Say today's weather in Dutch, then find it in the grid

Weather is the one topic that renews itself every morning, which is why it earns a language sheet of its own. Six Dutch weather words are hidden here, each pictured beside the grid: WOLK for cloud, PLAS for puddle, SJAAL for scarf, and three more. A child finds them, circles them, and can then be asked to point out of the window and say which one applies today.

SNEEUWVLOK is the showpiece. Sneeuw is snow, vlok is flake, so a snowflake is put together in the same order as the English but written as a single word. PARAPLU, the umbrella, looks stranger than it sounds. WANTEN, the mittens, is a plural, which is why it ends in -en — and a child who notices that has picked up something a good deal bigger than one word.

It sits well at the start of a morning beside a weather chart, and it costs nothing to repeat: a word search does not go stale as fast as a worksheet with blanks in it. Younger children may want the word list read out once before they begin. There is no timer and no score, and the completed grid is printed on the second page for anyone who gets properly stuck on the last one or two.