Their, There, They’re: Why Children Pick the Wrong One

11 October 2026 · by Larry

The sentence is well written. The story is good, the handwriting is neat, and then it says "Their going to the zoo" or "I want to go to." Your child knows what the words mean. They just picked the wrong spelling of a word that sounds exactly like the right one.

These are homophones: words that sound the same and are spelt differently. They are a different problem from an ordinary spelling mistake, and it helps to see why, because the usual fix for spelling (practise the word more) does not touch it.

Why a child who can spell every one of these words still gets them wrong

Ask a child to spell "there" on its own and they will often get it right. Ask them to fill in "___ going to the zoo" and they may get it wrong. The spelling is known. What is missing is the decision about which word the sentence needs.

That decision gets made while the child is also thinking about the story, the full stop, the next sentence and their handwriting. The ear hears "there", the hand writes the first "there" it finds, and nothing in the sound says which one it was. A spelling list cannot fix that, because a list gives each word its own line, with no sentence to choose in.

The usual suspects

You do not need to teach all of these at once. Start with the ones you actually see in your child's books.

• their / there / they're. Their belongs to them ("Their bags are by the door"). There is a place, or "there is" ("Put it over there"). They're is "they are" ("They're late").
• its / it's. It's is "it is" or "it has". Its belongs to it ("The dog wagged its tail"). This one catches adults too, because an apostrophe usually means "belongs to" everywhere else ("Mei's bag").
• to / too / two. Two is the number. Too means "also" or "more than enough" ("too hot", "me too"). To is everything else.
• your / you're. You're is "you are". Your belongs to you.
• were / where / we're. Three different words that look alike on the page and sound alike in a quick sentence.
• whose / who's. Who's is "who is" or "who has".
• flour / flower, right / write, hear / here, buy / by / bye. These come up in dictation and spelling tests more than in free writing.

Notice that the apostrophe ones (they're, it's, you're, we're, who's) all share one rule: the apostrophe means letters have been left out, and what is left out is the "a" of "are" or the "i" of "is" (or the "ha" of "has"). That one idea covers five words.

The check that works: say it with the long form

For every apostrophe word, there is a test the child can run in their head in a second.

Read the sentence again with "they are", "it is", "you are" or "we are" in that spot. If it still makes sense, it needs the apostrophe. If it sounds silly, it does not.

"They are going to the zoo" makes sense, so it is they're. "They are bags are by the door" is nonsense, so it is their. For its and it's: "The dog wagged it is tail" is nonsense, so it is its.

For their and there, the test is a question: who owns it? If someone owns it, it is their. If it is a place, or "there is", it is there. A tip some children like: there has the word "here" inside it, and both are about places.

For to, too and two, ask whether the word means "also" or "more than enough" (too), or whether it is the number 2 (two). If neither, it is to. It is a three-way choice, and the "also" meaning is the one children forget exists.

A two-minute check that tells you which words to work on

Read these sentences aloud, one at a time, and ask your child to write only the missing word. Do not show them the options.

1. The children left ___ shoes at the door.
2. Put the box over ___.
3. ___ going to be late.
4. The cat licked ___ paw.
5. ___ raining outside.
6. I would like some cake, ___.
7. Do you know ___ my pencil case is?
8. ___ going to share ___ toys with us.

The answers are: their, there, They're, its, It's, too, where, and in the last one They're ... their. Sentence 8 is the useful one, because it needs two different words in one go, and that is the shape that appears in real writing.

Mark them and look at the pattern, not the score. Is it always the apostrophe ones? Always the same pair? Or scattered? A child who gets only its and it's wrong needs one rule, not a month of revision.

What helps

• Teach one pair at a time, in sentences. Pick the pair that cost the most in the check. Write three sentences for each word, ideally about your own house. "Their shoes are by the door" is easier to hold than a definition.
• Make the sentence do the choosing. Practise with a blank where the word goes, and let the child decide, rather than copying the word out five times. Copying uses the hand and skips the decision, and the decision is the whole problem. It is the same reason copying a spelling list five times does not make it stick; the weekly spelling list piece goes into that.
• Add a proofreading pass. When a piece of writing is finished, ask the child to go back and circle every "its", "their", "to" and "your" and run the check on each. It takes a minute, and it builds the habit of treating these words as decisions rather than as spellings.
• Read the mistake back in the long form. If you see "Their going", ask "Does that mean they are going?" and let the child hear that "they are" fits. Let them find the fix instead of giving it.

What does not help

• Learning all of them in one evening. Seven pairs at once means the child is guessing between fourteen words.
• Correcting every one in a story the child is proud of. Fix the one or two that matter most, and say what is good about the rest. A child who has stopped enjoying writing does not make fewer mistakes.
• "Just be careful." The child is being careful. The ear gives the same answer for both words, so there is nothing for care to catch.

Is this a spelling problem or a grammar problem?

A bit of both, and it is worth knowing which one you are looking at. The apostrophe words (its, they're, you're) are grammar: the child has to know what the word is doing in the sentence. The sound-alike words (flour, hear, write) are spelling: the child has to know which spelling goes with which meaning. The decisions are different, so the practice is different, which is why mixing them into one worksheet rarely helps.

If the same child is also writing "goed" and "eated", that is a separate pattern with its own explanation: why children write the wrong past tense. And if writing itself is the sticking point, rather than the spellings, composition: when your child says they have nothing to write about starts earlier in the process.

Which of these words your child is expected to know, and by when, is set by the school and the MOE syllabus (moe.gov.sg); ask the class teacher if you are unsure what is expected at their level. For practice with a sentence around the word, Spell Lab shows each word inside an example sentence with the word blanked, and takes your child's own weekly list.

Related: a sound-based rule that catches out even good readers is a or an: why “an hour” and “a university” trip children up. And three more small words children swap, this time for time phrases: in, on or at: why children mix up time words.

Related: Another case where a rule feels right and is never checked: when your child guesses instead of working it out.

Related: Another slip that a spelling test cannot catch is the verb that does not match its subject; see he go or he goes: why children drop or misplace the s on verbs.

Related: whose and who’s are another apostrophe pair, and they sit inside a different decision, who, which or whose: why children pick the wrong joining word.

Apostrophes are one punctuation mark with its own rules; speech marks are another, and the piece on speech marks in composition sets out where they and the commas go.