OURS and LOUP are four letters apiece — the bear and the wolf

The sheet shows six creatures from the woods — a bear, a wolf, a badger, a finch, a hawk and a cardinal — with the French name for each printed beside its picture. Every name is somewhere in the letter grid. Your child reads down the list, picks a word, and searches the rows and columns for it before ringing it. The drawings carry the meaning, so the reading stays within reach of a beginner.

The two short ones do the most damage. OURS and LOUP are four letters each and hide easily; children often walk past them twice. BLAIREAU, at eight, is far quicker to spot despite being much the stranger word. CARDINAL is a straight gift, spelled exactly as it is in English, and is usually the very first thing circled, which is a useful way to begin a page of otherwise unfamiliar words.

This one pairs well with a woodland walk or a story about animals in a forest, where the pictures are already in your child's head. ÉPERVIER, the hawk, is eight letters and starts with an accented E, which children sometimes skip over while scanning. If a word will not come, cover the grid and read the word aloud twice — the shape usually surfaces on the next look.