Transition in a suitcase between year groups

This half term we are at the end of the year's academic study of the target language across both KS1 and KS2. 
The new DfE POS requires that substantial progress is made ..... we also need to take stock and enjoy what the children have learned and the games, songs, stories and language knowledge they have explored.
In a previous blog I shared how I was supporting a school to put together a cohesive start up programme so that KS1 can enjoy learning alongside KS2 and so that staff have shared strategies and learning tools.Here's the blog 


Ready! Steady! Go!

Transition  happens between all year groups. How effective this transition is supports how effective and successful progression for all the children will be.
As you head back to school for the final Summer half term ...it's time to start packing those target language suitcases and sharing the strategies , learning tools and activities the children have enjoyed with the next class teacher!




Designer Suitcases
Ask the children to help you decide what your target language suitcase for the year's learning should look like?What have they learned this year?What content and contexts have you explored. Create the labels for your suitcase from this content and contexts. Your suitcase may be a folder with notes from the class to the next teacher , a virtual suitcase or a folder kept on the school VLE ...but it needs to look like you have all travelled on a language learning journey together this year- hence the labels!



Packing the suitcase!
Ask the children to share with you the games, songs and stories that have enjoyed this year.Revisit and use again some of the activities and resources and take a class vote on which to put in your class suitcase ready to set off for the next year of language learning.

Maybe it's your.....
 Plant pot story
Easter Movie
Shape sentence jungles

and remember the books you have enjoyed reading too!




Don't forget those always useful items!
Discuss with the children the grammar that you may have explored. Add a noun treasure chest (facts about nouns and some key nouns from different content) and an adjective atlas (a picture on which the children can stick or add key adjectives they have met e.g colours/sizes/characteristics).Pop in a listening stick or two - so that the children with their new teacher can play some very familiar listening games and then build on these and move on!


Listening sticks


Have you packed your phrase book?
What can the children now ask and say about themselves that means they are moving more toward independence in simple basic dialogue and conversation. Pack an example totem pole -if you made them- or create a cartoon strip or recording of a typical dialogue.
What's a totem pole? Take a look here!


Totem Poles 

Hurrah off we go! 
Celebrate with the children their success this year.Why not put on a class language exhibition to share with another class or parents what you have done this year?
Now it's time to check what's in the suitcase and pass it on to the next class teacher...so they can unpack the suitcase with the class next year.

When are we there?
Once September arrives then the next class teacher has a reference point that can act as a prompt with the children and the whole class can have great fun unpacking their suitcase and explaining what they already have learned. The suitcase can come out throughout the year when content or contexts are supported by the prior learning.


What does this look like in practise?
Well the wonderful @EWoodruffe has been packing her classes suitcases this July and here is her blog all about this Let's pack our suitcases



Something a bit French, fishy and fun!

Celebrating Summer with a visit to the seaside?

Every year we take our young learners to the seaside in the target language ....well on a virtual tour!
We work with Year 5 on a comparison of beaches here and abroad.
Summer is also a time when the older children can share with the younger children some of their learning in end of year assemblies etc.  

This song about "les petits poissons" allows us to combine the work we are developing with a comparison of English and French seaside with some performance fun and the practise of the target language. 

 We love this authentic and traditional song for young children about fish in the sea.We can unpack with the children the use of adjectives in this song and we can create our own versions with colours or different descriptive adjectives too.Then we can have some simple Summer fun with the song and the theme of fish! 

LES PETITS POISSONS

Les petits poissons
Dans l'eau,
Nagent, nagent,
Nagent, nagent, nagent,
Les petits poissons
Dans l'eau,
Nagent aussi bien que les gros.
Les petits, les gros,
Nagent comme il faut,
Les gros, les petits,
Nagent bien aussi.
You can find wonderful clips of the song to share with your children too. Take look here!




The obvious thing to do is to teach the children the song .... and why not get the children to play the song as well perhaps on recorders ?
It will make a great independent performance for the rest of the school.
Take a look here!


Add a visual performance element too ! 
Have a go at making your own origami fish puppets so that the children can create their own puppet performances of the song 


Click here on the jedessine website to find the French instructions for your class and yourself to follow.

Finally why not each the whole class a traditional party game based on fishermen and fishes ...."pécheurs poissons"

It's a simple rhyme and a traditional early years' French playground game- great for KS2 beginner learners or just for fun with older children!
Maybe Year 5 can teach Year 3 the game ? 
Below are the simple words 


Petits poissons 
Venez
Passez
1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10



Divide the class into two groups.One group are fishes and the other group are the fishermen.
The fishermen make a circle and join hands . they lift their arms up so there are arches through which the other children (the fishes) can weave their way in and out of the circle.The fishermen decide on which number they will drop their arms and close the net and see how many fishes they have caught.The caught fishes join the fishermen for the next round.Who will be the last to be caught?









Fantasy Football Team

Sometimes the old ideas and the simplest ideas are still the best!
Many World Cups ago with a group of beginners in Year 5 I was practising numbers and how to say our names in French. It seemed a great opportunity to combine football, numbers and names. We created our own fantasy football teams and the idea has been rolled out many times and in many different ways.


All you need are templates for football shirts with the numbers printed on them. The lowest order of numbers is obviously 1-11 but you could add subs too!


The activity appealed to boys and girls because this was the creation of their own personal fantasy football team so it was amazing how many story characters, film stars, boy bands and cartoon characters made their way into these teams . However some of us took t really seriously and had to contemplate which great footballer was their goalie etc….especially when the players had to be drawn from the international pool of players taking part in the World Cup or European Cup etc that was the sporting event of the season.
So with a simple set of cards this is what we have done over the years …since 1996 to be exact!



Manager and team
A simple number sort .
The manager can’t get the numbered shirts in order!A different child holds each shirt and the scenario is a team photo 1-11- can the class help you put the shirts in order. It’s great fun misplacing the numbers in the sequence and getting the children to help you reorder the numbers and over and over again getting the order out of synch! Finally give up and let someone else be the manager and ask the class to help them count the shirts into the correct order.


Sound shirts and players from the target language country.
Who will be playing in which shirt at the match .  Introduce the children to famous players from the target language country …not necessarily playing in the specific World Cup team. Focus on key sounds in the names of the players. Add the sound as a grapheme to the reverse side of one of the numbered shirts. Blu-tac them to the board number side up .Divide your class in to two teams. Can the  children select a number, turn the card over say the sound they read on the reverse and name the correct player .Which team wins?



Colours, flags and shirts
Introduce the children to five key teams in the World Cup. Practise the names of the countries in the target language. Look at the flags for each of the countries and practise the colours in the flags. Blu-tac the flags to the board with no country names on them. In a bag or box put the names of the five countries with one of the numbers 1-11 on the cards too. Divide the class in to two teams. Can each team take it in turns to ask politely for a country. Pull out a card with that country on it and the team must then say the number and identify the correct flag. 
Can they say the colours on the flag and can one of their team members
colour in the shirt with these colours?


Fantasy Teams


Give each class member a set of smaller version team shirts with numbers on. Ask the class to decide who they would like in their fantasy team. They must create a mobile or a poster or a team layout for their fantasy team with pictures of the heads of the chosen famous people or characters attached to the shirts. The children must introduce their teams to their class mates –as if they were holding a simple greetings and question answer dialogue .

This can be done in the first and second person singular:
e.g

Hello number one. What are you called?
Hello I am called ……..

Or as third person singular question and answer dialogue
e.g

Hello ! What is player number ….called?
S/he is called …….

Or as simple presentation
e.g 

In my team there are eleven players ,Number one is called ….., number two is called……. etc

Finally don’t forget to display the teams – as the children are always really proud of their own fantasy football teams ! 

Take a look at the sequence of lessons here we have already created for the World Cup celebrations




Brasil, celebrating the World Cup with a twist

World Cup Warm Ups

World cup Lessons Ready To Go

Building purposeful links with a school abroad

A week or two ago  I shared on Twitter the fact that Latchford Year 6 had gone on their annual visit to Malaga to meet their partner aged children in their link school.I wrote this blog about the school's preparations for the visit Year 6 on their way to meet their Spanish friends.

 I received this email at the start of the half term from the Year 6 class teacher at Latchford St James CE Primary School and current Primary Languages Co-ordinator on her return from the school visit to their link school in Malaga. 

 Hi Janet, just to let you know that we had a great trip again and our children made many new friends. They had the opportunity to visit the market in Malaga where they all bought things, using their Spanish, our food in the hotel was ordered entirely in Spanish and when two groups lost their room keys, they went to reception and asked for new ones, again in Spanish. The kiosk on the beach was a great hit and since the lady spoke no English the children had to use their Spanish. It was so nice to hear them with their new friends and we were complimented everywhere for their behaviour and use of language . A fantastic experience for them.  Tina 

 What a brilliant start to my half term! It's the joined up thinking I really like. 

 Why? Well Tina is supported and indeed was accompanied by the Spanish language assistant José on this visit .Thorough out the  year José and Tina have been organising language learning to prepare the children for the visit. The previous language coordinator also went on the visit to continue the teacher to teacher contacts between the schools and to support Tina.

 The children have had opportunity this year to prepare for their visit.They worked with Tina and José on familiar routine language they might need on their school visit.They created their own Spanish market in their classroom.... 

...but what better way to consolidate this language and cultural understanding than to actually visit the market in Malaga! Tina tells me in her email that all the children had "the opportunity to visit the market in Malaga where they all bought things, using their Spanish".


In class they had skyped and emailed their Spanish friends to find out about what they liked to do as hobbies and pastimes.


but then they were able to spend time with their friends, speaking Spanish, supported by the teachers and of course José.Tina tells me in her email "It was so nice to hear them with their new friends and we were complimented everywhere for their behaviour and use of language."


And now they are back!

They have made new friends and have gained confidence in their ability to communicate in a foreign language! 

And in a week's time they will be able to share their world with their new Spanish friends,when they come to Warrington to visit Latchford CE for the week! Together the Spanish and English friends will explore the our local community, culture and school including the English seaside ....not sure it will be as warm and sunny as Malaga though!



The children have used their language learning to communicate.They have opened their minds to a new culture and way of life.They have been able to explore and celebrate their own knowledge of Spanish,which they have been learning  since KS1 at school and they have made new friends.

The teachers have real reason and purpose to engage  with Spanish language and culture and bring so much new knowledge and ideas back to school in England with them.

The children have participated in school life in Spain and they all went on shared excursions.They return to school with exciting stories for their younger friends at school about Spain, Spanish school and culture  and why it's so very important to be able to communicate in another language.

The school visit is a culmination of substantial progress in learning a target language over six years. It's inclusive and supportive and is an integral part of the annual calendar of both schools - an urban town centre primary school here in Warrington and a Spanish primary school by the seaside!   

Simple past tense moods swings poems

In UKS2 in Year 5 and Year 6 we investigate extended feelings- so we move on from simple characteristics such as sad, happy , bored, interested and explore other words to describe how we are feeling. 

 Let's create a performance based upon these new words to describe feelings and link this to the change in moods.


The whole activity is based upon  the use of present and past tense use of the verb "to be " in the first and third person singular (I am/was and also s/he is /was) and a wider range of emotions looking for opposites in describing emotions.



  1. Introduce and practise with the children the key verbal phrases they will need to be able to say "I am / I was " and to say "s/he is and s/he was"

  1. .Ask the children to think about past and present. Stand the children in front of an imaginary line on the floor. Ask the children to listen to one of the six key phrases above that you have introduced them to. Ask them to become time travellers . Explain to the class that to go back in time they must step backwards across the line and to travel forwards they need to position themselves in front of the imaginary line.
  2. Ask the children to listen out for the phrase you say and to position themselves correctly
  3. Allow the children to work through the above activity several times with eyes open.Now can they be brave time travellers and listen with eyes shut and step forwards of backwards depending upon what they hear.This is a great way to conduct some AfL- who can really do this independently without following someone else's lead?
Throw of the dice and change the time 
  1. Divide the class in to groups of four- two boys and two girls preferably.You will need dice- one per group Each group needs a die. They roll the dice and if it lands on an odd number they must say a past tense phrase and  add an emotion word.If it lands on an even number they must say a present tense phrase and an emotion word.

Mood Swings
  1. Working in the groups of four children - provide the groups with a set of 10 emotion word cards and a bi-lingual dictionary (make sure there are five pairs of opposites e.g happy/sad). Firstly the children need to check the meaning of the key emotions using a dictionary.Can they as a group think of an action and facial expression to match the meaning of the emotion.
  2. Can the groups now divide the emotions into negative and positive emotions?
  3. Can they change the categorisation and  find the matching pairs of opposites?


Mood Swing Poems 
  1. Now can they create a simple performance poem  to depict the mood swings using the key emotion cards- one in the present tense and one in the past tense using the first person singular. Each group must think of a movement pattern that reflects past and present tense - (stepping forwards and backwards /standing back to back in pairs and turning round for past and present etc).Each group must explore ways of portraying and saying the key phrases. 
  2. Can the groups now add a past and present tense mood swing echo. This means that two people in the group are assigned the responsibility of saying  the first person singular mood swing statements (e.g I am happy / I was sad) and the other two children in the group need to echo the statements in the third person singular past or present tense using the correct third person singular "he"/"she" to reflect the speaker (e.g I am tired (girl speaking)/ she is tired , I was lively (boy speaking) /he was lively).
  3. Ask the children working in pairs or individually to create and write their own mood swing present and past tense poems.Allow the children to access and use new words for emotions in the bilingual dictionaries . 


Let's talk about it .Moving talk on

As a network we work with children in KS2 who have as yet limited spoken language skills but also we work with children who have been learning the target language for 3,4 or 5 years and even more.As a network we need to get our children talking creatively and independently!Our current target with the more advanced learners are that :
We want our children to progress in their independent use of language!
We want the children to be able to say more than just limited responses!



The intention of the first sequence of activities below – which  should be developed over a series of lessons – is   to begin to enable the class to explore pictures  , photographs and stories in more detail. The activities are transferable so that over the course of the next academic year we can revisit the languages, set up the investigations and hold interesting discussion across a range of content and contexts. The intention is that the children become empowered  to extend what they can say and to allow them to access what they want to say.

You need to first take a look at Teacher French or Spanish  Talk Prompts to deliver the activities below.You can download the PDFs below

French Talk Prompts

Spanish Talk Prompts

The activities are based in the first instance around looking at famous picture and using these pictures as a stimulus for group talk.
Here are some famous works of art to explore and the content and contexts for which they could be useful  

 Possible pictures



Famous Art we like to use. Possible focuses for discussion are listed in brackets after the title of the piece of Art and the name of the artist)

·         The Boating Party  , Renoir (people, clothes , food , activities, animals)
·         Surprised : Henri Rousseau (jungle, colours, weather, actions, animals, emotions)
·         The Poet Reclining , Marc Chagall (people, countryside, animals, weather, actions, emotions)
·         The Starry Night, Van Gogh (weather , objects , town at night , colours, emotions)
·         Las Meninas, Velázquez (people, families, clothes, colours, emotions, actions , house and home)
·         La Grande Jatte, Georges Seurat (parties, activities, weather , clothes , emotions, people)
·         La historia de José, Antonio di Biagio (animals, actions , clothes, colours, )
·         July , the Seaside , LS Lowry ( weather, objects , activities, actions, colours, clothes , people, family

Artcyclopedia can help you to locate the pictures you want to use.

Below are the sequence of activities which can support your young learners to practise and explore becoming more creative and independent in their use of the target language.

 A.      Word Warm up activities

To ensure that all the children can contribute to the Talk Prompt activities, start with some Word Warm Ups. Ask the children to:
  1. Name / show / find certain categories of words e.g. colours, weather phrases   , animals, clothes
  2. Give the children   talking time to complete this with a partner or a group.
  3. Take feedback   .

Ask the children to :
  1. Check the language they have found by cross referencing this language in bi-lingual dictionaries .
  2. Consolidate the knowledge through a game of charades/ an alphabetical challenge (60 seconds to say five of the words in alphabetical order etc)


B.      Class consideration
Either give out the picture to the class or show a large version of the picture on the IWB screen or flipchart.

Ask the children in their pairs or on their tables to :
  • Familiarise themselves with the picture.Spot any items from the Word Warm Up activity above.
  • Give each table a blank piece of paper and ask the children to  create “word graffiti” art of  the picture.They must write down the key items / emotions/ descriptive phrases  they have identified in the picture and the words or phrases should be positioned in a similar place on the blank piece of paper to where the item/ emotion etc is depicted or found in the picture
  • Take feedback from the groups .Which words /phrases have they been able to locate and place in their replica “word graffiti “   pictures? As the children give you their feedback , either write up or invite a child to help you write up the key language that is being suggested by each pair/ table  on a flip chart
  • Table experts .Each table becomes an expert table  . This means that each table has a theme e.g. weather phrases, animals, colours, emotions, objects, clothes, food – the categories will depend upon the picture you have chosen to use . The expert tables must firstly decide as a group which of the brainstormed words and phrases written on the flip chart are phrases that fit in their category- sometimes a phrase might match two categories e.g. a colour and an item of clothing. You should call out a phrase or word from the feedback and the expert tables must listen and if they think it’s from their category they should put up their hands. Increase the speed and quantity of language used to make the activity more challenging. Ask for volunteers to take the teacher’s role in the activity.

C.      Talk Prompt Activities, matching questions and answers
  • Give out the “Children’s stem responses “(from the Talk Prompt PDF above)  either as separate cards – one card per pair , or as groups of three stem responses to pairs . The children’s stem responses  are located on the “Teacher Talk Prompt Sheet”
  • Ask the children to read and apply their knowledge of the language to  decide how to pronounce the stem responses correctly and also the meaning of the stem response.
  • Can the children match their stem responses to the possible questions you show them and you say from your “Questions for children” on the “Teacher Talk Prompt  Sheet”
  • Swap stem responses between pairs and re-run the activity so that children familiarise themselves with a variety of stem responses and the link questions

D.      Talk time
  • Children working in pairs or groups,possibly with the support of a TA or teacher , should now investigate the picture and be encouraged to actually "be in the picture" – even if there are limited characters that they can locate.
  • They should use their imaginations to step into the picture .Guide the children into this target language activity with the key phrases from the “Let’s imagine setting up the activity” phrases on the “Teacher Talk Prompt Sheet”
  • Hold “Listen ins” and ask children to feedback the language they are developing to describe what they see and what they are doing.
  • The children may use notes to prompt them if they have jotted down information.
  • Ask one pair to share with another pair their imaginary conversations and creative descriptions that they have generated inside the picture.what they have created- as spoken inside the picture” activity.


E.      Let’s imagine
As a whole class step back into the whole picture and now ask the specific questions   from the “Questions for children” on the “Teacher Talk Prompt  Sheet”. Take responses from several groups for each  question.
Ask the children to listen carefully and to imagine the scene they are creating as a class.



F. Return to the picture
In a following lesson , return to the picture and see if the children can respond appropriately to the simple questions from “Looking at pictures together” section  on  the “Teacher Talk Prompt Sheet” and can they remember their responses to the  “Questions for children” on the “Teacher Talk Prompt  Sheet” from the previous lesson?



You will now be able to use some of these activities to explore pictures , photographs and stories in more detail with the children over the course of the year , to extend what they can say and to allow them to access what they want to say .

Transition between KS2 and KS3 in languages

Transition?


Yesterday evening after the @guardian live chat on how to teach the new languages curriculum it was time to take stock and consider all the points raised and discussed.




What do we have to do?

 In the new DfE POS teachers of languages are required

 at KS2 
to provide the foundation for learning further languages, equipping pupils to study and work in other countries. 

 and at KS3 
should build on the foundations of language learning laid at key stage 2, whether pupils continue with the same language or take up a new one. 

Local solutions and different approaches are being generated it appears. 
Keep ourselves informed!

 Maybe some of these links will help to inform help to inform the learning journey

What is it looking like out there in the real World?

Well I am sure we can all share examples of transition and good primary practice and this all needs sharing too!

Here are two blog posts about two local developments to try to tackle the local challenges of transition.These are not necessarily solutions for everyone but are ways of setting off on the journey and approaching the demands of keeping continuity and building upon prior successful learning.

One high school is able to have a French learning continuum from Y3 to Y7 and is now holding meetings together with their primary colleagues to understand what the children can do.Simple projects that are easy to manage and deliver have been set up and are supporting developing dialogue about language learned and skills being developed.

The second high school has an alternate year French/Spanish Year 7 learning programme and is looking at transferable skills and links between French and Spanish that allow the pupils to access language. 

What we are learning .....

  • Share models that you create. 
  • Accept that they won't work for everyone
  • Be willing to listen, adopt and adapt 
  • Be willing to trust and have meaningful dialogue
  • It takes time!
  • It takes commitment
  • It's slowly slowly dripping tap...small steps forward and adjustments are required. 
  • Establishing networks both virtual and  face to face keep the dialogue and developments moving forward
  • Remember that when the children move to Year 7 it's a gap of six weeks in language learning but on entering secondary school the children will need time to adjust.
  • When it works, then the teachers on both the primary and secondary side of the fence feel valued and willing to go forward with the next steps.
My current conclusions?

 Should we not accept perhaps many roads that lead to Rome! and maybe too this is at the moment necessary?

 In our network we have schools starting off, schools who have children who have been learning to speak a new language from Nursery , schools where the children already have languages they speak well as home languages and schools where other priorities have meant that here have been staff changes etc. 

 It's certainly challenging but we can address the demand of effective transition if we go step by step and support each other.





A taste of great literature.Drama and mystery in the café!

Drama in the café! 

Poetry with Jacques Prévert

Although my example is in French, once you have found your poem in Spanish or German etc then the activities  will be  equally useful.This poem though is just so evocative and thought provoking by 

Jacques Prévert. We are working with the first verse only of this poem.This is because the poem's content beyond the first verse is too mature for the children . We want to zoom in too on the first verse and look at the simple caf

é

 language and how it evokes a mystery.

In the new DfE KS2 POS we are encouraged to read “great literature” with our KS2 pupils ,so here is a way to do so with UKS2 as we consider café culture in Summer second half term.

.

Déjeuner du matin

(Jacques Prévert)

Il a mis le café

Dans la tasse

Il a mis le lait

Dans la tasse de café

Il a mis le sucre

Dans le café au lait

Avec la petite cuiller

Il a tourné

Il a bu le café au lait

Et il a reposé la tasse

Sans me parler

At the end of KS2 we explore “café culture” with our Year 6 language learners. This poem by the French poet

Jacques Prévert will enable us  to explore “great literature”on several levels.

Some of you may say but it’s in the past tense ! I don’t think this is an issue here as the messages are clear and the children will be able to understand the text once we have investigated the language.

Recently I wrote a blog post about ways to  begin to 

explore the simple past tense

 using “ il y avait”,asking the children to become factual observers of what takes place in the café as they watch the World go by.The ideas below are about observation brought to life!

Déjeuner du matin , 

Let’s first put it into context for young language learners.

Café culture

Find some pictures of French cafés 

through the ages- both photos and paintings

.

  • Ask the children to look at the people, to think about what the people might be saying to each other
  • Ask the children to explore what the people may be thinking. 
  • Ask them to jot down on paper their thoughts as they discuss this in groups of four.

Whispering galleries

  • Ask the children to make a whispering gallery ofthe utterances and thoughts they have come up with in the activity above (probably at this stage of learning ranging from greetings, feelings, selecting food and drink , opinions about the food,/people and clothes , comments about the weather , third person singular simple descriptions etc) 
  • Bring children to the front of the classroom and ask them to bring their whispering galleries to life in front of the pictures.

Sound scene

Now bring your classroom to life as a café. 

  • Ask the groups to sit at tables and to perform their whispering galleries again. This time you will direct from the front. 
  • Just like singing in the round you will indicate when a table should start talking and when they should stop – so sometimes you will have one table talking and sometimes you will have all the tables talking etc.
  • You will also control the volume by raising you arm to indicatelouder and lowering your arm to indicate when the tables need to be quieter or whisper. 
  • Finish the activity, by one by one stopping each table and their whispering gallery,until only one table is speaking. 
  • Explain to the children that they have just created the “Sound Scene” of a café.

An Observation

  • Discuss with the children the key objects we may find in a café.
  • Discuss this in English and elicit from thechildren the key nouns you will need to bring the poem by Prévert to life. 
  • As the children offer the key words such as cup, spoon, saucer, table ,plate , knife, coffee, tea, glass , milk , sugar – set a table with the items at the front of the classroom and as you do so name the items in French.
  • Give the children picture cards to represent the items used in the poem –coffee, cup, spoon, milk, sugar. 
  • Now you have discussed the key language with the children ask them to listen to the poem and lift the correct items as they hear them said.
  • Repeat this a second time and ask the children to try and anticipate the order of the items- pausing before each item to give the children time to secede which picture card to show you.

Here is a reading on You Tube of the poem.I would suggest that you stop the clip after the first verse.The words are on the screen so you can see when to stop the clip.(The second verse continues on to talk bout lighting a cigarette etc). You may like to show the clip up to the end of the first verse now the children understand some of the key nouns in the text.

A physical performance

Now hand out this part of the poem , cut up into sentence strips . One set between two children. The cards should be in a random order.

Il a mis le café

Dans la tasse

Il a mis le lait

Dans la tasse de café

Il a mis le sucre

Dans le café au lait

Avec la petite cuiller

Il a tourné

Il a bu le café au lait.

Can the children reconstruct the lines of the poem?

Share with the children the whole first verse of the poem and add actions for “il a mis”/il a  tourney/ il a bu.

Can the children help you to understand what physically happens in the poem? Read through and ask the class to help you act out the poem?

A silent movie

But what is the customer really doing, thinking and feeling?

Ask the children in pairs to read the poem themselves again and in English discuss what the “back story” is to the customer. 

Why is he there? What has happened? What will happen? 

Can they   create a silent movie of the action in the correct order that has emotion and physicality to portray what they think the back story is to the action?

Putting life in to our poetry performances

Using voice recorders and  filming the action each pair can now create their own short filmed sequence of the first verse of the poem?

KS2 and KS3 making links between language learning

This morning I sat down with the  HOF, Julie Sutcliffe, at University Academy  High School  to plan a link lesson visit to local cluster primary schools. Here is another “work in progress” transition project that JLN are working on.


First a little context , over the last 18 months the High School language staff and I have been considering the links between KS2 and KS3 .The school has access to the JLN SOW JLN SOW. The high school runs an alternate year French Spanish Y7 language learning programme with the option to pick up the second language in Year 8.We are looking for simple solutions to local transition here.

Julie is aware that some of the children are just setting off and other children are writing simple texts in the present tense.Over the next couple of years the children will all begin to work at a similar level

Last academic year Julie and I looked for links between KS2 and KS3 learning by using the SOW as our reference point. All Julie’s main cluster primary schools are working at an early or more advanced stage with this SOW in French or Spanish. We were looking for links – in language , structure and skills..


Julie and I then adapted the current 2013-14 Year 7 first term learning scheme, offering KS2 children the opportunity to share prior learning, access familiar games and songs and use familiar learning tools and approaches. We considered ways of sharing knowledge across the two languages of French and Spanish to bring children up to speed or to allow children to value the knowledge that have gained during their primary language career. Last Summer term we held staff training for the secondary language department to look at prior learning and development of skills.



There was a light bulb moment when we saw a way forward for this high school and its year 7 intake! How often do we as linguists move from French to Spanish to find key words or to understand structure or grammar? As linguists we can promote with the children in Year 7 some of our “tricks of the trade” and how we can reinforce “language linking skills” they may not as yet have realised they possess! We are therefore building on prior language learning and knowledge as the new DfE POS asks KS3 to do! 

The children in Year 7 this year have made the links between the language learning that took place (mainly in French in KS2) and the new language for most of the children in Autumn term Y7 in Spanish. Masculine /feminine nouns- much easier to develop , because there have been similar links made in KS2, foods, animals, days of the week ,months of the year  etc, etc– the children as “language detectives and explorers” are simply making links between prior learning of French and the new language of Spanish. 

The children who have arrived in Year 7 with Spanish are not being held back as the speed with which links are made between French and Spanish is allowing progression to happen quite naturally. I loved an email earlier in the year  from Julie that told me the children just conjugated the verb “tener” because they could already do this in French and they understood why and how!

So what comes next? Well that’s what we have been planning today. Next year the cohort arrive with French and learn French in Year 7 .So Julie’s challenge with this next  year’s academic  cohort is to look more deeply at the skills the children are bringing with them from KS2 and how to build on these in a language they are familiar with already We remind ourselves all the time that we are helping young language learners with competent basic skills become linguists. So what skills of a linguist have the children already developed? 

Reading this on paper or hearing it from me for Julie  is not the same as actually experiencing this. With limited time and finding days that suit primary and secondary, Julie is flipping the languages and trialling the following school visit to two cluster schools,where the children learn French. They are going to explore some text level Spanish… because don’t forget she also needs to promote the Year 8 second language option. After the trial visits she will be better equipped to inform her secondary colleagues about  what to expect of young year 7 language learners who are looking forward to becoming linguists!


The activities are based on this you tube clip ………….




And a  power point word document that one of the associate Spanish JLN teacher uses to help her KS2 classes in Y4 when they learn this song with both the words and pictures to explain the actions and body parts. 


Why have we chosen this?
All the children will have practised the parts of the body in Year 4 as part of the class alien building activities and throughout their language learning with songs such as “Heads, shoulders, knees and toes”. Take look here – Karen the teacher at one of the cluster schools presented her simple ideas about the use of Mr Potato Head to practise parts of the body with Year 4 French.
It is a song that the Year 6 class teachers can then follow up and practise and use as part of their end of year leaving assembly or as part of their World Cup                                             celebrations  and link to the Brazilian Crown making 
                             activities as a Spanish samba style dance!

It also allows Julie to get beyond word level quite quickly , allows her to engage with the primary style of language learning and to promote the liveliness, cross curricular nature  and effectiveness of speaking another language!

Below are the simple steps and activities that Julie will follow when she visit and works with the trial cluster primary year 6 groups .She should meet  approximately 90  children in total in the two schools and will feedback her simple observations to secondary colleagues that are written below in red.We will let you know in a later blog post how she gets on!

Activity
Reason
Resource
1.French – revisit familiar body parts language with a song e.g. Heads, shoulders , knees and toes/ Jean petit qui danse (nb You Tube clip)
Reinforce and practise/ revisit language so all children are comfortable with the key words for transfer activities.
Feedback : knowledge and retention of language
You Tube clips: Jean  petit qui danse / Heads, shoulders , knees and toes
2.Spanish key word cards / French key word cards- matching activity
Promote the skill : finding meaning of new language through second language knowledge
Seeing links  and patterns in words from different languages
Feedback : making links between la familiar and an unfamiliar language
Spanish body part word cards
French body part word cards
3.Finding the key words in the Spanish bilingual dictionary What else can we now find out about these nouns
Use of bilingual dictionary
Recognition of masculine and feminine nouns
Feedback : prior understanding of how to use a bilingual dictionary/are children aware of masculine and feminine nouns and how to use the (m) and (f) to find this out?
Spanish bilingual dictionaries – one between two – provided by high school.
4.Match the written word to the spoken word
Listen ,read, respond activity
Feedback :  listening for key  sounds /word recognition skills
Spanish word cards for children
Teacher to only use spoken word
5. Listen and watch the You Tube clip – which just show the words of the text. Spot the key words and point to the correct part of the body
Identifying and understanding key familiar words in an unfamiliar text.
Feedback : accessing sentence level text to find familiar language.
You Tube clip
6.Add the missing words to a text
Look for cognates / semi cognates in commands within text
Understand text by accessing picture and clue prompts
To feedback  : following a foreign language text and anticipating key language. Exploring unfamiliar text by context  
PPT of song with pictures on IWB – key body parts omitted.
Children have Spanish word cards
7.Perform the song
Recall prior knowledge and familiar language  
Listen, read, respond and join in
You tube clip
8.Leave text and song for follow up by class teacher as part of World Cup/ end of year celebrations
9. Children’s feedback
Children to complete simple slip of paper with 3 points that they have realised/ considered/ explored whilst exploring a new and unfamiliar language about their own language skills
Feedback to secondary colleagues

Paper for children

Brasil, Celebrating the World Cup with a twist!

This afternoon was a wonderful afternoon and to be truthful it always is! I am meet with the language teachers who work with me in 31 schools on a regular all year weekly basis. It's our half termly training session. They bring their news and success stories and we discuss ways to develop and enhance the next half term's work over KS1 and KS2!  

Today the  planning focus was  the final half term during this Summer term 2014 and the language learning that will take place.

What a final Summer half term 2014 with

the World Cup, the Tour de France  and the Commonwealth Games

already offering us wonderful ways to celebrate the diversity of languages and the sense of a global community through sport !

We also want to encourage the children to think about the diversity in local languages as we live so near to Wales, Ireland, the Isle of Man and only a couple of hours from Scotland. Some of the resources sourced for the

Commonwealth Games

 will allow the teachers the opportunity to listen to and practise languages that are spoken a matter of miles from where we live (15 miles to be exact from Warrington is the Welsh border) and one of the colleagues who attends the training today speaks Welsh! Indeed as we sat and discussed languages from quite near to us (and explained to our target language native speakers what we meant by "Manx"), it dawned on us that as many of us are local north-western people, our heritage and ancestry is tied up with these local languages! Many of our children and families will be able to trace their roots too in this way ... so what a great way to track all the children's family trees of languages too!

I think it’s also important that we look not just at the World Cup as a sporting occasion but as a chance to throw the spotlight on Brazil itself and celebrate culture and the environment in the target languages. We deliver currently French, German and Spanish.

So let's open the doors on Brazil !  

Set the scene with music !

The sound and traditional children’s music of Brazi!

Here are short beautifully sung sound files which you could use to introduce the flavour of Brazil to your classes. Just to listen to and enjoy and maybe to vote on which is the class favourite!

musique-bresilienne-enfants

Listen and join in with the French versions of the Brazilian children’s songs that you can hear first in Portugese on the wonderful Mama Lisa site

Take a look at the geography and climate of the continent !

Learn some facts from Enchanted Learning Brasil page

Find out too from them about the Rainforest habitat and vegetation

Let the children read along with you this wonderful French story  where they can investigate and learn about the animals from Brazil in this wonderful repetitive story based on a toucan finding out who else is awake in the jungle 

Below is a clip in French, created for children in France to give them a taste of the tropical rain forests of the continent . The French is far too hard for young children but the ambience it creates – to just watch and see visual clues with the French commentary , adds a certain je ne sais quoi! 

In Year 4 Summer 1 with JLN SOW  we become jungle explorers...

So, here is a chance to revisit those jungle explorer rhymes and to create a Rainforest display filled with target language animal caligrams and shape sentences to describe the animals! 

Learn some basic Brazilian Portugese ! 

Don't forget to learn a little language on the way! This 

Brazilian Portugese Omniglot  webpage may help!

Daily life for children in Brazil

Using this marvellous site 24heures vie de enfant we can explore with the children the everyday life of a young child in Brazil through pictures and puzzling out of facts. Take a look

here

Let's celebrate, samba style! 

Finally when we think of Brazil we think of carnival and sambas , dancing and music and here I have found on the website Momes ,a Brazilian crown headdress which will leads us very nicely into the world Cup itself!

My suggestion is that we find out the names of  the countries that will be participating in the World Cup in the target language studied and select 12 feathers for our headdress.Each of the feathers created as  “paper feathers “ are made up of the flag and the name of participating country in the target language we are learning.Here are the French instructions on how to make a

Brazilian crown

Now we are ready for own samba style crown parade!

The dance class here for children could help your class to do this dance with proper

samba style

.

Exploring primary target language learning and developing competent risk takers

A young teaching colleague @NahuelPGCE and myself  discussed last week the  need to encourage children to take risks - informed risks - in language learning.
Take a look here.This is the simple chart that we created to demonstrate what we were thinking in the earlier stages of learning a language.


We had noticed in a lesson based on colours and preferences that children stopped learning when they felt "overload". We asked ourselves did we need as the learning facilitator  to consider how to help all the young learners develop coping and learning strategies?

Strategies that allowed them to take risks in their language learning but armed with useful language detective skills.What would be more useful to have experienced vast amounts of content or strategies and skills to approach new and unfamiliar language successfully?

We discussed the "horizontal” plain that primary language learning affords us. How we can link our learning across the curriculum and revisit and build on language making links with other subject areas. We have the  opportunity to take a “horizontal “ view of  primary language learning.

This should allow us to explore simple content looking for learning opportunities across the curriculum. This may help us to create engaging language learning-both inclusive and challenging.

Primary language learning needs to be an integral part of the curriculum and not an “add” on. From my privileged  position I am able to see language learning delivered successfully by class teachers,teachers in school with language expertise,visiting teachers or fantastic HLTAs! They all have a wonderful role to play and bring so much to the learning of languages.
What works best in all these scenarios is when the language learning is able to meld in with the primary curriculum or when approaches are adopted in language learning that are familiar to the primary learning environment.
So what did we come up with?

Colour across the learning curriculum!

Nahuel and I explored how to take specific content and explore language learning and the skills we acquire as linguists without rushing on to the next topic or content.
Here are our thoughts on teaching colours with Year 4 beginners on Spanish!

Introduce colours through familiar language learning games:


Create an opportunity to explore the sound and spelling of colours:




Say a sound from a colour word and pick up the correct card and say the whole word back to the teacher or game leader.
Colour machines – what do the colours sound like as we add them to our"imaginary" voice machines? 
What actions do they make us do as a reaction to the sound of the word? What word associations do we make with words and therefore what images might we draw on a whiteboard as a visual outcome?
Can someone else guess our colour/ label our colour/redevelop in a different way our colour?

Colour challenges for partners:

Show a colour, say a colour.
Show a colour,say a colour, bat a different colour back to someone else.
Add two colours together and challenge someone else to say the colour they make
Investigate with a partner colours we want to say but can’t yet and don't know ,by using bi-lingual dictionaries
Challenging a partner to label items with post its around the classroom with colour identification labels.


All these  clusters of activities above are about not “rushing by” but giving the whole class a chance to inclusively access and practise the language and on the way rehearse very useful language learning skills- recognition , repetition, pronunciation, recall, association of words, ways to access the unfamiliar.

A class survey with options!

We discussed the questions and responses that naturally fit with the content of colour and made sure these would be question that the children would find useful.
What colour is it? 
Can you find me something ……?
What colours do you like? / not like? Have you got a favourite colour?

Again we  considered how we would stage this learning and engage all our learners, setting different staged challenges with the questions in a class survey. Giving the children a choice as to what they asked and how they answered , encouraging autonomy with limited and simple language.

Getting creative with colours

We wanted to make the learning of colours creative and link to the rest of the primary curriculum and continue our "horizontal" journey to allow the children to explore their knowledge of the content but see how it can be used to communicate creatively. 

Haiku and colours to describe a scene 

So we decided upon a haiku poem challenge – describing a visual picture such as a beach, a garden,a park or a mountain view-using the limited amount of colours and language they know and applying the rules of Haiku to the process.







At the start of this blog I mentioned that we were exploring colours in Spanish and I had recently written a blog on the Matisse Cut Outs exhibition at the Tate (which could be used in any target language activity). We felt it was important that we explored Spanish art here as these young learners are beginners and we wanted them to have a taste of Spanish culture. So we decided upon Joan Miró.

The colours of a Joan Miró piece of Art 


  • Take an A3 piece of paper – blank sugar paper and insert for children (who would be working in twos) a work of art by Joan Miró.This must be in colour and printed on an A4 piece of paper. 
  • The children are practising their writing of the colours and must draw arrows to the edge of the A4 paper and onto the A3 paper, where they clearly write the name of the colours in Spanish- but in the style of the artist if they can and possibly copying the shape the colour has been painted.
  • Now all you have to do us take away the A4 paper, put all the A4 pictures on the wall – number them in Spanish- and make sure everyone can see them. Ask the pairs to remember which  is their A3 written document and hand the A3 sugar paper to another pair . 
  • Can they identify which A4 painting matches the sugar paper?They record their decision and pass the sugar paper on to another group. 
  • At the end of the activity you can have a big reveal and match the written A5 papers and the A4 paintings together.

Word Art or Calligrams using Colours of Joan Miró

This leads really well into Word Art or Calligrams!

Nahuel is a Manchester University PGCE Primary ITT and Clare Seccombe @vallesco and myself work with the students as day tutors. Clare wrote this blog called magical miro about an activity she observed another of the students deliver on one of our trips to Hursthead Primary School this year.It would make a great way of generating the children’s own creative display and written form of Joan Miró art work …. finishing off nicely our “horizontal” exploration of a content focus in primary language learning which has hopefully given young language learners to explore lots of ways of developing their language skills and knowledge.

Playing with the simple past tense..watching the world go by!

As the children move further through their language learning in KS2, there are times when they want to explain or describe simply a past event.

In Year 6 there is an ideal learning situation linked to one of the focuses of the

JLN SOW

 ...... the cafe!

In Year 6 we look at 

 caf

é culture and one of the wonderful things I enjoy about 

caf

é culture abroad is the way you don;t rush .... you sit.... and you watch the World go by!

Think of all those times when we sit in caf

és

 and watch the world go by and observe the actions and interactions of the people we see sit down at a table and order a drink or food then leave!

The past tense focus will be in this instance on the phrase

"il y avait ...." / hab

ía......./ es gab...."

To accomplish the final task of "Watching the world go by" we firstly will need to practise the core language.(You may decide to spread this across a sequence of lessons).  

Activity One:Stepping in and out of the picture

  • Introduce and practise the present tense and past tense verbal phrase for "there is/are " and "there was/were" in the target language.
  • Ask the children to freeze frame if you say the past tense phrase and to move and be active if you say the present tense phrase
  • Discuss with the children why they think you asked them to freeze frame or to move and be active. Discuss with the children the concept of the past and an event having happened that is now a memory and a picture. 
  • Discuss with the children the concept of the present and an event that is still happening and is active before your very eyes!
  • Can the children use the two phrases and play the same game of freeze frame or moving with a partner. Hold "listen and watch ins" and see if the children are responding correctly to the two phrases in the present and the past.

Activity Two: Time travellers and stopping time!

  • Ask the children to walk around the room and be active, talking to each other and asking each other questions in the target language until they hear you call the apprppriate past tense phrase :"il y a avait ...." / había......./ es gab..."Now they must freeze exactly where they are and hold there action until you say the present tense phrase. You may decide to say the past tense phrase over and over again and try to catch them out ..... they mustn't move!
  • You can generate a game here to see which children are the best time travellers - if the children move to soon , they must sit down. Who will be the last children standing?
  • Once they hear the present tense phrase then the children can carry on their conversation and move around the room...until they must freeze frame and travel back in time again.

Activity Three: Spot the difference and step back in time!

  • Show the children a picture of the classroom yesterday  - in black and white. Explain that in the picture you have added items- a bag, a book,a picture  et that are not in the classroom today. Can the children spot the difference? They will need to describe the room to do using the present tense phrase and the room yesterday using the past tense phrase. Provide the children with bilingual dictionaries in case they can not recall certain key nouns they need .  

The main event .....watching the world go by.

  • Working in groups of the three ,ask the children to create their café role plays .they must order two drinks and a snack and the children must take the roles of a waiter and two customers. Each of the customers must have a character e.g a mum and a child or an old man and an old woman  or be creative a monster and a child etc.
  • The class must "Watch the World go by" and listen and watch the role plays as the children volunteer to perform them for the class.
  • Can the class report back in spoken form what they saw and understood- using the past tense phrase?

 For example

"There was an old man and a child and a waiter.There were two drinks. There was a coffee and a lemonade. There was also a piece of chocolate cake with cream"

  • Now listen to and watch a new role play and ask the class to observe and report back how the scene changes yet again!