Modern Foreign Language

Spanish is the language taught at Alderman’s Green.  We offer all pupils a rich and ambitious linguistic and cultural experience to enable them to make substantial progress in that language over their time in school.

We provide a balanced curriculum which allows them to attain receptive and productive skills. It is designed to develop pupils’ knowledge of phonology, syntax, grammar and vocabulary (in familiar and routine topics), giving them the tools to understand and communicate basic ideas, facts and opinions. Opportunities for raising pupils’ cultural awareness are embedded in careful planning which is tailored to engage and motivate with a range of activities meeting different learning styles and abilities. At the end of KS2, pupils should have acquired solid foundations, multiple skills and a taste for learning further foreign languages when transitioning to KS3, all of which will improve their chances to succeed in life.

Implementation

Our language specialist, Mrs. Grainger, teaches Spanish to all children from year 2 onwards. Alongside her weekly lessons our class teacher’s endeavour to drip-feed, and recap learning from those discrete lessons, where possible regularly throughout the week.  Spanish is firmly embedded in the school timetable.

Classroom practice

Lessons develop oral (Speaking and Listening), written (Reading and Writing) skills, phonetics, grammar, intercultural understanding and language learning strategies. Lessons will make use of stories, songs, games, repetition, pair and group work, using a research-based ‘Listening and Reading as Modelling’ approach, to embed durable and autonomous language.  Target language is used as and where appropriate.

Careful planning relies on a variety of resources to cater for all learning styles.  A variety of resources are used to engage and motivate the learners including; purpose made (flashcards, worksheets, sentence builders and knowledge organisers), authentic resources (classic books, CDs and videos, food), ICT (PowerPoint presentation, interactive websites, applications and website subscriptions), whiteboards, and bilingual dictionaries. Work is recorded in folders.

Assessment

Children’s progress is informally assessed in Spanish. Progression is measured and ensured through acquisition of skills against the POS in the National Curriculum.