Are you ready for Halloween? Make sure you don't make these 10 mistakes this spooky season: Don’t muddle up the words witch and which! Our spelling game Which Witch is great for practice! Heard a scary sound? It’s a probably a creak, not a creek! As Frankenstein is a name, it needs capital letters. Make sure you don’t confuse forget the apostrophe if you’re writing about Frankenstein’s monster. Don’t get caught out by silent letters – watch out for the sneaky ‘h’ in the words ghost and ghoul . Describing somethin...
Happy Halloween to all our subscribers! This month we’ve been looking at all things spooky and scary in our Word for Wednesday blog posts. Have you ever seen a ghost? How about a were-hyena? Where does the word vampire come from? Who was Victor Frankenstein? We also stayed on theme in our 10 Words blog post where we shared alternatives for the word scary. Whether your Halloween plans are alarming, chilling, or eerie, we’ve got the right word for you. Maybe it’s because we’ve got handwashing on the brain, but this month we decided to base our Idioms blog post on hands. From lending a hand to having your hands tied, there are plenty of idioms to learn in ...
It’s time for our last Word for Wednesday post in October! This month’s blog posts have been themed around all things spooky and scary. So far, we’ve looked at the origins of the words ghost, werewolf, and vampire. Today’s word is technically the name of a character from a book. Frankenstein was written in 1818 by English author Mary Shelley. The story is about a scientist called Victor Frankenstein who, in an unusual experiment, creates a monstrous living creature out of old body parts. Here is how the creature is described in the book: “His limbs were in proportion, and I had selected his features as beautiful. Beautifu...
It’s ten days until Halloween and our October Word for Wednesday theme is all things spooky and scary. Have you had a chance to try out our Spooky Spelling game? Click here for five spooky spelling lists to play the game with. So far this month we’ve looked at the words ghost and werewolf. Today’s scary word is vampire! From Dracula to Buffy the Vampire Slayer to Twilight, there’s no doubt that the vampiric figure is popular when it comes to scary stories. The word is used to describe a corpse that rises at night to drink the blood of the living. Folk tales about vampires exist all over the world and details from how to create a vampire to how ...
Halloween is going to be different this year, but we’re still excited to celebrate all things spooky and scary in this month’s Word for Wednesday articles. Last week we looked at the word ghost and today’s word is werewolf. So what exactly is a werewolf? Sometimes referred to as a man-wolf or a lycanthrope, the werewolf suffers an affliction which forces it to change from a human to a wolf or wolf-like creature at the full moon. A human usually becomes contaminated after being bitten or scratched by another werewolf. The werewolf crops up in stories across Europe and evil shapeshifters appear in mythology from all over the world. Humans...
With Halloween at the end of the month, our Word for Wednesday theme for October is all things spooky and scary. The first word this month is ghost. A ghost is a spirit of a dead person that appears to the living, often as an image of what they looked like when they were alive. More recently the word has been used as a verb to describe the act of writing someone else’s work for them and, in an online dating context, the act of disappearing from a relationship by suddenly ending all communication. You can read about other words which have changed in meaning thanks to the internet and technology here. Ghost comes from the Old English ‘gast’ which meant ‘good or...
With one more day until Halloween, how could we resist choosing a scary Word for Wednesday? Today the word aghast might be used to describe someone who is struck with fear or dread. Here is the word used in some example sentences: He was aghast when he heard the news. The public were aghast to read about the horrific treatment of prisoners in the journalist’s exposé. Around 1300, the word 'agast’, meaning 'terrified' or 'suddenly filled with frightened amazement' started being used in English. It came from the Old English ‘gæsten’ meani...
Have you had a chance to play our new Spooky Spelling game? If not – make sure you have a go. The game is here for the spooky season only. In Spooky Spelling, you have to catch creepy spiders in order to spell words. Spelling games are great way to warm up at the start of a lesson, or to take a break with when you’re beginning to lose focus. They can be used with any of our thousands of spelling lists, or you can create your own spelling list of words you would like to practise. Once you have the words you want to learn, simply click on the football icon above the list and choose the game you want play, What’s better than a spooky s...
American vs. British English
Common Mistakes
Commonly Confused Words
English Idioms Explained
English Literature
Exams & Tests
Grammar & Punctuation
Mindful Spelling
Spelling at School
Spelling Games
Spelling Homework
Spelling Tips
Spellzone Tips & Tools
Supporting Adult Learners
Supporting Dyslexic Learners
Supporting EAL Learners
Word Origins & Stories
Writing & Vocabulary
"This is a fantastic opportunity for our students! I'm sure Spellzone will be invaluable in helping them to improve their spellings and therefore improve the quality of their writing in all subject areas!"
Teacher, High School, UKConnect with us at: 
