A bakery counter in Italian: hunt down TORTA, CORNETTO and BISCOTTO

Six Italian bakery words are buried in the grid, with pictures beside it to say what to hunt for. TORTA is cake, CORNETTO is the Italian croissant, BISCOTTO is a biscuit. Two of the six will look oddly familiar: BAGEL and TOAST are English words Italian simply borrowed and kept. Your child reads along the rows and down the columns, recognises a whole word, and draws a ring round it.

The value here is repetition without drill. A child who circles CORNETTO will meet those eight letters again on a café sign or a menu and know them on sight. ÉCLAIR keeps the accent from the French it came through, which is worth pointing at. Keep a pencil to hand rather than a pen; hunting goes better when a wrong guess can be rubbed out and tried again.

This one suits a rainy afternoon, or the wait for something to come out of the oven. Read the six words aloud in Italian first, so your child is listening for a shape they have already heard. BISCOTTO tends to be found last, being long and easily confused with its neighbours. Print as many copies as you like; a second run through is usually faster. Nothing here is timed, and there is no score at the end.