Ratatouille!

In French with our year 8's today we were talking about the Pixar movie Ratatouille and started discussing where the dish came from and what is was made from. Here is a photo that we found with some explanation.

MFL Teachers Use Languages too!

Mrs Stockwell has done us proud in the MFL office today. The last time she had a conversation in Italian was 20 years ago. Yet today, when in desperate need of an Italian linguist, Mrs Stockwell came to the aid of Mrs Murayama and pulled an Italian conversation out of the bag in order to book hotel rooms in a hotel in Italy. She successfully booked the rooms and we are very proud!

The MFL team!

Why Learn Languages - The Apprentice

Here it is! Another reason why you need to learn languages - you might not fail tasks on The Apprentice. Languages help you get a foot in the door in business!

¡Hola!

Today we had a wonderful lesson in year 9 Spanish where we were looking at Spanish restaurant menus, practising dialogues and learning how to describe a dinner with a celebrity in the past tense. Whilst we discussed this we were looking at the various styles of Tortiallas in Spain and Mexico, how David Beckham(our chosen celebrity!)has learned Spanish for his football career and how the inventor of Doritos has died recently and requested that he was buried with Doritos! We even integrated salsa music into the lesson to add to the Spanish Tapas restaurant ambiance.

¡Buen provecho!

European Week of Languages Sept 2011

Continuing on theme of European Week of Languages, here is the assembly presentation led by the Head of Faculty and the 6th formers which celebrated the importance of learning languages:

why learn languages

More PowerPoint presentations from MFL Dept

Yr 12 French: Imperative

Please watch this video on the formation of the Imperative mood in preparation for today's lesson.

Merci!

Miss H

French du/de la /des

Cher 10D FR,

Voici les sites webs pour le cours lundi 3 Octobre:

After the negatives test we will move onto the following sites. Please use the below links to research and practice the use of du/de la/des and also au/à la/aux in French: (make notes in your neat book).

1. Youtube video 1 - including notes on using just "de" after negatives.


2. GCSE Bitesize notes - don't forget to click "Next". There are 3 pages of notes.


3. A very quick exercise


4. Youtube video 2 - Including notes on au/à la/aux.


5. Information on using "de" after expressions of quantity.

We will discuss these in the lesson. We will also be using exericses on p.216 in the Edexcel French text book.

Mlle H

BA Flag Awards

As part of the European Week of Languages the MFL department hosted an assembly to award year 10 students with their BA Flag Award badges to celebrate the success of all their hard work last academic year. As a result of the BA Flag Award running successfully in schools British Airways has won special recognition in the form of the European Language Label award. They have sent an email thanking all testers, including those here at the Weald of Kent.

European Week of Languages

Today the MFL department led an assembly on why it is important to learn languages. As part of that assembly some of the students gave testimony as to why they enjoy learning languages and the Weald of Kent, describing also some of the benefits of the trips they have been on. Here is one student's account:

I first chose to go to France on the basis of how much my sister enjoyed it and the fact that I wanted to study A level French, despite not being very confident in speaking it. However, taking part in the French Work Experience has been very beneficial for my language speaking and understanding skills. I would recommend this experience to anyone who is passionate about languages, as it really builds your confidence in being able to speak a foreign language. The trip can also increase independence as you are constantly given the freedom to spend your own free time however you would like, instead of having a programme of activities like lower down in the school. I took my guitar with me and sang with the primary and nursery school children, teaching them songs such as Heads Shoulders Knees and Toes, which proved very popular. This was an incredible experience and taught me that there are so many ways to get over language barriers that don’t involve speaking the language, although studying French for 5 years did come in handy!

Just like everyone else on the exchange, I made a long-term friendship with my exchange partner Priscilia, as well as all of the other French partners that were involved in the visit. From going over in June, she has already come back to England once and I am returning to Elbeuf in October with a few others to see them again. This was a truly incredible experience and I would recommend it to anyone.

Yr 12 French: Modal Verbs

Please watch this youtube video on modal verbs in preparation for the classwork on modal verbs today.

This is taken from the site: http://www.frenchspanishonline.com/

Merci!

Mlle Hardman

Spanish Picnic

To culminate our Spanish Key Stage 3 work, we decided to arrange and enjoy a Spanish-themed picnic. Each of us brought in different foods and drinks, including tortillas, tropical juices, fruit skewers, and countless amounts of olives! We had great fun sampling all the different food, and we all thought that the picnic was a great success. 8S

Here is a recipie that the students used to make some of their picnic food.

Pastel de Limón

Ingredients

For the Cake

 2 eggs
 200g sugar
 250g self raising flour
 175ml of olive oil
 250ml cup of milk
 Grated lemon rind

For the Icing

 125ml cup of icing sugar
 2 tablespoons of milk
 1 teaspoon of soft butter
 The juice from half a lemon


Method
Put all of the ingredients into a large bowl and mix well. Once the ingredients have been thoroughly mixed and is pourable, put the mixture into greased cake tin, roughly 20cm in diameter.

No need to preheat the oven. Simply put the tin in the oven at 160˚C for the first 15minutes. This is so the cake can rise. Then raise the temperature to 180˚C for 20 to 35 minutes until cooked, or just until the cake is golden on the top, and is completely solid.

When it is cooked, take the cake out from the oven and let it stand until it is cool. Then remove the cake from the tin, before adding the icing.

For the icing simply mix all the ingredients together, before drizzling over the cake.

Spanish Love Poems

Year 9I listened to a song “Mi princesa” by David Bisbal in class. After listening to the song, they wrote their own poems to the “prince of their dreams”. These are some of their poems.

Necesito tus besos para no sentirme sola.
Volar sola no puedo, eres la estrella del cielo.
Estoy muriendo en la tristeza sin ti.
Lucie (9I)

Eres las estrellas de mi cielo.
Me encantan tus besos más que un helado.
Jasmine (9I)

Vivo en el desierto del deseo
¿Qué milagro tiene que pasar para que me ames?
Mi alma sola ha regalado todas las estrellas del cielo
Porque sabe que eres el príncipe de mis sueños encantados.
Bella (9I)

Sabes que eres las estrellas de mi cielo.
Sabes que eres el príncipe de mis sueños encantados.
¿Qué milagro tiene que pasar para que me ames?
Volar sola no puedo; estoy muriendo en la tristeza.
Tus besos curan mis heridas.
Eliza (9I)

ICT in French project

I am very pleased with my two year 9 French classes who have today demonstrated the final pieces from their ICT in French projects. See below for one example of a news broadcast and a radio broadcast. Others include E-Safety videos and Murder Mystery stories. More to come...

Mlle Hardman

Here is a radio broadcast created and presented by the year 9 French class. They worked hard on the project and the results show!



News broadcast:

Nous sommes de retour!

The Elbeuf work experience trip (25 June - 1st July 2011) has had another successful year, providing students in year 11/12 the opportunity to teach English to primary school students in Elbeuf, near Rouen in France. They also spend their free time with very accommodating families and a day in Paris takes place on the Wednesday. Miss Hardman was very proud of how the girls conducted themselves in the work environment and many long term friendships have been developped. Student reviews to follow but here are some photos of the trip for a taster.


Mlle Hardman practising her French by buying tickets for the group to go up the Eiffel Tower!











One of the views from the second floor of the Eiffel Tower.

Proof! We climbed 700 steps (including the top one!) to get to the second floor.

Our exchange school "le Lycée André Maurois".

Word of the Day (French)

We have another word of the day entry!!! "pneu" (m) = tyre in French.

Vocabexpress Trials - Year 10

We trialled www.vocabexpress.com again today but with some of our year 10's this time. The girls were so engrossed I had trouble getting their attention to give me some feedback as to what they thought of the site!

They liked the fact that you have to repeat the tests until you get it right. In our 20 min session one student thought that she had learned 15 new words. It makes you learn it as you cannot just skip past any stage that you are finding difficult.

Student Flag Art

We have some more flags that have been produced by our students that will be used on the menu on the right hand side. Thank you to all students who have made such an effort on these. Just the Japanese one to go!

Word of the Day (French)

We have some more entries for the Word of the day: "pneu" / tyre. Thank you very much to the students who have so far taken part!

Les Langues et La Technologie

We have a great opportunity to do an ICT project in this term with our year 9 French students. Projects so far include: an animation, a video, a French radio broadcast, an e-safety video, and a murder mystery themed www.voki.com project! I am really looking forward the results. More updates as we go along.

Miss Hardman

Bradley Cooper speaks French!!!

Oh my gosh - in the languages department we are very excited: Bradley Cooper of "Limitless" and "The Hangover" (1 & 2) fame, SPEAKS FLUENT FRENCH!! Click here for the link to the video recording.

Videoconference with Ourense pen pals

Our three Year 7 Spanish classes have been writing to their Spanish pen pals in Ourense this year. 7 Blue have been the lucky ones who did a videoconference with their friends in 5°B. Below are some photos that were taken in the Spanish classroom. Their school blog is here. Why don't you take a look?

Word of the Day (French)

Yet again more entries for the Word of the Day homework. Well done to those completed so far! A wall display will also be created in the B corridor of all entries.

Word of the Day (French)

We have more entries for the Word of the Day!!

Vocab Express Trial

Today we have been trialling an online vocabulary learning tool called "Vocab Express". Good features include tests where all words must be correctly translated (target language to English/English to target language) in a row. Any errors and the test has to be done again with those words causing trouble being repeated at the end. It is also case sensitive and necessitates the correct use of apostrophes in both the target language and in English. The vocabulary lists are also directly linked to the text books that we are using so it links nicely with any text book based work.

Student reactions from today's lesson were as follows:

"I like the fact that if you get one wrong you have to do the test again. I prefer this to all the other websites as I've learned alot today"

"It helps you learn because if you get one wrong you have to go back so it is helpful with revision"

The students were certainly on task for the whole of the lesson and 100% indicated that they felt the process had help them learn new phrases. Students didn't want to log off at the end of the lesson!

Mlle Hardman

Word of the Day (un pneu)

Whey heyyy we have our first student entry into the "un pneu" Word of the Day homework. Très bien fait!

Word of the Day (FR)

We have a new entry in for the Word of the Day from Mme Stockwell:

"pneu" (m) (/pne(r)/)

...which means "tyre" in French.

What a fabulous word! I think we need to get some students taking photos with objects represented by these Word of the Day entries. Will update when we have some pictures to add...

In the mean time with 9D FR we have discovered this great phrase: Je n'aime plus le pneu!!! Quite a tongue twister.

Mlle Hardman

Eisteddfod yr Urdd 2011

Now we sometimes hear students saying that learning languages is hard (suspecting that they say this to every teacher of every subject...). However, check out Welsh! I've been watching SKY channel 134 S4C showing the Urdd National Eisteddfod 2011 - one of Europe's largest cultural festivals. I've taken a sound file recording of it too and will load it here when I get a mo...

Mlle Hardman

Word of the Day

Le Mot du Jour!

My favourite word of the day today is French:

"FEUILLE" (f)

...which means "leaf". It can be seen in compound terms that we use in our day to day language here in English such as "mille feuilles" /meel/fu(r)ee/(a thousand leaves) which is a multi layered pastry desert.



Mlle Hardman

A New Flag for our Blog

Thank you to a member of our year 7 Spanish class who created this great flag for our blog menu on the right:

Austausche, die wir immer in Erinnerung behalten

A week ago, five other students of AS German and I returned to England after spending a week in Wiesbaden. Whilst in Wiesbaden, we all had very different experiences, which were largely shaped by the type of work experience placement each of us had. Personally, I carried out my work experience in a museum, where I had the chance to learn all about tourism, the way the museum worked and the exhibits themselves, as well as completing a complex, philosophical translation concerning the relevance of women to the meaning of wisdom. In addition, I also assisted in the museum’s education department, which provided me with an opportunity to see how children acquire language and to improve my own basic vocabulary.

The other placements took place in a kindergarten, primary school, hotel, theatre and newspaper, where the tasks were varied but the hours short enough to allow us plenty of time to spend both with each other and our host families. During the weekend, we were all taken to Frankfurt as well as various other places, which was an excellent opportunity to visit a new place and get to know our exchange partners better. As a group, we visited the cinema, received a tour of the town and were treated to luxury cakes. The importance of foreign links was emphasised at a reception at the town hall, where we realised how privileged we were to have such an opportunity. For me, this was one of the highlights of the week, because I was invited to make a speech thanking all of those involved in the exchange, which I know I would never have had the ability to do a year ago.

Overall, we all agreed that our spoken language has improved considerably as a result of the exchange in a way that it would never have done by merely sitting in a classroom; we were exposed to many registers of speech and had to think quickly in numerous situations. In addition, the way of life allowed us to become more independent and confident whilst in a foreign country, and many of us have made friends and connections which will hopefully be a part of our futures.

Ich hoffe, dass viele andere Schüler in der Zukunft solche Möglichkeiten haben werden. Wir möchten noch einmal unserer fleißigen Lehrerin danken.

Bis zum nächsten Mal!

Teachers Learn New Things Too!

During the French Elbeuf exchange, I produced an invoice for the French partner school in order to settle accounts for the first part of the trip. Not knowing the exact title of the French finance office worker in the French school I used the general term: "financier" for the signatory section of the invoice. However, what I learned during the week is that the term "financier" can also mean a small cake! The same term for finacial person appeared on the gift that I received from the French teacher for allowing her to stay with me during the week. This proves that Teachers Learn New Things Too! Another reason why exchange trips are a good thing.

Miss Hardman

Extended Sentences

In languages it always gains more marks if you extend your sentences and elaborate from the basic facts of what you want to say. Here are some good examples from 8I FR's second writing assessment:

Elbeuf Exchange 17-25 mars 2011

We have just said "Au revoir" to our exchange partners from Elbeuf near Rouen in France. Student reviews of the trip to follow, but for now why not read the French teacher accounts of their stay here from the French school's website "Lycée André Maurois":

23rd March - Day in Tunbridge Wells

21st March - Day in London

22nd March - Day in school with partners

Mlle Hardman

Modal Verbs - French

8I have been making comic strips to experiment with modal verbs and invitations. Here is Mlle Hardman's effort. There is not the opportunity to embed code from the website we used (http://www.makebeliefscomix.com/) so we have added a screen shot using our visualiser here. Hopefully we will get some students efforts here soon too...
8S &

Weald Student Feedback on national languages website

Our students have been getting to grips with the MYLO (MY Languages Online) Goverment funded language learning website recently and feedback from our students has been posted on the CILT Languages website "Languages Work". Take a look to see how our students are finding it!

(Students - you will find your comments under your MYLO screen names).


Mlle Hardman

A2 Spanish Student Work