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Important update from TheSchoolRun

For the past 13 years, TheSchoolRun has been run by a small team of mums working from home, dedicated to providing quality educational resources to primary school parents. Unfortunately, rising supplier costs and falling revenue have made it impossible for us to continue operating, and we’ve had to make the difficult decision to close. The good news: We’ve arranged for another educational provider to take over many of our resources. These will be hosted on a new portal, where the content will be updated and expanded to support your child’s learning.

What this means for subscribers:

  • Your subscription is still active, and for now, you can keep using the website as normal — just log in with your usual details to access all our articles and resources*.
  • In a few months, all resources will move to the new portal. You’ll continue to have access there until your subscription ends. We’ll send you full details nearer the time.
  • As a thank you for your support, we’ll also be sending you 16 primary school eBooks (worth £108.84) to download and keep.

A few changes to be aware of:

  • The Learning Journey weekly email has ended, but your child’s plan will still be updated on your dashboard each Monday. Just log in to see the recommended worksheets.
  • The 11+ weekly emails have now ended. We sent you all the remaining emails in the series at the end of March — please check your inbox (and spam folder) if you haven’t seen them. You can also follow the full programme here: 11+ Learning Journey.

If you have any questions, please contact us at enquiries@theschoolrun.com. Thank you for being part of our journey it’s been a privilege to support your family’s learning.

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Active and passive sentences

Active and passive sentences worksheet
A Year 4 English worksheet created by an experienced teacher to help your child understand active and passive voice, with examples.


Keystage:  KS2, Year 4

 

How can you tell if a sentence is in the active voice or the passive voice? 

Think of a sentence like a little story with three main parts: the subject (the person or thing doing something), the verb (what's being done), and the object (the person or thing that's affected by the action).

In an active voice sentence, the doer of the action comes first (the subject), followed by the action (the verb), and then the receiver (the object). It’s straightforward and direct. 

In a passive voice sentence, the object often comes first, the verb follows, and the subject might be mentioned at the end or left out. It flips the order around and often sounds less direct.

How to Spot the Difference:

Find the action word (the verb).

Identify who is doing the action.

Check the order:

  • If the subject comes first and is followed by the action, it’s active.
  • If the object comes first, and the action is followed by the subject (or the subject is missing), it’s passive.

Look for was, were, is, are, and a past participle (usually a verb ending in -ed, but there are exceptions like written or done). This combination often signals a passive voice.

What are some examples of passive and active voice? 

Here are sentence examples with passive voice: 

  1. The cake was baked by Mary.
  2. The book was written by the famous author.
  3. The window was broken by the ball.
  4. The homework was completed by the students.
  5. The song was sung by the choir.

Here are some sentence examples with active voice: 

  1. Mary baked the cake.
  2. The famous author wrote the book.
  3. The ball broke the window.
  4. The students completed the homework.
  5. The choir sang the song.

How will this active and passive worksheet help your primary school child?

This fun English worksheet was created by a teacher to help your child understand how to identify active and passive voice in a sentence. Your child will be given simple examples and asked to cut out the sentences (young children may need assistance or supervision) and they must sort the sentences into active and passive. This task will allow them to engage in the process and embed their learning. 

For more help with primary school English, check out our hub page, or try a new challenges such as our Clauses in a sentence worksheet.