why and how help us ask about people, things, places, times, reasons and methods.
Prefixes un- and re-
The prefix un- means 'not', so unhappy means not happy.
Dialogue Writing
Dialogue is the words spoken by characters in a story.
Sensory Words
Sensory words describe what we can see, hear, smell, taste and touch.
Word Puzzles
Word puzzles like crosswords, anagrams and word searches build vocabulary and spelling.
Making Notes
When you make notes, write only the key words and facts in your own style.
Rhyming Words
Rhyming words have the same ending sound, like cat and hat.
Story Openings
A good story opening grabs the reader's attention.
Writing Speeches
A speech is a spoken talk given to an audience.
Using a Thesaurus
A thesaurus is a book or tool that lists synonyms and antonyms for words.
Letter Sounds
Each letter, or group of letters, makes a sound.
Cinquain Poems
A cinquain is a five-line poem with a set pattern of words, often 2, 4, 6, 8 and 2 syllables in each line.
Possessive Nouns
A possessive noun shows that something belongs to someone or something.
Short Stories
A short story is a brief piece of fiction that focuses on one main event or idea.
Expanding Sentences
Expanding a sentence means adding details like adjectives, adverbs or phrases to make it more interesting.
Connecting Words
Connecting words like and, but, so and because join ideas together.
Paragraph Order
Paragraphs should follow a logical order so the reader can follow the story or argument.
Imagery in Poetry
Imagery in poetry uses vivid language to help readers picture, hear, smell, taste or feel something.
Formal and Informal Language
Formal language is polite and used in serious situations, like letters to a head teacher.
Sentence Starters
A sentence starter is a phrase that begins a sentence, like 'Suddenly', 'In the morning' or 'Without warning'.
Descriptive Paragraphs
A descriptive paragraph paints a picture with words.
Question Tags
A question tag is a short question added to the end of a sentence, such as 'It is cold, isn't it?' They are often used in speech to check…
Reading Aloud
Reading aloud helps you practise pronunciation, expression and confidence.
Word Meaning from Context
Sometimes you can work out a word's meaning from the words and sentences around it.
Tricky Plurals
Some plurals do not follow the usual rules.
Mnemonics
A mnemonic is a memory trick, such as a short phrase or rhyme, that helps you remember information.
Acronyms
An acronym is a word formed from the first letters of other words, such as NASA or UNESCO.
Abbreviations
An abbreviation is a shortened form of a word or phrase, such as Dr for Doctor or etc for et cetera.
Multiple Meaning Words
Some words have more than one meaning, such as bat, which can mean an animal or a piece of sports equipment.
Sentence Combining
Sentence combining joins short, choppy sentences together using connecting words.
Helping Verbs
Helping verbs work with main verbs to show tense, mood or voice.
Modal Verbs
Modal verbs, such as can, could, should, must and might, show ability, permission, possibility or obligation.
Gerunds
A gerund is a verb ending in -ing that works like a noun, as in 'Swimming is fun.' Gerunds can be the subject, object or complement of a…
Adjective Order
When you use several adjectives before a noun, they follow a usual order.
Writing Titles
A good title is short, catchy and gives the reader an idea of what the text is about.
Tone in Writing
Tone is the feeling a writer creates through word choice and style, such as serious, playful or angry.
Prefixes mis- and dis-
The prefix mis- means 'wrongly', so misread means to read wrongly.
Suffixes -ness and -ment
The suffix -ness turns an adjective into a noun, so happy becomes happiness.
Homographs
Homographs are words that are spelled the same but have different meanings and sometimes different pronunciations.
Comparative Adjectives
Comparative adjectives compare two things.
Superlative Adjectives
Superlative adjectives describe the most or least of something.
Antonym Pairs
Antonyms are words with opposite meanings, such as hot and cold, fast and slow, or bright and dark.
Greek and Latin Roots
Many English words come from Greek and Latin roots.
Word Origins
Word origins tell us where a word came from and how its meaning changed over time.
Loan Words
Loan words are words borrowed from one language and used in another, often with little change.
Proper Nouns
A proper noun is the name of a particular person, place or thing, and it always starts with a capital letter.
Abstract Nouns
An abstract noun names an idea, quality or feeling that you cannot touch or see, such as happiness, courage or freedom.
Collective Nouns
A collective noun names a group of people, animals or things.
Assonance
Assonance is the repetition of vowel sounds in nearby words, such as 'the rain in Spain'.
Repetition in Writing
Repetition means repeating a word or phrase for emphasis or effect.
Rhetorical Questions
A rhetorical question is asked for effect rather than to get an answer.
Anaphora
Anaphora is the repetition of the same word or phrase at the beginning of several sentences or lines.
Juxtaposition
Juxtaposition places two very different things side by side to create a contrast.
Irony
Irony is when the meaning of words or events is the opposite of what you expect.
Persuasive Techniques
Persuasive writing uses techniques such as facts, opinions, emotional language and questions to convince the reader.
Brainstorming Ideas
Brainstorming means creating lots of ideas quickly without judging them.
Editing Your Writing
Editing means checking your writing for mistakes and improving it.
Reading Between the Lines
Reading between the lines means working out what is implied in a text, even when it is not stated directly.
Story Settings
The setting of a story is the time and place where it happens.
Frequently asked questions about English and Language
How can children improve their English?
Read a little every day, keep a word journal, write short diary entries and talk about books. Practise one grammar idea at a time.
What is the difference between grammar and vocabulary?
Grammar is the set of rules for building sentences. Vocabulary is the words you know and use.
Why is punctuation important?
Punctuation shows where sentences start and stop and helps readers understand meaning, pauses and questions.