When I started my current role as Second in Department, Curriculum Leader for Spanish our main concern was the lack of motivation our students had for studying languages. It was compulsory for them to take at least one language for GCSE but we had a fair few students who were disengaged and just didn’t see the benefit of learning another language. Seeing this I decided to focus on the influence of the extended curriculum on student motivation to study MFL for my MA Education dissertation, I blogged about it here. Then in April I attended some training with a couple of colleagues where a speaker talked about projects in MFL and it sparked a re-vamp of our schemes of work to see what we could do to motivate our students. The following blog is a summary of what we have done, how it’s been going and what we need to be doing differently in the future. The first thing we did was decide which of the projects we had heard about we wanted to include in our schemes of work and for which year groups. I then planned these into the schemes of work, with the aim of the projects running alongside our normal curriculum. I will briefly explain the projects below, but I cannot take credit for any of the ideas. Eurovision (Year 7 and Year 8 Beginners) - Learn a verse or two of a song in Spanish / French, perform as a class, film and older classes vote on a winner. We chose this as a fun interdiction to the language, the way it sounds and (depending on song choice) the culture too. This one went down fairly well and was a good way for year 7 forms to get to know eachother at the start of the year. The year 8 beginners weren’t so into it and I would consider removing it for them next year. Spelling Bee - Adapted from the Routes into Languages resources we run this with year 7 and year 8 beginners. With rounds in class to find the best in the form, in the school hall to find the best in the year and then a local competition against other schools to add an extra level to it. We even integrated it with our school house system this year to try and get even more students engaged. This has been a great way of showing year 7 how important it is to learn their alphabet and vocabulary early on. For the most part I think they have enjoyed it but some responses to student surveys have shown that some felt that it put them under pressure to perform in front of their peers. Translation Bee - very similar to the above but for year 8 continuers (those who started the language in year 7). These are harder to engage than the year 7 students, but this is the first year. I hope once this is something they’re used to doing it will become part of what learning MFL is out our school. LinguaMaths - just as it sounds, encouraging students to learn their numbers by getting them to do maths in French/Spanish. We currently do this with all year 7 and 8 but I think next year just the beginners will take part, not the continuers. Or I’ll have to make some more challenging tests....
Have Your Say - A competition organised by ALL, everyone in year 7-10 takes part. The best pair in each class is selected, then the best in the year. We have only just done this but we have seen a fairly split reaction, those who enjoyed it got really into it, but those who didn’t were difficult to engage. I know we can’t please all students with all of the projects though so I think this might not change any time soon. Mother Tongue, Other Tongue - A competition run by Routes into Languages. We took part in this last year and all students wrote poems in class. It was easy enough to fit into the schemes of work as students could write their poems on whatever the current topic is, so for example my year 7 Spanish wrote about their holidays. Students generally enjoyed this and we had a number of students get prizes and attend the celebration event. As well as these projects we have more than 150 students from year 7-11 involved in a Spanish pen pal project, an annual 4 day year 7 French trip, a French exchange and a trip to Andalucía. We have also tried to find relevant experiences within the UK and have taken students to see Flamenco at Saddlers Wells theatre and we’re going to see Tartuffe this summer. These trips haven’t had large numbers, but we are working on building these. I think one of the things that students appreciate most about these projects is the recognition they are getting. I have made sure that all projects are rewarded with winners certificates for as many students as possible, that senior staff are notified and that students are celebrated in assemblies or on newsletters. For some students these projects are about boosting confidence and for others they are more about finding reasons to learn a language or how it is more fun than maybe they had realised so far. I had about 200 responses to a student survey and they’ve been largely positive. What I have noticed is that unfortunately we still haven’t reached those students who were particularly disengaged. Those students are still anti-Languages and don’t understand the point. This is our next challenge. Surveys showed that where staff were able to ‘sell’ the projects well to the students they were more likely to be engaged than where staff saw the projects as a chore. We have work to do on how the projects are presented to students but I think we are heading in the right direction. I’m really interested to hear what other schools are doing and how you try to motivate students to learn MFL.
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