TheSchoolRun.com closure date
As we informed you a few months ago, TheSchoolRun has had to make the difficult decision to close due to financial pressures and the company has now ceased trading. We had hoped to keep our content available through a partnership with another educational provider, but this provider has since withdrawn from the agreement.
As a result, we now have to permanently close TheSchoolRun.com. However, to give subscribers time to download any content they’d like to keep, we will keep the website open until 31st July 2025. After this date, the site will be taken down and there will be no further access to any resources. We strongly encourage you to download and save any resources you think you may want to use in the future.
In particular, we suggest downloading:
- Learning packs
- All the worksheets from the 11+ programme, if you are following this with your child
- Complete Learning Journey programmes (the packs below include all 40 worksheets for each programme)
You should already have received 16 primary school eBooks (worth £108.84) to download and keep. If you haven’t received these, please contact us at [email protected] before 31st July 2025, and we will send them to you.
We are very sorry that there is no way to continue offering access to resources and sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused.
Top 5 grammar mistakes sorted

There are many mistakes children make with grammar and punctuation but the majority will fall into these five categories:
1. Capital letters everywhere
Children (and adults!) routinely capitalise nouns. In some cases words are incorrectly capitalised to highlight their importance, but whether you're writing about dogs, lions, dinner or cinemas, there is no need for a capital letter. The word does not become more important if you capitalise it, it just becomes incorrectly written!
So remember: Don’t capitalise nouns.


Watch your child's grammar skills & confidence grow
- Perfect Punctuation Workbook
- Grammar Games Pack
- PLUS 100s of other grammar resources
2. Too many apostrophes
The most common mistake is using an apostrophe to signify a plural, which is incorrect.
So:
three cars, all the lions
but:
the baby’s toy (the toy belonging to the baby), the car’s engine (the engine of the car).
For plural possessives (where more than one noun is involved), the apostrophe goes after the ‘s’ instead of before.
So:
The puppies’ mum, the girls’ argument
Read our complete guide to using apostrophes correctly to make sure you never get confused again!
So remember: apostrophes are for possession, not plurals.
3. Mixing up it's and its
So which one is correct?
‘Its’ is a pronoun. For example, ‘The cat ate its dinner’.
‘It’s’ is short for ‘it is’. For example, ‘It’s a nice, sunny day’.
Explain to your child that they can check their sentence by rewording it. For example, 'The cat and it's kittens' is incorrect because they didn't mean to say 'The cat and it is kittens'. The correct sentence is 'The cat and its kittens' – the cat and the kittens which belong to it.
So remember: It’s is short for it is.
4. Using too many commas
A comma is used to separate a main clause and a subordinate clause, or to separate items in a list. Children sometimes mistakenly use them where they should use a full stop instead, or forget to use them altogether.
In this sentence, the use of the comma is correct:
'At school today, I played on the climbing frame.'
Your child can tell that a comma is needed, rather than a full stop, because the subordinate clause - 'At school today' - doesn't make sense on its own.
The comma is also used correctly in this sentence:
'At school today, I did maths, literacy, PE and art.'
Without commas, the sentence reads 'At school today I did maths literacy PE and art' - and there's no natural pause between the items in the list.
Tell your child to read their sentence out loud: often, they'll be able to hear where the commas should go.
So remember: commas to separate main and subordinate clauses, or to separate the items in a list.
5. Misplaced inverted commas
Inverted commas (usually known as speech marks) go at the start and at the end of direct speech – but do they go before or after the full stop? It is easy to get confused.
If a direct quote is part of the sentence, the inverted commas go before the full stop.
So:
The teacher talked about “the importance of inverted commas”.
If the speech is the whole of the sentence, the inverted commas go after the full stop.
So:
“It's time to go home now.”
Read more about direct (or reported) and indirect speech in our parents' guide.
So remember: If the speech is the whole sentence the full stop comes first.