Modern Foreign Languages

Modern Foreign Languages (MFL)

Current languages taught:
French, German and some Mandarin Chinese in Year 8

Aims of the department

For our students to find language learning rewarding and enjoyable.
For all students to have the opportunity to learn a foreign language, regardless of ability.
For students to understand that languages can improve the quality of your life and your understanding of how other people live and think. You can travel more, meet new people and you could earn more in your job one day!
For students to realise that in a globalised 21st century world, English is not enough. 94% of the world’s population does not speak English as their first language and 75% do not speak English at all!
For students to recognise the importance of self-discipline and independent learning in becoming a really successful language learner.

How do you bring this subject to life at BGS?

The MFL department uses a variety of teaching and learning styles such as regular opportunities for language learning through,
- ICT
- Pair and group work
- Thinking skills
- Games and competitions
- Listening and speaking activities
- Reading and writing tasks at word, sentence and text level
- Video clips
- Songs and TV programmes
- Creative writing and puzzles
- Interactive whiteboards are used extensively for MFL teaching!
Our annual Year 8 residential visit to Normandy enables students to use their French for real purposes and to learn more about French culture and history.

What facilities do you have?

All MFL classrooms have interactive whiteboards, which are used extensively.
We have produced masses of our own resources to support language learning
A range of textbook courses across the three Key Stages
We have our own departmental set of laptops, which are great for independent learning
2 Foreign Language Assistants (one French and one German) to help students to become more confident in speaking the target language and to learn more about French and German-speaking countries and communities

Do staff have specialist areas of interest?

A general passion for language learning!
A good illustration of this is the fact that Mrs Pickering, Miss Marteel and Miss Grimes are currently learning Mandarin Chinese after school along with a group of BGS students!
If you’re lucky enough to be taught A level French by Miss Marteel, you will learn lots about Brittany, her home region, for your Cultural Topic, and she will teach you the intricacies of the Past Historic!
With Mrs Pickering in German, you will study the Oscar-winning film Das Leben der Anderen (the lives of others) and she loves teaching German grammar - especially the cases, adjective endings and word order!

What is the coolest thing about the department?

Our day in Paris during the trip to France
Miss Marteel singing La Marseillaise to her bemused classes on 14th July.

What do pupils enjoy most about learning in this department?

Our multi-coloured reward stickers and tokens.
Watching ‘Extra’ in French and German and watching ‘Hennings Haus’ in German!
Learning some Mandarin Chinese
Language learning games
Using ICT, eg. www.voki.com to help improve their pronunciation

What teaching styles do you use in the department?

We include activities to cater for all learning styles and try to make learning active rather than passive.
We encourage students to become independent language learners, rather than regarding their teachers as ‘Walking Dictionaries’!
When we teach grammar, we encourage students to use thinking skills to work the rules and patterns out for themselves
We encourage students to use daft but effective ways of remembering things, eg. Sausages, Eggs, Potatoes for learning the Perfect Tense with être in French.

Mrs Pickering .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Miss Marteel .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Miss Grimes .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Mrs Walters .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Mrs Tebay .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

Curriculum

Year 7:

We try to build on the French students have learned at Primary School and our course includes the following:

Dictionary skills
Sound-spelling link and correct pronunciation
Talking about self, family, and pets
Numbers, dates, birthdays, colours
Describing the daily routine of a celebrity
Nouns, pronouns, possessive pronouns, present tense of ‘er’ verbs, common irregular and reflexive verbs.

Year 8:

Beginner’s Course in Mandarin Chinese

French (two lessons per week):

Countries and their capital cities
Famous footballers
The European Union and the Euro
Higher numbers
Weather and climate, producing a weather forecast in French
Transport and crossing the Channel
Using the PLUS project to produce a profile of a country
Using the simple future tense and learning how to make longer sentences to write about planning a future holiday

German (one lesson per week):

Learning facts about Germany, Austria and Switzerland
Introducing yourself and talking about character, your family and pets
Discussing school, describing your school day and giving opinions about school subjects
Definite and indefinite articles
Pronouns
The nominative and accusative cases
Weak verbs in the present tense

Year 9:

French

We begin the GCSE course to get a head start and cover the following areas from the AQA Contexts and Purposes as well as a wide range of grammar points such as tenses, adjective agreement, comparative and superlative, impersonal and irregular verbs and adverbs.

Myself
My free time
School
Lifestyle

German

Higher numbers
Describing your house and your ideal house
Discussing food and drink
Interests and hobbies
European countries
Describing your town
Weather
Expressing opinions
Strong verbs
Word order
Adjectival agreements
Subordinating conjunctions
Modal verbs

Year 10:

Both French and German are optional. However, the government states that at least 50% of students should be studying a Modern Foreign Language in Key Stage 4 and we encourage as many as possible to continue learning either French, German or both.

Students take the AQA full course in both French and German.

There is no longer any coursework for MFL GCSE. Controlled assessments in speaking and writing will be undertaken in June of Year 10 and in December and May of Year 11.

French

A wide range of grammar points plus the following GCSE ‘Contexts and Purposes’:

Home and Environment / Leisure:
Là où j’habite
Allons-y!
Work and education : Il faut bosser!

German

A wide range of grammar points plus the following GCSE ‘Contexts and Purposes’:

Leisure: Die Medien heute, Ich habe Reiselust!
Work and Education: Unser Schulleben
Lifestyle: Kind, Freund, Bürger, Gesundheit

Year 11:

French

Grammar, examination practice, revision plus the following GCSE ‘Contexts and Purposes’

Leisure: Tourisme
Lifestyle: Mode de vie
Home and Environment: Le monde en danger

German

Grammar, examination practice, revision plus the following GCSE ‘Contexts and Purposes’:

Work and Education: Die Arbeitswelt
Home & Environment: Meine Umgebung
Die Umwelt und ihre Zukunft
Leisure: Die Freizeitstunden

Year 12

AQA AS French and AQA AS German

Students study the grammar of the target language and the following subject content:

Media - television, advertising and communication technology
Popular culture - cinema, music, fashion/trends
Healthy living/lifestyle - sport and exercise, health and well-being, holidays
Family/Relationships - relationships within the family, friendships, marriage/partnerships

Module 1 Examination: Listening, Reading, Writing
Module 2 Examination: Speaking
(There is no coursework element)

Year 13

AQA A2 French
AQA A2 German

Students study the grammar of the target language and the following subject content:

Environment - pollution, energy and protecting the planet
The multicultural society - immigration, integration and racism
Contemporary Social Issues - wealth and poverty, law and order, impact of scientific and technological progress

Cultural Topics

French: La Bretagne (Brittany)
German: The work of the director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck - the film Das Leben der Anderen (2005)

Module 3 Examination: Listening, Reading, Writing
Module 4 Examination: Speaking
(There is no coursework element)

Modern Foreign Languages