Spell Duel

Two animals face each other. One of them throws something at the other — and the thing flying at you is the word. A drum comes sailing over, you spell d-r-u-m, and naming it stops it dead in the air.

The words get harder as you get better. You start on three-letter things with the letters laid out in front of you, and if you keep naming them, you climb: six letters, then seven, then eight, with decoy letters mixed into the tray and a quicker throw each time.

Higher up, the letters are taken away altogether and you spell on a full keyboard with no help at all. At the top the things being thrown are helicopter, playground, toothbrush, ambulance, butterfly and lightning — and you have about ten seconds.

Miss one and nothing bad happens. The word is shown, the animals shake it off, and the next one comes. There are no lives, no health bars and no way to lose — just a timer you can beat.

What it practises

• Spelling under a little pressure — which is what a spelling test actually is
• Naming things — you have to know the word before you can spell it
• Letter order — the word is built one letter at a time, left to right
• Spelling from nothing, once the letter bank is taken away and only a keyboard is left

Ages

Roughly 7 to 11. It starts easy enough for a Year 2 child and the top of the ladder is genuinely hard for a Year 6 child, so it grows with them rather than being outgrown.

How the difficulty works

There is no level picker. Block three in a row and the game moves up a rung; miss one and it eases back down. But it never drops below a rung you have already earned, so a word band you have mastered is never ground through again.

No ads, no losing, a timer you can beat. Part of Tadpole Games.