Intent
It is our intent at Our Lady and St Anne’s to provide all of our children with a high-quality education in Foreign Languages, which develops their love of learning about other languages and cultures and helps provide them with an understanding of the world around them. We aim to build the children’s ‘cultural capital’ so that they have a knowledge and understanding of the richness and diversity between cultures. We believe that learning another language gives children a broader perspective on the world, encouraging them to understand their own cultures and those of others.
All pupils at Our Lady and St Anne’s will be expected to achieve their full potential in their foreign language learning (French) - the ultimate aim is that pupils will feel confident engaging in spoken French, develop skills in reading, listening and writing, and know how important languages will be for their future prospects.
We hope that all pupils will develop a genuine interest and curiosity about languages, finding them enjoyable and exciting and show a desire to continue their language learning past KS2. Although our current MFL taught is French, we strive to provide children with opportunities to experience a range of other languages and celebrate the diversity of the families in our school family.
Implementation
Children develop their love of language learning and develop skills throughout their time in KS2 at Our Lady. A yearly action plan is written by the subject lead to monitor teaching and learning across school. The Subject Leader monitors the effectiveness of the language teaching provided throughout the year with book looks, learning walks and pupil voice.
Our French curriculum has a focus on speaking, listening, reading and writing skills. Within this, children are taught about the many complexities of French grammar and phonics to help deepen their knowledge. We have a specialist French teacher (Madame Hewson) who delivers French lessons weekly. Lessons are 30-45 minutes for all KS2 classes. During the lesson, children have the opportunity to retrieve previously learnt knowledge and may take part in ‘un petit conversation’, which will then be followed by the main content of the new learning. Evidence of learning can be captured in French books, but we acknowledge the importance of spoken language, so children are encouraged to speak their French around school too. Songs, stories, poems, tongue twisters and other role play activities are an important part of French lessons at OLSA. All learners have access to lessons and lessons are adapted according to the needs of the children in the lesson. We encourage staff to display key vocabulary in the classroom to serve as a reminder for children. Displays may be created in classrooms or in corridors to celebrate the children’s achievements. Additionally, in our whole school assembly, each class receives a ‘French Star of the Week’ from Madame Hewson.
We try to ensure that children have many opportunities to celebrate other languages throughout the year. These opportunities may include:
- European Day of Languages
- Taking part in events for Express Yourself North East Festival of Languages
- Learning greetings in Chinese, Arabic and other languages
- Year 6 learning Italian to support their trip to Rome
- World Maps displayed highlighting where children are from and what languages they can speak
Impact
Our languages curriculum ensures that all pupils develop key language learning skills set out by the National Curriculum, as well as a love of languages and learning about other cultures. Ensuring we have the highest quality teaching for our children ensures that all children achieve and make progress enabling them to become competent and confident language speakers – in readiness for not only their future schooling, but their future careers too. We regularly celebrate those who are not only achieving, but also trying their best in French lessons.
We will measure impact through ongoing summative assessment, which is reported three times a year. We hope that by the end of KS2, the majority of children will have met the National Curriculum standard set due to our high-quality teaching and knowledge of the children we teach. We know that all children will make progress from their own individual starting points. Children’s knowledge, understanding and skills will build progressively over their time in KS2 and this will be evidenced in lessons, tasks set in lessons (be this written, verbal or reading), assessments, and through discussions with children. Ongoing CPD and working alongside our French specialist and the prospective high schools our children attend will ensure children receive the best teaching possible from staff in school.
Learning an additional language will offer pupils the opportunity to explore relationships between language and identity, develop a deeper understanding of other cultures and the world around them with a better awareness of self, others and cultural differences. It is hoped that children will foster a love of language and a desire to further learning beyond the classroom and in their future.
