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Introduction
| Overview
| Becoming an LC
| CILT support
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CILT-SLC case study |
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Bishop Wordsworth’s Schools’ cluster |
Primary |
A Celebration of Primary Foreign Languages
This is a diary of events of my first year as a Primary Language coordinator in Salisbury. We have 12 primary schools in our cluster and we visit 10 schools weekly to support the teachers.
December 2006
I created a French nativity script, which both the teachers and pupils wanted to perform in front of family and friends. We were very impressed with the positive, enthusiastic way pupils performed in French, and with such fluency, accuracy and confidence. The costumes, supplied by Bishops Wordsworth’s School (BWS), added to the splendour and excitement of the performance. We rehearsed for five lessons only, focusing on pronunciation and intonation and the final result was superb.
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Pictures from Coombe Bissett Primary School
February 2007
We also developed the PMFL page on the BWS website in order to share resources and to disseminate information about PMFL. This page has been useful for the primaries, to access lesson plans, free resources and useful addresses. My aim is that all the schools share resources and contribute to the website as the PMFL programme takes off.
Please take a look at the BWS website and the primary section is available under the heading of Language College.
April 2007
We purchased the Early Start resource and find this to be an exciting resource which will enrich the PMFL programme and enable primary teachers to provide follow-on lessons and take over the teaching of the lesson the following year.
BWS MFL Easter Sudoku competition
This was won by Ellie Joint at St Andrew’s. Congratulations! The class were presented with French resources.
Primary PMFL Inset to Lille 9th -10th June 2007
BWS offered one teacher from each of the primary schools in our cluster, the opportunity to attend an inset weekend in Lille. We wanted to enable teachers who were less confident in the classroom to improve their French skills. It was also a resource gathering exercise for teachers to purchase authentic literature, take photos, to use back in the classroom. Finally, we wanted to offer a cultural understanding of this area and of France as a whole.
We took the Eurostar from Waterloo to Lille and stayed at ‘Europe’ a hotel near to Euroville. We then received the services of a marvellous French tourist guide who informed us of the historical importance of the town and described many aspects of the culture and architecture of Lille. We also experienced a “dégustation” of local wine.
That evening we shopped at Carrefour, where many colleagues bought books and magazines and French chocolate. After a busy day, a local restaurant was recommended to us, where we ordered in French and asked questions about the local dishes. The waiter was so impressed with the enthusiasm for speaking French, he even let us take the menus home for use in the school.
On Sunday, we caught the driverless métro to a large market. Our task was to buy picnic food for lunch. We divided up our shopping list, dispersed and reunited later, armed with French local cheese and fruit. Everyone had lots of fun asking questions in French and buying various quantities of food from the list. We then went to the zoo to taste our picnic food and this was followed by free time, for colleagues to meander around the town and practise their French.
For me the most positive outcome of the trip was the enthusiastic response from our primary colleagues, who were highly motivated by this experience and were looking forward to enhancing their lessons by using resources from the inset weekend. Many have produced PowerPoint slides, others are using books they have purchased or leaflets and photos. Some have even booked return trips to support their language learning!
July 2007
Dégustation de fromage at St Martin’s and St Osmond’s School in Salisbury.
A wonderful opportunity for pupils to taste different cheeses from France and to experience some cheeses they would not have tried normally. This was a very exciting activity and thoroughly enjoyed by all pupils and staff!
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French menus from St Osmond’s School Salisbury.
The menus were developed in conjunction with a healthy food topic that was being taught in school.
2006-2007 was a very exciting and busy year in which Primary Foreign languages played an ever important role in the primary curriculum.
Sept 2007 - the future
The start of the new term has seen the launch of Spanish in four of our primary schools and we are able to accommodate this and provide resources and lesson plans. The Spanish teaching provision is shared out amongst three BWS teachers and we are really enjoying the launch of this subject and the excitement is has generated amongst the schools.
Melanie Oliver-Basquette, MFL teacher and Primary Languages coordinator at Bishop Wordsworth’s School, Wiltshire, October 2007
