Word Time
Phonics and word-building, reading comprehension, grammar and punctuation (SPaG), and vocabulary-in-context — spanning Year 1 phonics through to Year 6/11+ reasoning about text, drawn from real bundled passages and banks, not generated on the fly, so every question has been checked by a person.
What's covered, year by year
- Years 1–2: phonics and word-building, sentence-level grammar and punctuation, early vocabulary and reading-comprehension strategies — with tap-to-listen read-aloud support for pre-readers.
- Years 3–5: grammar and punctuation deepening year on year, retrieval, inference, vocabulary-in-context and language/figurative devices across narrative, explanation, persuasion, discussion, instruction and poetry texts, plus vocabulary work extending into Greek and Latin word roots and connotation.
- Year 6 / 11+: advanced punctuation (semicolons, colons, dashes, brackets and hyphens), word analogies, connotation and shades of meaning, and 11+-style reasoning about longer passages.
More Word Time questions
Choose the word that completes the sentence correctly: The cat licked ___ paws.
- its ✓
- it's
- its'
- it is
"Its" shows belonging (the paws belong to it). "It's" is short for "it is".
In the sentence "The enormous elephant lumbered across the field," the word "enormous" means:
- extremely large ✓
- very small
- quite fast
- rather old
Enormous describes something of huge size, so it matches "extremely large."
Comprehension · "The Lighthouse Keeper"
Every evening, just as the sun slipped behind the waves, Mr Alden climbed the winding stairs of the lighthouse. There were two hundred and ten steps, and he had counted them so many times that he no longer needed to look down… Some nights the storms were fierce, and the whole tower trembled.
Why does Mr Alden no longer need to look down as he climbs the stairs?
- The stairs are brightly lit
- He has climbed them so often that he knows them well
- There is a strong handrail to hold
- He is carried up by a machine
Great thinking!
He "had counted them so many times" — long familiarity means he knows the stairs without looking, which the text implies rather than states.
Tap to continue →
Inference question from the real "Lighthouse Keeper" passage, with the correct option highlighted in leaf-tint green — never red.
How the difficulty adapts
Word Time, tuned question by question
English isn't one blended skill here — comprehension, grammar, vocabulary and spelling each move independently, so the difficulty always matches the specific skill being practised, not a general "reading level".
Four ratings, not one
Word Time keeps four separate ratings under one roof — comprehension, grammar & punctuation (SPaG), vocabulary and spelling. Each moves up on a correct answer at the edge of what your child can do, and eases back after a wobble, so a strong reader who's still shaky on apostrophes shows up accurately rather than being averaged into one number.
Year-anchored, then placed
A new Word Time trail cold-starts near the standard expected for their school year, then a short placement run across comprehension, SPaG, vocabulary and spelling settles each of the four levels in turn.
The same score you see as a parent
These ratings feed the 55–145 standardised-style score on the parent dashboard, centred on 100 like an 11+ standardised score — a useful guide, not an official result.
Stretched, not overwhelmed
Practice stretches a little past secure ground on whichever of the four skills needs it most, while still cycling back through all four so grammar doesn't stall while comprehension races ahead.
Learned things come back
A passage once answered confidently, a grammar rule once secure, a word once learned — each resurfaces on its own spaced schedule rather than being ticked off and forgotten.
Grammar in gentle steps
SPaG questions are also tagged in difficulty bands from 0 to 4, so grammar and punctuation step up gradually — possessive apostrophes before subordinate clauses, for example — rather than jumping around at random.
The same five-stage scale every subject's trail runs on — each of Word Time's four skills moves along it separately.
The rating a typical child is expected to be secure at, by the end of each school year — about 250 points per year.
Try Word Time for real
No sign-up — jump straight into a few real, adaptive questions on Conkerly's demo account. Nothing you do here is saved.