Welcome to UKLO, an annual language-analysis competition for schools which is a bridge from university linguistics to schools. We showcase the fascinating subject of linguistics which is taught at universities and applied by language enthusiasts around the world. Have a look around the website to find out more about UKLO, our committee, and our supporters.
Tour for new teachers: Please click tabs 1 – 4
For new teachers who want to get fully setup and updated with all our changes.
We wish to ease the process and provide assistance for teachers with new materials provided below:
This is our basic guideline (students can skip levels/ do levels above or below their recommended level)
| UKLO Level | Age | Year Group | Key Stage Level |
|---|---|---|---|
| Breakthrough | 7 – 11 years old | Year 3 – 6 | KS2 |
| Foundation | 11 – 14 years old | Year 7 – 9 | KS3 |
| Intermediate | 14 – 16 years old | Year 10 – 11 | KS4 |
| Advanced | 16 – 18 years old | Year 12 – 13 | KS5 |
Once you have a list of students with their levels assigned, you will need to tally up the estimated number of entries at Advanced level to submit to the UKLO Portal. No need for anything like that for lower levels.
Please sign up for your school and fill in all details in the forms by clicking the picture below. In case you get stuck, please have a look at our full instructions.
The most important pages for you on this website is this page (Teacher’s Room) and the noticeboard that details all times, dates and extra information for the UKLO Season this year. Please have a look at the Noticeboard
For the latest news from the UKLO Chair, check out the UKLO Messages
You are fully set up and ready to rumble! Proceed to Stage 2 for specific information of the exams you’ll be running (including deadlines and exam procedures).
For all times, updates and exam arrangements for all levels this season, see noticeboard.
Important Information:
| Students may work in teams and the competition can be spread across a number of timetabled lessons. | |||||
| We rely on teachers using their discretion in this matter. | |||||
| When to schedule the exam | Timing is up to you as you mark your own scripts. | ||||
| Deadlines | You mark these competitions yourself, so there’s only one deadline, in mid March (see noticeboard). This is when you should try to finish entering all your competitor details and marks so that we can include them in calculating the national award thresholds for each competition. |
On the Exam Day: Portal, Print
Electronic copies of the UKLO Exam Questions will be provided to you before the Exam Week on the UKLO Portal. The time they’ll be released is in noticeboard. You will need to log in and download them, and then print them out.
Mark and Submit
Once you have finished marking, you need to submit the total number of points for each student via the Portal system.
Important Information:
Students work individuallyExtra TimeStudents can be granted extra time if they would qualify for extra time in school or public examinations.DeadlinesDeadlines (see noticeboard):
| We rely on teachers using their discretion in this matter. | |||||
| When to schedule the exam | Within the Exam Week: Second week of February (see noticeboard).If you’re entering competitors for the Advanced competition the exam must be within this week. | ||||
1) Late January: You tell us via the portal roughly how many competitors you expect to enter this year so that we can assign a marker to you. 2) End of the exam week: By this time you should have entered the names and demographics of your competitors in the portal. You must upload your scripts by the end of the Friday evening (unless you have made alternative arrangements with the marking coordinator – marking@uklo.org). |
On the Exam Day: Portal, Print, Scan, and Submit
| Portal, Print | Electronic copies of the UKLO Exam Questions will be provided to you before the Exam Week on the UKLO Portal. The time they’ll be released is in noticeboard. You will need to log in and download them, and then print them out. | ||||||||||
| If you are entering multiple candidates, please bundle their scripts in a small number of pdf files as this makes them more convenient for the markers to handle. This pdf will include only the answer sheets and presented as follows [Student A’s Answers][Student B’s Answers][Student’s C….]; there is no need to scan the question paper. Students should write their names on every answer sheet they give in. Please check your pdf file in case you scanned any of your student’s papers upside down. If you are scanning double-sided sheets, please see the helpdesk for assistance in how to scan them. | |||||||||||
| Submit | The pdfs must be submitted for marking via the UKLO Portal. | Each school is assigned a marker who will have your email address, so that they can communicate with you. |
Important Information:
You will learn which of your competitors has got through to Round 2 on Results Day for the Advanced competition.
| We rely on teachers using their discretion in this matter. | |||||
| You will receive an email invitation to pass on to the successful pupils, and you will be asked to tell us whether they will be taking part in Round 2. Round 2 must be scheduled for a specific day chosen centrally by UKLO, and must be timed so as to include a fixed anchor point – usually 2.00. If this is not possible, competitors must be supervised to prevent use of phones between their exam time and the anchor time. | |||||
On the Exam Day: Portal, Print, Scan, and Submit
| Portal, Print | Electronic copies of the UKLO Exam Questions will be provided to you at least a day before the exam day on the UKLO Portal. The time they’ll be released is in noticeboard. You will need to log in and download them, and then print them out. | ||||||
| Scan | When you are scanning your student’s answer sheets, please check your pdf file in case you scanned any of your student’s papers upside down. If you are scanning double-sided sheets, please see the helpdesk for assistance in how to scan them. | ||||||
| Submit | The pdfs must be submitted for marking via the UKLO Portal. |
Certificates are issued on demand once you submit your points via the Portal system, including Gold, Silver and Bronze awards.
You can download your Advanced results and your Advanced certificates, including Gold, Silver and Bronze awards, from the UKLO Portal on Results Day.
The results for Round 2 are generally announced to teachers about a fortnight after the competition. Certificates of participation are issued by email to the teacher’s registered email address, and may also include a Distinction or Merit award.
Click here for more information on certificates
Thank you so much for competing in UKLO this year, and we hope to see you again next year for more interesting and fun linguistics puzzles!
Why are the total number of marks for each question different to the total number of marks in the marking rubric?
A UKLO question (for example) may say (20 marks) given on the question paper, but in the marking scheme it says 51 points for that same question. This is because UKLO distinguishes marks and points. Marks are the official scores calculated by the portal on which we base the results, and points are given by markers of the exam paper. Marks show the relative challenge, and therefore importance, of individual problems, rising from 5 for Problems 1 and 2 to 25 for Problems 9 and 10. Once markers submit their points into the UKLO Portal, they get turned into official marks by our algorithms.
Why is the final total not simply the sum of the marks for individual problems?
Because it presents the total marks as a percentage of the total available marks. For example, the total available marks for the Advanced competition is usually 15 + 20 + 20 + 25 + 25 = 105, so the total score for a competitor is the sum of the marks for all the problems x 100/105.
For any other questions, please visit our UKLO Helpdesk, as well as older documents explaining the entire process
Links and Teaching Resources
Email discussion list: Our email discussion list is UKLOS@JISCMAIL.AC.UK. If you subscribe to it, you will receive messages but you will also be able to post messages and search the archive of past messages. To subscribe, go here, then under ‘Options’ click ‘Subscribe or unsubscribe’.
This is the general hub for teachers with advice on running linguistics clubs and introducing linguistics problem solving into your schools. For the current year, you will hear about current arrangements and issues in occasional email messages to all registered teachers and on the noticeboard.
- Noticeboard for 2027
- Permanent instructions for running Round 1 and Round 2
- UKLO messages to teachers
- Data protection
- Safeguarding
- How we select for the training camp and for the IOL team(s)
- Annual statistics from 2016 to now
Entries and thresholds
| Year | Total Entries | Award Thresholds (%) | ||||||||||||||
| Breakthrough | Foundation | Intermediate | Advanced | |||||||||||||
| Breakthrough | Foundation | Intermediate | Advanced | B | S | G | B | S | G | B | S | G | B | S | G | |
| 2026 | 620 | 799 | 843 | 1512 | 29 | 56 | 78 | 61 | 73.6 | 83.3 | 70 | 84.3 | 91.3 | 34.5 | 46 | 58 |
| 2025 | 1030 | 1872 | 1364 | 1777 | 52.5 | 69 | 84 | 36.8 | 53 | 75.5 | 46.2 | 66.5 | 80.1 | 35.5 | 47.5 | 62 |
| 2024 | 695 | 1335 | 1324 | 1822 | 67 | 77 | 88 | 55 | 68 | 80 | 67 | 85.5 | 95 | 35.4 | 47.7 | 62 |
| 2023 | 1225 | 1225 | 1506 | 1715 | 37 | 61 | 84 | 53 | 73 | 84 | 57 | 71 | 81 | 31.7 | 45 | 60 |
| 2022 | 807 | 1278 | 1313 | 1488 | 51 | 73 | 88 | 67 | 79.9 | 86.1 | 52.5 | 63.5 | 77 | 44.5 | 58 | 73 |
| 2021 | 232 | 593 | 396 | 1017 | 58 | 77 | 92 | 54 | 79 | 88 | 55 | 75 | 85 | 43.5 | 59 | 72 |
| 2020 | 316 | 736 | 1006 | 1650 | 66 | 78 | 83 | 72.7 | 79 | 86 | 46.9 | 60.7 | 71 | 42.5 | 54.5 | 66 |
| 2019 | 268 | 1000 | 1116 | 1497 | 72 | 79 | 85 | 72 | 78 | 86 | 55 | 69 | 82 | 46 | 54 | 66 |
| 2018 | 220 | 1042 | 970 | 1650 | 60 | 76 | 90 | 42 | 60 | 71 | 55 | 70 | 80 | 29.6 | 40 | 52 |
| 2017 | 279 | 1329 | 1124 | 1545 | 59.4 | 71.6 | 80.9 | 66.1 | 75.4 | 84.2 | 52.3 | 65.3 | 79.9 | 48 | 62.3 | 72 |
| 2016 | 244 | 506 | 774 | 1345 | 50.1 | 62.3 | 76.8 | 72 | 79.6 | 86.2 | 71.5 | 79 | 87.1 | 74.7 | 83.3 | 89.2 |
Extra Information for Teachers: Gold Silver and Bronze Thresholds.docx
Teaching Resources
These are resources you can use to introduce linguistics and UKLO problem solving to students
Powerpoint Presentations
Breakthrough Level Resources
Posters
There is a blank at the bottom of each poster for the teacher or appropriate correspondent to write their name after printing. Special thanks to all the artists who have made these posters (posters have been edited to keep up with the times [Editor, 2022]).
(From left to right)
Poster 1 by Gary Wood (2011).pdf
Poster 2 by Catherine Sheard (2015).pdf
Older Documents
How it Works Charts with Comments.pptx
UKLO Coaching 101 Number Systems_Student Version.docx
UKLO Coaching 101_Number Systems Teacher Version.docx
The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog”
Lorem ipsum, or lipsum as it is sometimes known, is dummy text used in laying out print, graphic or web designs. The passage is attributed to an unknown typesetter in the 15th century who is thought to have scrambled parts of Cicero’s De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum for use in a type specimen book.