The Anvil
The resource shop inside The Forge — downloadable packs for phonics, vocabulary, handwriting, and etymology in French, German, Italian and Spanish. Each pack is £2.
Most of these are an illustrated word history — a word traced back through its stages, drawn in plain black-and-white panels, with its English cousins named alongside. Each one is a PDF that prints two ways: as large cards you laminate and clip onto a ring, for a deck a child can handle and lay out, or as a single reference sheet for the pencil case. They're made to be talked through in short sessions, not worked through like a test. The phonics, morphology and handwriting packs follow the same plain, printable approach.
What’s in The Anvil?
Using these packs
These packs are one part of what helps a child with reading, writing or vocabulary. They work on their own, alongside school, tuition, or home education. Use them however you need to. If you're not sure whether a particular pack is right for your child, drop me a message and I can point you in the right direction. For more detailed guidance, you can book a specialist consultation.
I add new packs fairly regularly — usually when I've needed something for a student's work between sessions or for one of my own children, and thought it might be useful for other people too. These packs are for personal use in home education and tutoring only. For school or multi-classroom use, drop me a message to discuss.These packs are made by Joanna Whale, a Level 7 dyslexia specialist and Morrells Handwriting Practitioner. More on the About Me page.
The Soundsmith's Workshop
Packs for children learning to read — how letters and sounds work together, decoding words, reading fluency.
Why word-histories, and why structured literacy
These packs come out of a particular way of teaching — showing a learner how a word is built and where it came from, rather than asking them to memorise it whole. It's the approach I use in tuition, and there's evidence behind it, strongest in English and with struggling readers. I've written about where that evidence is solid and where it's more reasoned than proven, over in the Compendium.
And on why word origins help specifically with modern languages, there's a piece in the Compendium on that too.
The Wordcrafter's Bench
Packs for building vocabulary — how words are made from smaller parts, families of related words, what words mean and where they come from.
Die Wortwerkbank
German etymology packs — word origins, cognates, vocabulary building through history.
L'atelier des mots
French etymology packs — where French words came from, what they share with English, how they fit together.
L'Officina Radice
Italian etymology packs — where Italian words came from, what they share with English, how they fit together.
El Taller Raíz
Spanish etymology packs — where Spanish words came from, what they share with English, how they fit together.
The Scribe's Desk
… Coming soon
Packs for handwriting — letter shapes, spacing, joining letters up
