Mark the Word in H5P (A Fun Way to Test Vocabulary—But It’s Got Quirks)
Hey folks,
Let’s talk about another fun (but slightly flawed) H5P activity: Mark the Word. It’s one of those sneaky powerful tools—you paste in a paragraph, tell students to highlight specific words (like verbs or adjectives), and they click the ones they think are correct.
On paper? Super slick.
In practice? A little clunky—but still totally worth using if you know its limits.
🧠 What It Actually Does
Here’s what this activity looks like:
You give students a paragraph. You ask them to mark, let’s say, “five verbs.” They click words. If they click the right ones, they get a point. Simple.
Example:
The Smurfs built a beautiful home. They used wood, brought water, told stories, and the rain swept it away.
In this case, words like built, used, brought, told, and sweep are marked as the correct answers (by wrapping them in asterisks). Students have to pick them out.
🛠️ How You Set It Up (Quick Version)
If you’re using WordPress + H5P, the flow is:
- Go to your H5P plugin > Add New.
- Search for Mark the Words (install it if you haven’t).
- Paste your paragraph in the question box.
- Wrap each correct word with an asterisk on each side: *used*, *built*, etc.
- Add your instructions at the top (“Mark the five verbs in the paragraph.”)
- Save. Done.
🚨 Important: You can only mark single words. No phrases, no multi-word expressions. “built a home” won’t work. Just “built.”
🤔 A Few Things That Might Annoy You
Now here’s where I step in with a few reality checks—because if you plan to use this for grading, there are things you should know:
❌ Students can mark as many words as they want
Even if your instructions say, “Mark 5 verbs,” nothing stops a student from clicking every word in the paragraph. H5P doesn’t limit the number of selections. No warning, no max limit.
So yeah, guessing is a viable strategy.
❌ Mistakes = Penalties
Mark 4 verbs correctly but accidentally click 1 noun? You don’t get 4/5.
You get 3/5 because one of your answers gets you a -1.
This can be a little harsh, especially when students are genuinely close. Unfortunately, you can’t turn off this penalty system in this activity (unlike some other H5P types where that’s optional).
❌ It Doesn’t Look Interactive
The activity just shows up as a normal paragraph. Unless students hover over it, there’s nothing to suggest it’s clickable.
A little hover effect helps, but a subtle visual cue—like dotted underlines or faint borders—would’ve made this much clearer.
💡 So When Should You Use It?
Despite the flaws, Mark the Word has its moments:
✅ Great for low-stakes classroom activities
✅ Useful in practice exercises or self-checks
✅ Can help reinforce vocabulary or grammar points quickly
❌ Not ideal for graded assessments
✅ Final Thoughts
This activity is like a good side dish. It’s not the main course—but it adds flavor. It’s quick to build, easy to understand, and gives you another way to make reading passages a bit more interactive.
Just… know what you’re getting into. It’s not perfect. But it can be fun.
👉 Subscribe to my YouTube channel for detailed H5P tutorials and WordPress tips: @edu-hermit
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