Vocabulary Teaching Resources
Explore vocabulary games, printable worksheets, cloze reading activities, task cards and more primary school teaching resources designed to help you help your students build their vocabulary skills!
This extensive collection of teaching resources has been created by teachers for teachers like you. Aligned to the Australian curriculum, the collection includes word-of-the-week activities, teaching presentations and more to save primary teachers time on lesson planning.
Created by expert teachers, each resource in this English collection has been carefully reviewed and curated by our team. That means it's ready to use in the classroom! You'll even find editable resources, plus differentiated options.
New to teaching this part of the English curriculum, or just looking for fresh ways to engage your students? Read on for a primer from our teaching team, including some vocabulary teaching techniques and tips for teaching this important part of the curriculum to your primary students.
What Is Vocabulary?
It may seem obvious, but let's start at the beginning.
In a primary school context, vocabulary can be defined as the set of words that a student is expected to know and understand. It includes not just the words themselves but also their meanings, spellings and how to use them in different contexts.
Teaching vocabulary at this level is focused on the development of a strong foundation of language skills, which will serve our students well as they continue to learn and communicate throughout their lives.
Vocabulary Teaching Techniques to Try in Your Classroom
Teaching vocabulary at the primary school level involves a host of different techniques to help students learn new words. Some of those include:
- Providing definitions and examples of words
- Using visual aids to help students understand new words
- Encouraging students to use new words in their writing
- Teaching students to use context clues to figure out the meaning of unfamiliar words
- Teaching students strategies to decode new words they encounter, including the introduction of common prefixes, suffixes and root words
Students need both explicit and implicit vocabulary instruction in primary school to learn new words as they will build a strong foundation of words, not just by picking them up while reading and listening to others, but also through direct instruction.
Teaching Vocabulary in Primary School
Teaching vocabulary for the first time? Here are some topics you can expect to cover, depending on your year level!
- Basic high-frequency words
- Vocabulary related to specific subjects
- Words with multiple meanings (and how to use them in context)
- Synonyms and antonyms
- Prefixes and suffixes
- Root words
- Words with irregular spellings and pronunciation
Vocabulary Teaching Ideas
Looking for some ideas to get your students excited about vocabulary? In addition to the teacher-created resources in this collection, here are a few favourite ideas from our teacher team!
Erase a Word Pronunciation Challenge
In this pronunciation game, you can select word lists related to current units or use a high frequency word list to improve student vocabulary.
Supplies
- 3 whiteboard erasers
- Vocabulary list(s)
How to Play
- Break students into three teams, and have them stand in lines in front of your whiteboard.
- Write three lists of words onto the board — one list in front of each team.
- On the teacher's signal, the first person from each team goes up to the board and reads aloud one of the words on the list.
- If they get the word correct, they erase the word and go to the back of their team's line.
- The first team to erase all of the words on their list is the winner.
A-Z Vocabulary Relay Race
This is a fun, physical vocabulary game that is great to play outdoors or in a large multi-purpose area. Students play in teams, racing to complete a list of words (one for every letter of the alphabet) around a familiar topic or theme.
Supplies
- pens or pencils
- A4 paper
- tape
How to Play
- Divide students into mixed-ability teams of 4 to 5 students.
- Students stand in a line on one side of the space. On the other side of the space, place a pen or pencil and tape to the ground a sheet of paper with the letters A-Z listed down the side.
- Choose a topic that the students are familiar with. This will be the theme for all the words the students write on their A-Z list. Alternatively, you can choose a unit you're currently studying as your topic.
- The race begins with the leader running to the paper and writing a word beginning with the letter A that is related to the theme. Once they've written the word — spelled correctly — they run back to their team.
- The next team member runs up to the paper and writes a word beginning with B, before running back to their team so a teammate can go up to write a word starting with C, and so on.
- If a student cannot come up with a word, they can call a friend to help. If they still can't come up with a word, they can call the teacher for help.
- Teams continue this word relay until they have written a word for every letter. The first team to complete their word list (and have it verified by the teacher!) are the winners.
Snake Words
In this game, students work in teams (similar to the A-Z relay detailed above) to create a word snake on the board. Students have a limited time (e.g. 10 seconds) to write their word or their team risks being eliminated.
Supplies
- 4 -5 different coloured whiteboard markers or chalk
- a timer or stopwatch
How to Play
- Split students into 4 to 5 mixed-ability teams of equal numbers.
- Have each team select a leader and send them to the classroom whiteboard.
- Team leaders should take a coloured marker and stand in a line.
- The teacher begins the game by writing a letter of the alphabet on the board, and starting the timer.
- The first team leader writes a word beginning with that letter and must complete the word within the time limit. For example, if the teacher wrote the letter G, they might write galaxy. Then they hand their marker to the next person in their team.
- The second team leader uses the last letter of the previous word as the first letter of the next word, also within the time limit. Using the example word above, the next student may write 'yoghurt.' Then they hand their marker to the next person from their team. Note: Students write the words without spaces, in essence creating a word snake. E.g. galaxyoghurt
- If a student cannot come up with a word within the time limit, they can pass it to the next team member, but you should set a limit to the number of passes each team can have. After this, the team is eliminated.
- The last team standing is the winner!
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Word Study Lists – Homophones
Introduce your students to the most common homophones with these two sets of comprehensive word lists.
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Homophones Poster Pack
Surround your students with examples of homophones with this set of 20 classroom posters.
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Suffixes Mini Book
Learn to make pancakes and use the suffixes -ed and -ing with a printable mini-book.
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Prefixes and Suffixes - Colour By Code Worksheets
Practise identifying words with affixes with a fun colour-by-code worksheet.
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Find The Imposter! Interactive Suffix Game
Practice using the suffixes -s and -es to pluralize words with an exciting FInd the Imposter Interactive activity.
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Prefixes and Suffixes Quiz
Assess your students’ knowledge of prefixes and suffixes with a vocabulary quiz.
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Word Building Bricks - Prefixes, Suffixes and Roots
Build, read and write multi-syllable words using prefixes, suffixes and base words with a fun word-building literacy activity.
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Prefix Bingo
Match prefix words to their definition by identifying the meaning of the prefix and the root word with a fun game of BINGO.
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Which Suffix is it? - Task Cards
Practise using suffixes in sentences with a set of printable suffix task cards.
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Greek and Latin Root Words - Illustrated Word Wall
Use word wall displays to build student vocabulary with daily exposure to Greek and Latin root words.
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Synonyms and Antonyms PowerPoint
Use this synonyms and antonyms PowerPoint to expand your students’ vocabularies and teach them about the nuances between words.
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What is an Affix? Suffix Puzzle Pack
Practice building, reading, and understanding the meaning of words with suffixes with a fun set of printable puzzles for kids.
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Greek and Latin Roots Poster Pack
Encourage vocabulary development with a set of 24 Greek and Latin Roots posters.
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Synonym and Antonym Posters
Print a pair of handy synonym and antonym anchor charts for your students to reference during writing lessons.
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Synonym Cards Match-Up Game
Download these synonym cards to help your students recognise words with similar meanings by playing an engaging, hands-on matching game.
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Roots Window Graphic Organiser
Organise ideas about roots and their origins with this graphic organiser.
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Morphology Match-Up Game
Consolidate your morphology lessons by ensuring students understand word parts terminology and the meanings of different word parts.
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Dice Roll Vocabulary Game
Use our Roll-the-Dice Vocabulary Game as an opportunity to help your students grow their vocabulary skills in the classroom.
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Words with Prefixes Worksheet - Prefix Re-
Build students' understanding of the prefix re-.with a printable prefix worksheet.
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I Have, Who Has? Homophones Game
Play a whole-class game to review common homophones and their meanings.
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Homophones Bingo
Make learning about homophones and their definitions an engaging whole-class activity with this homophones bingo game.
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My Word of the Week Mat
A fun worksheet to use in the classroom when building vocabulary.
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Shades of Meaning in Synonyms Poster
Teach shades of meaning in words with an instructional poster perfect for Year 4 classrooms.
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I Have, Who Has Prefix Game
Play an exciting prefix game to help your students identify and define words with the prefixes - pre, re, un, and dis.
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Root Words Activity - Word Family Flower Craft
Explore the power of grammatical morphemes and create a stunning flower craft that showcases their understanding of word families.
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Everyday Objects Vocabulary Charts
Use these Everyday Objects Vocabulary Charts in the Year 1 classroom to develop awareness of different vocabulary.
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Children’s Word of the Day - Tier 2 Vocab Warmup Slides
Boost academic vocabulary skills and provide your students with daily tier 2 vocabulary review using our Children’s Word of the Day Warmup Slides for Year 2.
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Context Clues - Printable Word Meaning Worksheet
Download a Context Clues - Printable Word Meaning Worksheet to help your students practice finding word meaning in context.
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Fast Finisher Vocabulary Task Cards - Upper Years
Boost student vocabulary skills with rigorous, engaging Vocabulary Task Cards for Fast Finishers.
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Vocabulary Foldables for Interactive Notebooks
Use Vocabulary Foldables to help your students demonstrate and review a variety of vocabulary concepts.
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Shades of Meaning Verb Flashcards
Encourage your students to use different shades of meaning in their sentence writing with this set of shades of meaning verb flashcards.
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Which Homophone? Interactive Game
Add some excitement to your vocabulary lessons with an interactive game exploring homophones and their definitions.