Worksheets for Teachers
Did someone say printable worksheets? From year 1 maths worksheets to reading comprehension worksheets to printables for kindergarten and beyond, our collection of teacher-created teaching tools is ready to make learning fun and engaging for your students in all subject areas and on all primary year levels.
Explore printable activities, free worksheets, homework sheets and more — all aligned to the Australian curriculum and all created by teachers, for teachers just like you!
Teach Starter worksheets undergo a careful review process by our expert teacher team to ensure they're ready for your lesson plans ... and your students! Best of all, you know each printable is designed with the goal of turning on that lightbulb over your students' heads and producing more of those 'aha!' moments in the classroom!
Curious about how to make worksheets more engaging? Or maybe you're just wondering how worksheets became a tool used in schools? Read on for a primer from our teacher team!
Why Do Teachers Use Worksheets?
Worksheets are an important part of any teacher's toolkit — and yes, we say part because we believe in the importance of hands-on learning too (explore our full collection for plenty of student-led activities!) — but do you ever wonder how they ended up being so ubiquitous?
It was back in the mid-20th century that worksheets started to take hold in education.
The concept of individualised instruction was gaining traction, and educators recognised the need to tailor learning experiences to students' unique abilities, interests and learning styles.
Worksheets started to emerge because they were a means to provide students with both individualised practice and reinforcement of skills. Psychologists like Jean Piaget (you may know him best for his theories on children's cognitive development?) played a role here. The Swiss psychologist suggested teachers should be providing their students with materials that would advance their thinking, and worksheets offer a means for students to assess their own learning.
The real win for worksheets, however, was the invention of the photocopy machine! It made it easy for this supplemental tool to spread like wildfire!
How Do You Make Worksheets Engaging?
You already know educational printables are a beneficial learning tool. They enable students to work independently, practising and applying the concepts they've been learning in your classroom.
So how do you keep them from putting your students in boxes?
At Teach Starter, our worksheets aren't 'just worksheets.' Our expert teacher team works every day to create the tools you need to create impactful classroom experiences. That means our teacher team creates our school worksheets specifically to engage students with eye-catching graphics and creative formats. Here are some of their tips to ensure worksheets are used effectively in the classroom — and truly help engage your students!
- Use worksheets as just part of your toolbox. These are great tools to support classroom instruction and provide independent practise, and they should be balanced with a mix of other teaching tools!
- Mix up your worksheet types. Teach Starter's cut-and-paste worksheets, for example, add an interactive element to help hold students' attention.
- Encourage students to doodle. Doodle notes have taken education by storm in recent years as the visual note-taking method has been proven to improve students' focus and memory. Apply those benefits to your worksheets, and you may be surprised by how it pulls kids' attention to the page!
- Add plastic sleeves. Slipping worksheets into plastic sleeves and allow students to use wipe-away pens on the sleeves is a good way to extend the life of a worksheet — and it adds and element of fun for kids who love the chance to use pens!
- Use digital worksheets. Allow students to fill out their worksheets on classroom tablets as a means to add an extra level of engagement.
It's Not Just a Worksheet
The key to effective worksheets comes down to how you use them — a balanced approach to education combines worksheets with other instructional strategies — from hands-on activities to group work to project-based learning.
So what can you get from worksheets?
Consider this — early years students can work on their fine motor skills with our mini books, cut-and-paste worksheets and more while their upper years peers get pulled into the fun of vocabulary fun with word searches and crossword puzzle worksheets. Printable puzzles that engage students in the form of a brain game and colour by worksheets that bring art elements into maths and reading.
Worksheets also provide the opportunity for formative assessment and give your students a chance to practice problem-solving while they work independently.
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Subject and Object Pronouns Worksheet
Download this 2-page worksheet to get your students using objective and subjective pronouns.
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Identify and Colour 2D Shapes Worksheet
Use this 2D shapes worksheet to help your students identify 8 of the most common two-dimensional shapes.
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Find the Numbers - Worksheets for Kindergarten
Practise number identification with printable Number Hunt Math Worksheets for kindergarten.
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Which Unit of Measurement? - Length Worksheets
Identify the unit of measurement needed to measure the length of an object with a pack of ‘Which Unit of Measurement’ Worksheets.
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Writing Out Loud: Dialogue Punctuation Worksheet
Practise using double quotation marks in writing with a Punctuating Dialogue worksheet.
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The Number of Days in Each Month - Colour By Code
Help you rstudents remember the number of days in each month with a colour-by-code worksheet.
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Order Up! Elapsed Time Puzzles
Practise determining elapsed time with a printable pack of nine Order Up! Elapsed Time Cut and Paste Puzzle Strips.
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Adaptive Animals of the Arctic - Adaptations Worksheets
Explore the adaptations of polar animals and discover how they help them survive with a set of cut-and-paste labelling activity sheets.
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Animal Adaptations - Informative Writing Prompt Worksheets
Write to describe animals and their adaptations with a printable pack of informative writing worksheets.
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Characteristics of Animal Classes - Cut and Paste Worksheet
Identify the characteristics and features of different animal classifications with a cut-and-paste activity.
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Telling 24 Hour Time - Clock Worksheet
Download a free Year 5 Telling Time worksheet to practise telling time on a 24-hour clock.
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Platypus Adaptations - Reading Passage & Questions
Learn about the physical and behavioural adaptations of the platypus with a set of printable reading comprehension worksheets for Year 3.
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Colour-Coding Summarising Nonfiction Text Worksheets
Practise summarising small nonfiction texts with this fun colour-coding set of worksheets.
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Naming Decimals Worksheet
Get students applying decimal place value skills to represent numbers to the thousandths place in standard, word and expanded form.
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Year 3 Sources of Heat Worksheet Pack
Learn all about different thermal energy sources with this set of heat worksheets.
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Forms of Energy (Heat, Light and Sound) Worksheet
Guide your students to identify different forms of energy with this cut and paste worksheet.
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What Are Floods? Comprehension Worksheet
Read and learn about flooding with a printable reading comprehension worksheet.
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Weathering, Erosion and Deposition Colour By Code Worksheet
Guide your students to differentiate between examples of weathering, erosion and deposition with this colour-by-code science worksheet.
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Snail Trail Odd and Even Properties Worksheet
Help students identify the properties of odd and even numbers and using the ‘rules’ when calculating with this maze-style worksheet.
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Identifying Lines of Symmetry Worksheets
Use this set of differentiated worksheets to help students practise the process involved with identifying lines of symmetry on two-dimensional shapes.
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Odd and Even Colour-by-Number Worksheets
Practise identifying if the sum of two numbers is odd or even with this fun set of colour-by-number worksheets.
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Dot Day Art - Roll a Kandinsky Circle Art Project
Introduce your students to the circle art style of Wassily Kandinsky with a fun Roll-a-Kandinsky Dot Day Art Activity.
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Desert Food Chain - Cut and Paste Worksheet
Create a desert food chain to show how energy flows between organisms with this cut-and-paste worksheet.
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Reading Pictographs - Worksheets
Use this double-sided worksheet to enable students to practise reading and interpreting pictographs.
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Making Monsters Subtraction - Worksheet
Have some spooky subtraction fun with three differentiated Halloween subtraction worksheets.
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Narrative Elements - Worksheet
Practise identifying characters, settings, problems and solutions in fictional texts with this set of worksheets.
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The History of Australia's Parliamentary System - Comprehension Worksheets
Explore the ins and outs of Australia’s parliamentary history with this reading comprehension activity.
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Subtraction Using MAB Blocks - Worksheet
Subtract two-digit numbers using MAB blocks with a printable subtraction worksheet.
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A Day in the Life of a Water Droplet – Comic Strip Templates
Put your artistic skills to use as you illustrate a day in the life of a water droplet with these printable comic strip templates.
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Subtraction within 20 - Colour-by-Number Worksheet
Reveal the mystery picture by solving the subtraction problems with a colour-by-number worksheet.
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Fractions Worksheet Pack – Differentiated
Practise partitioning shapes, shading in fraction models, representing fractions on a number line and more with this set of differentiated worksheets.
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Countries Neighbouring Australia - Cut and Paste Worksheet
Discover the location of some of the countries neighbouring Australia with this simple cut-and-paste worksheet.