There’s nothing better than getting stuck into a good old adventure story. Except, perhaps, writing one for yourself – which is exactly what the pupils of Mid Calder Primary School and Ecole Antoine Pizon in France discovered with the highly successful ‘Novel Idea’ project.

 ‘James Walker and the Buried Treasure’ was written, illustrated and published by this group of budding linguists – with alternate chapters in French and English. The pupils would receive a chapter from the French school, and work together to pick out vocab and translate phrases (often surprising themselves with how much they could decode) before continuing the story themselves and sending their chapter over to the French pupils.

A blog was set up and the children produced illustrations for each chapter – and parents and other pupils could vote for the school whose work they preferred.  In groups, the children then used Windows Movie Maker to produce an animation for some chapters – which meant they could experiment and be creative whilst picking up more of the target language.  

The schools have developed a great partnership, and the pupils can use video conferencing and email to develop their speaking and listening skills further. It’s a truly innovative project, and one that has increased pupils’ confidence no end. The competitive element was also great in helping them focus. This project also receives the EuroTalk Primary Education Languages Prize.

Language(s): French

Mid Calder Primary has 350 pupils plus a nursery, and is situated in a village just outside Livingston in West Lothian. It has thirteen classes, ranging from Primary 1 to Primary 7, with children learning French throughout the school.