Visiting Madrid for the first time. Lovely city. But it's amazing that the Madrid History Museum stops in 1920. It's almost as if the 20th century never happened. Nothing about the siege of Madrid. Really brought home the implication of the Pacto del Olvido.
They are correct to point out that if we say that communication in the TL is the sole aim of school MFL teaching, we set ourselves up for failure and a lot of media posts on the lines of "my DS or DD did GCSE and cant speak fluently, so MFL is a waste of time. - QED."
But it's not their A level! They lost the battle over making literature film essays in English - they are in the TL!
Self justifying, yes I agree. But I'm not insulted by this article. And it is over 10 years old
It's tricky and I am undecided on this. When asking students to analyse a passage/discuss themes in a text, I am aware that analysis becomes deeper/ more sophisticated if done in English (less cognitive overload). But equally, the ability to discuss a text and write about it in the TL is valuable.
I remember exactly the same issues when the last spec came in (despite the safety net). We've always had to make these decisions. Occasionally we will get it wrong. Exam board advice has always been "if in doubt, enter for foundation". A 5 instead of a 6 is better than a U instead of a 4.
Nothing like bit of nostalgia for one's childhood...I actually preferred it when book 3 moved away from the Marsaud family to the activities of a young news reporter, Yves Mornet and his girlfriend Danielle and her old 2CV which she used to transport her cameras!
Agree with more sensible goals.
The thing is, to communicate, you need to remember what to say. To enable language to stick in your memory so you remember, you need frequent short lessons in the early stages, something the UK school system can't usually accommodate.
You're right about needing to think through what we do and why. But communicative language teaching has had a pretty long trial and been found wanting. I know you'll say communicative teaching hasn't been tried properly, but can it ever work on 1 or 2 periods a week? My beginners in Bulgaria had 7!
www.tes.com/magazine/tea...
I'm sure Anthi means well, but tbh, people were saying all this stuff in the 1980s when I was training. Going on about langs being needed for communication isn't enough, I'm afraid.
Dear HTs, HR and recruitment people. Please don't ask job applicants to fill in your own fiddly Word application forms with not enough space and then wonder why you can't recruit. Use TES Quick Apply!
tes.com/en-gb/for-scho…
Chester if you haven't done it. Or pop over to Wales and visit Conwy - magnificent castle and you can walk the town walls
The reason is they aren't used to writing at speed. At sec we want them to get the info down before moving to their next lesson, so we're less concerned with neatness.Y7 don't always realise there's no time to finish the sentence or they'll be late for their next lesson and my next class is waiting!
Don't think anyone expects 8 sides of A4 in 2.5 hours! But the pace IS faster at secondary. I think any secondary teacher understands it takes time to adapt. But I don't think it's unreasonable to expect most of year 7 to write faster than 3/4 words a minute.
But this is the issue - we need them to write at reasonable speed.
Maybe the L2 functional skills needed reform. I don't know much about it. But am I alone in feeling uneasy that an education leader is cheering a headline proclaiming no need for maths or English qualifications?
Yes - I do it that way in vocab tests where they write the word or phrase I say in the TL and then translate it. But when it comes to dictation, for me it's always whole sentences.
Which words are different? As Kedi says, the vowels are often where they have most difficulty, so un/une or le/la/les might be good? Or similar words with different vowels? Otherwise, don't they find it far too easy? Duolingo gives word choices and I don't think I've ever got one wrong.
Really thoughtful blog.
"They hold it in during the day. Their parents see the distress, but the school thinks they're fine." Naomi Fisher
Schools can't win. When children kick off at school it's because of the school's harsh rules. When they behave well at school, it's because they are holding it in.
Labour are good at things like understanding that classroom teachers need rights and protection from overbearing managers. And reasonable payrises. But history shows they are easily seduced by whacky ideas on pedagogy and curriculum.
Personalisation in education is automatically assumed to be a good thing. Here's a link to a blogpost which suggests it might not be. People are not simply a mass of data ready to be broken down.
fivetwelvethirteen.wordpress.com/2017/03/19/p...
Thanks for this!
They always use Prosit Neujahr at the New Year's Day concert in Vienna. (Not raising glasses). Is Prosit Neujahr used instead of Frohes Neues Jahr as a greeting in Austria?
#WhyLearnGerman? According to an August 2024 survey, German is the most in-demand second language in UK job ads. A January 2024 study also showed it to be the highest earning. Post-Brexit, it is now much harder for UK businesses to hire native speakers from the EU. This could be your chance!
In recent years the role of personality has sometimes been neglected. Overly scripted lesson plans which a teacher has to follow rigidlycan be stifling.
The phrase "Happy New Year" is pretty standard in most countries. But German has so many variations. So when I greet my classes next week, I use "Prosit Neujahr!" Austrian style (Neujahrskonzert) What do other German teachers use? Frohes Neues Jahr? Guten Rutsch?
Agree. Particularly the thing about guessing genders. Eg. Default gender of a cat is masculine in French but feminine in German. No particular logic to it.
'Most high-quality research in instructed language contexts has been about the teaching of English to self-selecting learners in higher education. We call for rigorous empirical research in primary and secondary schools in majority Anglophone settings."
www.lspjournal.com/post/balanci...