Verbs Teaching Resources
Explain verbs to your primary students with printable worksheets, digital activities, English games and more from the teachers of Teach Starter.
This collection of teaching resources is aligned to the Australian Curriculum and was designed by teachers to help you help your students learn how to identify and use this part of speech correctly, including action verbs, helping verbs, linking verbs and the different verb tenses.
Each resource in this collection was carefully curated by our expert teacher team to ensure it's classroom-ready, saving you time on your lesson plans!
New to teaching this part of the English curriculum or just looking for new ways to engage students as they learn about verbs? Take a peek at this primer from our teacher team!
What Is a Verb? A Kid-Friendly Definition
We know it's a bit obvious, but knowing the definition of this part of speech is only part of the battle. You'll also need to explain verbs to your students!
Try this verb definition for kids in your classroom:
Verbs are words that describe actions or states of being. They can be used to describe what a person, animal or thing is doing or what they did.
For example, 'run,' 'jump,' 'sing' and 'sleep' are all verbs.
What Are Verb Tenses?
Different verbs can be used to indicate the time when an action occurred. They do this by something called tense. Verb tense refers to when the action or state of being expressed by a verb takes place.
In the English language, there are three main verb tenses — the past, the present and the future.
Past Tense
The past tense refers to actions or events that have already happened.
Past tense verbs are created by adding '-ed' to the base form of regular verbs or by using the unique form of irregular verbs.
For example, 'walk' becomes 'walked' in the past tense, while 'go' becomes 'went.'
Present Tense
The term present tense refers to actions or events that are happening now or that happen regularly. It is the base form of the verb, without any additional endings or changes.
For example, 'walk' is the present tense form of the verb, as in 'I walk to school every day.'
Types of Verbs
Now that we have the meaning and tenses covered, what about all the types of verbs that our students encounter as they read in the classroom and (hopefully!) at home? There are six main types of verbs likely to come up in your classroom at some point:
Action Verbs
Action verbs are verbs that show an action or a movement. Words like 'run,' 'jump,' 'dance' or 'sing' all fit the bill.
Action verbs can be used in present, past or future tenses.
Helping Verbs
Helping verbs help (!) to form verb phrases. They are also known as auxiliary verbs.
Examples of helping verbs that your students will regularly encounter in their reading and use in their writing include:
- am
- is
- are
- was
- were
- has
- have
- had
- do
- does
- did
- can
- could
- may
- might
- will
- would
- shall
- should
Linking Verbs
Linking verbs link the subject of a sentence to a word or phrase that describes or identifies it. These verbs do not show action, so they can be a bit tricky for students to identify.
Examples of linking verbs include:
- is
- be
- am
- was
- were
- seem
- become
Modal Verbs
Modal verbs are helping verbs that express the speaker's attitude towards the action or state of being expressed by the main verb. These are also tricky for younger writers to wrap their heads around as they express hypotheticals rather than specific actions.
Modal verb examples include words such as:
- can
- could
- may
- might
- should
- must
- shall
- will
- would
Regular Verbs
Regular verbs follow a predictable pattern when forming their past tense and past participle forms. To make them, you just add '-ed' to the base form of the verb!
For example, 'walk' becomes 'walked,' 'play' becomes 'played,' and 'talk' becomes 'talked.'
Irregular Verbs
Irregular verbs are more challenging for young spellers because they don't follow the predictable pattern of adding '-ed' to form their past tense and past participle forms. They have unique forms for each tense.
Some examples of irregular verbs are:
- Eat/ate
- Go/went
- Write/write
- Catch/caught
How to Teach Verbs to Kids — Fun Verb Activities
When you first begin introducing verbs to your students, they'll learn to identify and use verbs in sentences and understand the concepts of past, present, and future tense. Students will learn more complex verb forms and tenses as they progress through primary school and beyond.
Looking for a few ways to make this fun and engaging? This teaching resource collection is chock full of fun reading rotation activities, engaging printables and more ideas from our teacher team.
You might also want to try these ideas and activities:
- Action Charades — For kindergartners who are just learning about action words, action charades can be a lot of fun for the whole class. Act out words they've learned and have your students guess them. It's simple, fun and engaging! You can also flip this activity on its head by having students act out the verbs themselves.
- Picture It — Provide a picture prompt, and ask your year 1 students to create a story about what is going on in the picture using verbs in the proper context. For students who need extra support, you can provide sentence starters.
- Show It — Make show and tell a verb activity! Have students bring special items to class to show off to their classmates, and encourage them to share details about it using verbs.
How to Teach Verb Tenses
Do your students already have the basics of this part of speech down? It's time to turn to verb tenses.
Teaching verb tenses can be a bit more complex than teaching verbs themselves, but there are a few strategies that can be effective:
- Verb Tense Stacking Block Game — Label wood blocks with action verbs and have students play a stacking tower game in small groups, carefully removing one block at a time to prevent the tower from falling. Each time they remove a block, the student will have to write down the past, future and present tense of the verb on their block.
- Verb Tense Timeline — Provide a timeline of events your class is studying in HASS. Challenge students to write sentences using verbs in different tenses to describe events that occurred in the past, are happening now, or will happen in the future. For kids who need extra support, provide visual or written cues to help them identify the different tenses.
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Saying Verbs Poster
A poster giving the definition and examples of saying verbs.
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Paragraph Study Grammar Interactive PowerPoint
Interactive PowerPoint presentation allowing teachers and students to learn and revise grammar by highlighting paragraphs.
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Has/Have, Do/Does Subject Verb Agreement - Interactive Activity
Embed subject-verb agreement practice into digital learning with this interactive activity.
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Irregular Past Tense Verbs Worksheet
A worksheet that helps students identify irregular verbs.
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Simple Present and Past Tense Match-Up Cards (Irregular Verbs)
A set of 30 match-up cards to help students learn about simple present tense and simple past tense of irregular verbs.
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Strong Verbs Word Wall
Print a set of strong verbs word wall cards to help your students boost their writing skills!
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Colour by Parts of Speech - Nouns, Verbs, Adjectives and Prepositions - Owl
Consolidate parts of speech by colouring nouns, verbs, adjectives and prepositions on the owl.
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Parts of Speech Word Cards Sorting Activity
Engage your students with this parts of speech group activity where they sort 112 word cards into categories (nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, coordinating conjunctions or prepositions).
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Subject Verb Agreement Dice Game
A dice game for pairs of students to practise subject verb agreement and sentence writing.
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42 Action Vocabulary Words
42 action verb-related vocabulary word cards for use on a word wall.
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Strong Verbs PowerPoint
A 10 slide editable PowerPoint to use in the classroom when learning about verbs.
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Verb Grammar Card Game – Flip It!
A fun game for students to play in small groups to consolidate their understanding of verbs.
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Grammar Grid Colour by Code - Easter Parts of Speech Worksheet
Follow the colour-coded parts of speech guide to fill in the word grid and reveal a mystery image.
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Is/Are Subject Verb Agreement Task Cards
Practice using 'is' and 'are' correctly using a set of subject-verb agreement task cards.
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"Simon Says" Instruction Cards
A set of 24 instruction cards to use when playing "Simon Says".
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Nouns, Verbs and Adjectives Board Game
Reinforce your parts of speech lesson with our grammar game for up to 4 players.
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Autumn Parts of Speech Sort
Review three parts of speech by sorting nouns, verbs, and adjectives with a parts of speech sorting activity.
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Parts of Speech - Colour by Code Mystery Picture Worksheet
Follow the colour-coded parts of speech guide to fill in the word grid and reveal a mystery image.
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Is/Are, Was/Were Subject Verb Agreement - Interactive Activity
Embed subject-verb agreement practice into digital learning with this interactive activity.
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Comical Chronicle Worksheets – Year 3 – Set 2
A set of 10 ad-lib style stories for students to complete.
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Comical Chronicle Worksheets - Year 6
A set of 9 ad-lib style stories for students to complete.
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Noun and Verb Sort – Worksheet
A simple noun and verb sorting worksheet.
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Commonly Used Verbs Flashcards
Teach commonly used verbs with this set of printable flashcards.
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Parts of Speech Card Game – Lower Years Classroom Game
A card game for nouns, verbs and adjectives.
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Parts of Speech Word Search (Nouns, Adjectives and Verbs) – Worksheet
A word search where students find and categorise nouns, adjectives and verbs.
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Comical Chronicle Worksheets - Year 3
A set of 10 ad-lib style stories for students to complete.
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Colour by Parts of Speech - Nouns, Verbs, Adjectives, Pronouns, Prepositions and Adverbs - Toucan
Consolidate your parts of speech lesson by colouring nouns, verbs, adjectives, pronouns, prepositions and adverbs on the toucan.
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Parts of Speech Card Game – Editable
An editable parts of speech card game.
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Comical Chronicle Worksheets – Year 5
A set of 10 ad-lib style stories for students to complete.
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Irregular Verbs Relay
An active relay race game in which students spell out irregular verbs.
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Past Tense Folding Cards
A set of 21 past tense folding cards.
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Parts of Speech Worksheet - Halloween Nouns and Verbs
Use this English grammar worksheet to add some Halloween spirit to your nouns and verbs lessons with a cut-and-paste worksheet.