Modern Foreign Languages
We provide an opportunity for our children to develop their modern foreign language skills, to prepare them for secondary school or experiences later in life. We believe in forming a concrete foundation of basic language skills, which children will be able to build upon in the future. We provide our children with the chance to become bilingual, which may be essential to them when they are older. Our experienced Spanish teacher provides fun and engaging lessons, which inspire children and develop their confidence. KS2 are provided with weekly Spanish lessons, whilst KS1 are provided with an after school club.
Subject Leader: Dannielle Carroll
Knowledge, Understanding and Skills
How has COVID affected the Spanish Curriculum at Leamington Primary?
What was it like before Lockdown?
Before lockdown, our school used an outside agency to teach, our children in KS2, Spanish. The scheme of work was following the national curriculum and provided fun and varied lessons for the children. Our Spanish teacher would spend time once a week with each class in KS2 teaching them using songs, repetition, games, puzzles and using assessment tools to track our children’s understanding and progress. We offered an after-school Spanish club to all children in KS1 once a week. As a school, we have had Spanish staff meetings provided by the agency to help with our understanding of the teaching of Spanish and to help staff become more confident when supporting in the classroom.
What was it like during Lockdown?
During the first lockdown (March – July 2020), our schools’ main focus was the well-being of our children and helping support the teaching of the core curriculum at home. Our Spanish teacher would send over videos for the children to watch at home, recapping numbers, colours etc.
During the second lockdown (January 2021– March 2021), our key worker children were receiving zoom lessons from our Spanish teacher weekly. Spanish content would be sent over to staff from our Spanish teacher to help children at home with mini activities.
What was it like after Lockdown?
When we returned to school in September 2020, the children received Spanish sessions over zoom. Unfortunately the KS1 after school club had to stop due to restrictions, but the KS2 children contained to receive Spanish lessons. The Spanish teacher recapped previous year group targets.
When we returned to school in March 2021, after the second lockdown, we continued to teach the curriculum via zoom. There were opportunities to play lots of games, to reengage the children with Spanish, lots of paired work and also assessments to see where the children are up to with so much time lost due to COVID.
What does the future look like?
As a school we have decided to buy a new scheme of work which will be taught by our teachers. Our new scheme is called ‘Language angels’. This scheme of work provides teachers with lesson plans, audio PowerPoints, songs and audio karaoke, audio language translation worksheets, videos on Spanish pronunciation and grammar and assessment tools. Language angels is a quality scheme of work, which I have researched in depth. Language angels provides each child with their own log for if they ever have to work at home again. Their home log in will also allow children to play fun interactive games at home. Language angels provides each member of staff with their own log in so they can track the progress of their own class. Each year group will be taught 6 different strands (1 per half term). Lessons will be split into ‘intermediate language teaching’ or ‘progressive language teaching’. Each strand is made up of pre-assessment activities, songs/karaoke, audio tasks, games and post-assessment tools. Language angels also provides teachers with their own assessment tracker so teachers can keep up-to-date their children’s progress and understanding. Language angels also comes with an ‘Early language teaching’ which can be used in KS1. Linguistic society states ‘Children acquire language through interaction – not only with their parents and other adults, but also with other children’. We have ensured that our new scheme of work is heavily based on interaction and creating a ‘learning together’ approach. Our new scheme will be shared with staff and rolled out in school in April 2021. Teachers will use their assessment tool to keep evidence of children’s progress and will use SeeSaw to store evidence of lessons/activities/ songs etc. As a subject leader, I will monitor the scheme after its roll out.
Miss Danielle Carroll
Spanish Subject Leader
March 2021