Which one did I not say?

 

Recently I've been doing a lot more listening with my classes before we start speaking (here's why)  This activity can be done before you start the speaking, or afterwards as a recap.

I've called it "Which one did I not say?" for want of a better name!  I say all of the words that we are practising (not in any particular order) except for one.  The children look at the grid on the board while listening, and then have to tell me which one I didn't say.  It requires a lot of focussed and careful listening, and I am always impressed that they get the right answer - I'm not convinced I would be able to!

So far I've used it for single words, as in the example above, which is for Year 4 (age 8-9).  However I think it could be used with any age or experience of learner, and could be used with short phrases or even sentences rather than just words.

It is a low-prep idea, but I'd recommend preparing it in advance, so that you know what you've said!  I jot them down on a sticky note or make lists like this:

Adaptable Activities for your Language Lessons

 

I'm delighted to announce the publication of Adaptable Activities for your Language Lessons.

This pdf download contains 120 different activities that can be adapted to any language and to most ages of learner.  There are activities for listening, speaking, reading, writing, grammar and phonics.

So if you've ever found yourself in a planning rut, wanting to try out something new but not sure what, then this is the publication for you!

Available now in my Sellfy shop: https://ideaseducationltd.sellfy.store/

Take a look at the index here: https://www.ideaseducation.co.uk/resources/Index.pdf

Dictation across the key stages #LW2024

 

On Saturday I attended day 2 of this year's Language World conference.  I gave a presentation about dictation, giving lots of ideas to use from Key Stage 2 (age 7-11) all the way up to Key Stage 4 (age 14-16) and beyond.

It was much easier to make a video for you in order to share it than to paste all the slides into this blogpost!  Here is the video:

Other links:

Point à la ligne: dictation in primary languages - blogpost

Dictados: resources to introduce, support and practise dictation in Spanish

Listening Chests

 

One of my schools was extended recently and has increased from single form entry to 1.5 form entry.  This year, for the first time, there are 45 children in Year 2 and 45 in Year 1.  Also for the first time, there is a mixed age class - Year 1/2 - alongside Year 1 and Year 2.  Previously I have always taught "pure" Year 1 and Year 2, so now have had to formulate a new scheme of work with 2 cycles, to cater for the mixed class.  I'm teaching it to all of Key Stage 1.

I'm beginning with a brand new Pirates unit, using my maxim of "the usual in an unusual way".  The children in current Year 2 can already count to 10 and know 6 colours, but the new Year 1s only started Spanish this week.  This term we will be learning greetings, saying your name, numbers to 10, and 11 colours, using Pirates as the theme.  Therefore the Year 1 children will learn what they need to, and the Year 2 children will recap some learning and learn something new, using a different context to before.

I've had to think of some different activities to usual for this reason.  One of them is Listening Chests.

I'm going to give each pair of children one of these cards with treasure chests on.  Definitely 4 chests for Year 2, 3 for Year 1 and we'll see how the mixed class gets on.

Let's use colours as an example, and 3 chests.  Ask the children to tell you which chest the colour red is in.  Then you say 3 colours: amarillo, rojo, azul.  You said rojo second, therefore the colour red is in the middle chest.  The children listen and point to the chest where the colour is.

This can be used for all sorts of different language areas.  I can see it being useful for phonics: show children a grapheme, then say 3 different phonemes or words, and they have to say which chest the grapheme is in.

You also don't need a special chests card to do this activity.  It could be as simple as the children quickly drawing 3 boxes on their mini whiteboard and using those instead.  A low tech and low prep activity.

If you are interested in my Pirates unit for Key Stage 1, I have already uploaded the first resources:

French https://www.lightbulblanguages.co.uk/resources-pr-fr-resources.htm#ks1

Spanish https://www.lightbulblanguages.co.uk/resources-pr-sp.htm#ks1

Kung fu punctuation

 

Last week I wrote a post about doing dictation in the primary languages classroom.  Yesterday I tried out the dictation activity that I mentioned, with my very keen Year 4 class (age 8-9) who are happy to try anything.  

I wanted them to listen and write in the opinion verbs, and then listen again and write in the correct punctuation.  The completed sheet will give them some good model sentences to use for their own extended piece of writing.  

They did well with the opinions generally.  When it got to the question form in number 3 a couple of the girls were frantically whispering to each other.  I asked if they were OK, and one said "But we don't know what Te gustan means."  I asked if it was necessary to know at this stage what it meant, or if they could write it down correctly using their well-practised phonics.  Needless to say they wrote it down correctly, and the fact that I said it with question intonation, and that we added question marks later, meant that they could work out the meaning.  It has made me reflect, though, on how I train them to do dictation, and how important it is for them to have words that the children already know.  (I should add that they had seen and heard the question form quite a few times in lessons, including in our minimal pairs listening!)

I was aware when planning the lesson that we hadn't ever worked on punctuation in Spanish before, other than practising writing upside-down punctuation at the beginning of Year 3, and my nagging them about full stops all the time!  I was also aware that we work a lot on the S and the G of SPaG (Spelling, Punctuation and Grammar, for the uninitiated) but not much on the P.  Our national curriculum for primary says that we need to show how the new language is different from or similar to English, and punctuation is another way of doing this while reinforcing English.

I remembered that back in the day I had heard at a languages conference from - I think - Jo Rhys-Jones about Kung fu punctuation.  If you google it, there are lots of websites, resources and videos that will tell you more about it.  It was first devised by Ros Wilson as part of the Big Writing model for English.  Essentially, you make the shapes of the punctuation marks in a Kung fu style, while making Kung fu noises.  So primary languages 101, actions and making noise!

We used these 6 punctuation marks.  The semi-colon didn't feature in the dictation, but it made sense to learn it alongside the colon.  By the way, aren't the Spanish names for colon and semi-colon so much more sensible than English!  Here are the moves we did for each one:

Full stop: Punch out with right hand and shout Ha!

Comma:  Make a swooshy comma shape with the left hand and shout Shi!

Colon / Semi-colon:  These are a combination of the full stop and comma, so Ha shi! for the semi-colon and Ha ha! for the colon.

Question marks:  For the upside-down question mark, first a punch with the left hand for the dot (Ha!) and then for the shape of the question mark a line downwards, then another line out to the left and a last down and to the right (Shi shi shi!)  So a zig-zag question mark rather than a curved one.  The 'normal' question mark is a reversal of this with the right hand.

Exlamation marks:    For the upside-down one, punch with the left hand for the dot (Ha!) and then draw a line downwards (Shi!)  Reverse it with the right hand for the 'normal' exclamation mark.  (The teacher will have to do these backwards when facing the children!)

We learned and practised the moves, then I called out the Spanish names for the punctuation and the children had to do the right moves.  This meant that when they heard them in the dictation they knew what to write.

This would be useful also for reading aloud, where the children read the text aloud and do the Kung fu punctuation where appropriate.  They could also read out a text with no punctuation, adding the Kung fu punctuation that they think fits the sentence best.

Year 4 enjoyed this activity, probably because it was so different, and went out to break saying Ha! and Shi! to each other.  We certainly got a weird look from the caretaker when he walked past the classroom!

Presenting new language - an update years later!

In February 2010, I wrote a blogpost here about presenting and practising new vocabulary.  At the time I had been in the primary classroom for a term and a half.  Now, 13 years later, I can see that my practice has morphed into something different, and something that I think is more effective.

In January I read an interesting article about the benefits or not of learners learning new words in the foreign language by repeating them out loud.  Here is the summary of the article:

This paragraph explains it a little more:

Reading and reflecting on this article has caused me to modify the way that I introduce new vocabulary and then get the children to move towards saying it out loud.

Here is what I now do, and I am definitely seeing the benefits, with better pronunciation and recall from both my more experienced Spanish learners and my beginner French learners.

1. I present the new vocabulary via Physical French/Spanish Phonics.  My PowerPoint slides show the words, the sounds that make them up, and image to show what it means.  We sound the words out, repeating each one at least 3 times.  We don't blend them at this stage, although I do hear some learners quietly saying the words.
   
   
2. On a new PowerPoint slide I put all the words in a numbered grid, along with the images to again show meaning.  I say the words firstly in order and then randomly, and ask the children to point to them on the screen.  Engagement is always good and it is a quiet activity.  Here's an example of a grid:
   
   
   
   
   The pointing game could be used as an alternative for this, and would be a useful resource for further practice later.
   
   
3. Next we use the numbers for listening practice.  I say the word and the children have to tell me which number it is.  It's also a good way to practise numbers!  We cycle through all the words probably two or three times.
   
   
4. Next it's time for the children to start saying the words.  We use "don't repeat until I click".  I say the words in order, but the children aren't allowed to repeat them back until I click my fingers.  I give them a good few seconds to mentally rehearse the words first.
   
   
5. Finally we do some choral repetition in the usual way.

We repeat some of these steps the following lesson, and gradually reduce the amount of practice that we have to do.

Do you have any other go-to activities that you do at this initial "getting to know the words before saying them" stage?

Skills icons

 

Recently I was shown the excellent work of the history lead of a local primary school.  They had chosen to design an icon for each of the seven history skills (Constructing the past, Sequencing the past, Continuity and change, etc..)  Their plan is to display the relevant icon at the beginning of each lesson, and then to discuss with the children how they will be learning, and to recall when they have used that skill before.

It got me thinking that we could use a similar system in Key Stage 2 Languages, to alert children to the skills that we are using and discuss how we are learning.  I introduced the topic in the Languages in Primary Schools Facebook group, where it turned out that some colleagues have used such icons in other subjects and have also dabbled with them in Languages.  We also discussed the skills that we would want to include.

I have used Canva to create sets of icons for French, German and Spanish.  The skills included are:

• Listening
• Speaking
• Reading
• Writing
• Phonics
• Grammar
• Culture
• Knowledge About Language
• Language Learning Skills

(For Knowledge About Language [KAL] and Language Learning Skills [LLS] see the objectives of the Key Stage 2 Framework for Languages.)

My plan for the icons at the moment is to put them onto the first screen of my lesson PowerPoints, the "Today we are going to..." screen, to explain how we are going to achieve our lesson objectives, and perhaps also on my worksheets.

I displayed them in my lessons today, and it enabled me to say not only what we were going to be doing, but also to tell them which skills we were going to be using.  I suspect that quite a lot of the time, the children aren't aware of the different skills that we use and why.

If you would like a copy of the icons (available as shown in the image above and in a reversed format for displaying on a dark background) then click on these links:

• French https://www.lightbulblanguages.co.uk/resources-fr-dis.htm#misc
• German https://www.lightbulblanguages.co.uk/resources-ge-dis.htm 
• Spanish https://www.lightbulblanguages.co.uk/resources-sp-dis.htm#misc

If you would like to use them (and I'm not saying you have to) I'd love to hear about how you have used them.

UPDATE 08.07.22:

• "Language Learning Skills" changed to "Language Learning Strategies" as per the KS2 Framework.
• Italian icons added (thank you Alberta!) https://www.lightbulblanguages.co.uk/resources-pr-it.htm#dis

Making faces and pointing

On Thursday I'm going to be practising 4 colours with Year 1 (age 5-6) and adding two new ones.  I've made this slide to help us with our listening practice.  The idea is that I say a colour, and they have to work out which one it is and then make the appropriate face or point in the right direction.  I think that this could be adapted for different topic areas and that you could also use chunks or sentences rather than images.

Not to be confused with this pointing game!

Pointing and Flicking

The Pointing activity is something that students can do individually or in pairs. 

• They have in front of them a copy of the Pointing sheet (for example the colours one above), and the teacher has a copy on the board.  
• As the teacher says each word, the students touch the correct image on the sheet.  
• First of all the teacher says the words in order, then randomly. 
• Finally, the teacher points to the words without speaking and the students say the words.  
• Students will be able to think of other ways that they can use the sheet to help each other to practise, for example giving each other sequences to find.

The physical act of finding and pointing to the right image makes students listen, think and focus.  A variation on the Pointing activity is the Flicking activity:

• Students work in pairs. 
• Each pair will need a coin or counter, a whiteboard marker and a laminated copy of the Flicking card. 
• Students take it in turns to put their coin or counter on the black circle and push or flick it onto one of the images. 
• If they can say the correct word for that image, they can write their initial on the square with the marker. 
• The winner is the first student to mark his initial on all the images.  (Each image can potentially have both students' initials on.) 

A more challenging version has an extra spider and star:

If students land on the spider, they have to erase their initials on one of the squares they have already 'won'.  If they land on the star, they get another turn. 

All these resources are available here http://www.lightbulblanguages.co.uk/resources-gen-pz.htm

¡Mi Madrid!

Today you can hear the first episode in BBC School Radio's new series for Key Stage 2 Spanish - ¡Mi Madrid! 

The 10-episode series was written by Lisa Stevens, who has given a full account of the project on her blog, so please read all about it!

I am honoured to have been asked to be the consultant on the series for the BBC.  I prepared the teacher's notes and have made a translation of each episode to provide as much support as possible for time-poor primary teachers.

Have a listen!  Don't forget that the French series, Radio Labo, is also still available.

Radio Labo

It's tricky to find suitable and good-quality listening materials for Key Stage 2 French.  Radio Labo from BBC School Radio is a series of 10 fifteen-minute programmes. They are intended for upper Key Stage 2, but the earlier programmes would be just as useful for Years 3 and 4.

The programmes cover vocabulary, grammar and phonics, and each programme also has a song.  The language is presented but also practised via games.

There are some very comprehensive teacher's notes to go with each programme, and I think it would be wise to study these before listening to the programme with the children in order to gain the maximum benefit from the programme.

Have a listen and see what you think!

QR codes

There was a lot of talk at #ililc6 about QR codes.  I recommend this presentation by Annalise Adam of which you can see my sketchnote here.

I had experimented before with the site QRCode Monkey, which allows you to add an image to the middle of your QR code.  That's what I used to make the two codes above.  I thought that adding an image could add an extra dimension to a QR activity.

I have designed a scavenger hunt, inspired by Annalise's weather activity in which we took part on Sunday, using QR codes with images embedded.  Please feel free to take a look and use it if you wish.  You can download it from here.

Language World 2015

Ever since #ililc5 I had been looking forward to Language World (#LW2015) for several reasons.  First, it was held at Newcastle University, only 8 miles from my house.  It made such a refreshing change to be able to hop on the Tyne and Wear Metro to get to a top-class conference, rather than have to make a trek of several hours.  Secondly, I was looking forward to catching up with old friends and meeting new ones.  Thirdly, it was an opportunity to find out new things and refresh my knowledge of things that maybe I had forgotten.  And finally, as you may have read here before, it was an opportunity to practise live Sketchnoting.

Here are the sketchnotes of the talks that I attended.  Those with multiple pages I have stitched together using PhotoJoiner.net.  If you go to the ALL website, you can download many of the presentations from the conference.  I gave my presentation Be a crafty Languages teacher, which you can find here.

1.  Bertram Richter - Planning for progress at Key Stage 2

2.  Vicky Cooke - Teaching reading in Key Stage 2: leading learners towards independence

3.  Bernadette Holmes - Interculturalism and the power of three

4. Louise Courtney - Primary to Secondary Transition in French: Insights from research

5.  Rachel Hawkes - ALL Connect

6.  Wendy Adeniji - How can your teaching be consistently good or outstanding?

7.  Nadine Chadier - It's all about the code

8.  Carol Hughes - 25 ideas for creativity from Language World

9.  Rachel Hawkes - Memory and Thought: why we can't have one without the other

10.  Steven Fawkes - Now we are 25

See you in Rugby next year!

Parking cars in Spanish

I got this idea from a picture I saw on Pinterest recently.  It's a pair activity for children to use to help each other to practise new vocabulary.  While the versions I have made so far are aimed at Key Stage 2, I think it would be equally suitable for Key Stage 1.

So how does it work?  One partner does the speaking while the second does the listening.  The second has a little car (one of the cars included with the resource or a real toy car) which they have to brmm to the parking space that their partner tells them.  The above image shows how it would work with Spanish numbers from 1 to 10.  Partner 1 says "cuatro" and partner 2 brmms their car to parking space number 4.

So far I have made versions for Spanish numbers 1 to 10, Spanish numbers 11 to 20 and Spanish colours.  I think it could also be used to build up sentences, with each of the parking spaces having one element of the sentence in it.  It could be used with one little car, going to one parking space at a time, or an element of competition could be introduced with the numbered cars, each partner having five cars each.

I will be uploading these resources and similar ones in French to Light Bulb Languages very soon.  Keep an eye on the LBL Blog to find out when they are there.

UPDATE:  Links to the resources are here

Talking mini-books

This takes mini-books to a new level!  Using Storyfold™ Audio Paper from Mantralingua, the Minibook Creator software and the PenPal (the successor to my RecorderPen) I have made a minibook that talks:

There are several ways of using this software and hardware:

• Make a mini-book with pictures and words, and record the sound for the children to listen to.
• Make a mini-book with pictures only, record the sound for the children to listen to and see how much they can understand.
• Make a mini-book with pictures only, and the children use the PenPal to record their version of the story.
• Children draw their own pictures to illustrate the mini-book and record their own sound.
• Separate the audio paper into 8 cards and record sound to use in board games or games such as Pelmanism.
• Separate the audio paper into 8 cards and use it to make audio labels for things in the classroom

Lots of different ways of encouraging all four skills, pair work and for providing individual records of learning and progress.

Thanks as ever to Bev Evans for her brilliant images.

Disclaimer:  I am currently working as MFL editor and author for Mantralingua.

Jacques a dit

This is the kit that I had with me for my Y3 French lessons this afternoon.  My Twitter followers may remember my mentioning Jack the Puppet, purchased from John Lewis in Newcastle on Sunday afternoon.  I simply could not resist his French colours!  He is now, of course, called Jacques.  I also had my four finger puppets from the same range that I have had for some time, who are now "Jacques's babies".  We were working on Olympic sports and simple opinions (c'est super, c'est pas mal and c'est nul).  Jacques said a sentence such as "La boxe, c'est nul", and the children had to use the Recorder Pen to make the cards say the same sentence.  Then they took it in turns to look after one of Jacques's babies and help the baby to say a sentence for one of the others to solve.


All very lower KS2, I know, but hopefully it will give you some ideas.  It's possible to create a smartboard activity with embedded sounds that you can use to build up sentences and which would work along similar lines.  Students get to demonstrate their understanding and they and the others hear plenty of the target language, building their confidence to use the language themselves. 

#MFLSAT+ at Cramlington

It's been a week of extremes for MFL teaching.  The Bishop of Bradford said that language teaching in this country is "deplorable".  And then today #MFLSAT+ happened.


#MFLSAT+ was the fourth MFL Show and Tell, following on from the previous ones in Coventry, Nottingham and Oldham.  It was invigorating, exciting, inspirational, exhilarating, challenging....  Don't believe me?  Then have a read of some of the tweets from the event.  If the esteemed Bishop of Bradford could hear about the language teaching that was described here, he would have to climb down pretty rapidly.


The event was well attended, with plenty of local support, which was good to see.  It made a nice change for me to only have to drive for 30 mins to get to a Show and Tell!  Admittedly Northumberland is a long way for some, and so for those who couldn't attend but would still like to find out what went on, here are the notes that I made.  You can also watch the video replay here.

Mark Purves

The Singing Tribe - MFL group dynamics

Mark showed us some warm-up exercises for the beginning of the lesson – warming up the voice, and also as children are copying what you do they are all focussed.

Use a backing track with a good beat to do this

Use rhythm, actions and tune for giving praise to individuals.

Samantha Lunn

Routines in the MFL Classroom

¿Puedo ser voluntario por favor?

¿Puedo cronometrar por favor?

¿Puedo pasar lista?

¿Puedo cronometrar?

¿Puedo ser voluntario por favor? – to the tune of Coming round the Mountain

One pupil calls the register, another times them with the stopwatch

Pupils then have to guess how many seconds the register took using an opinion phrase.

Then they express an opinion of the whole process  -“Fue + mal, super, bien” etc

Then porque fue + adj e.g. interesante

Expanding spontaneous language

Could build on this, for example "how long will the register take?"

Forfeits for people who speak English by mistake!

Using cognates, mimes and visuals to facilitate understanding


Read more about Sam's presentation on her blog.

Lynn Smith

Thinking Skills

Reading images – pretend you are a person and then say positive/negative sentences about them, say what they should do to be more healthy etc

Create a mindmap of what you have learned in the lesson

Draw round your hand – write how you’ve learned in palm, write what you’ve learned in fingers

Emma Bains
Small changes to the curriculum to improve motivation

Emma has been designing a new curriculum for KS3.

Creating own satnav using ppt and audacity

Language with purpose early in Y7

Complex language produced

Pupil assessment of the process

Fashion rather than clothes

Lots of opinion work with adjectives

1^st week of Spanish, mixed experience groups:
find cognates, use common sense, guess what things mean

Lesson 2 adapting the patterns

Cluedo can be adapted in lots of ways

Rights and responsibilities in Spanish Y7

Endangered species -  animals but in a different way.

“Soy un mamifero, vivo en Africa, soy amarillo” etc

20 statements for others to try to guess which animal it is.

Advertising – looking at videos – questions before start

“If the HT walked into the room during this, how would he know that you were learning?”

Simon McLoughlin

Audioboo

Audioboo.fm is an online application, and is also available as an app for Android / iphone.

Set up a free account

Record children speaking in class, can listen to the "boos" via the web interface straightaway.


Can embed "boos" in blogs

Children can listen at home and also reflect on how successful they were

(Put phone on airplane mode in class!!)

Alex Blagona

Getting students to 'mark' our lessons

“I thought this lesson was ….. because….”  Establishing dialogue with students

Teacher comments on the pupil comments – getting students to think about their learning and the usefulness of their comments to the teacher.

Informs marking, gives ideas of points to address next time

Personalises the experience for each child

Comments are good for showing to parents

Need to explain to students what constitutes a good and useful comment

Students can express problems privately

Gives teacher a very good idea of which level students are at, good for differentiation

Joe Dale

QR codes

QR codes video by Common Craft has just come out

Open URLs quickly

Link to audio or video files to play straightaway

Link to Google Form for students have to fill in information

There are some apps which will make QR of page you’re looking at on mobile device

QR Coder bookmarklet – whatever webpage you’re on, it’ll make a code for that page.  You put it in your bar on browser

Use in classroom:

QR treasure hunt

Qwikvotes – surveys etc

Kath Holton has made QR codes for Zondle games

“Make your classroom 4D” – QR codes of students' blogposts stuck in exercise books

SnipURL – can change link URL for your QR

Find out more on Joe's blog.

Suzi Bewell

Vocaroo

Free, and you don’t need to set up account

Record, click “send to a friend” to email the recording to someone

Receiver listens but can also save it as .wav file

Good for homeworks – individual speaking tasks

Opportunities for peer assessment

Pupils enjoy it – something a bit different and reaches the students who may not want to speak out in class

Avoids having to do it all in class – saves time. Instant.

Students can explain something for others, such as how to make tenses perhaps.

Mailvu.com – good for FLAs – videos with audio, can be sent to students for homework.

Also consider Voicethread, Ipadio.  Ipadio also provides an embeddable widget.


Read Suzi's blogpost about #mflsat.

Isabelle Jones

Music and art, creative partnerships

Isabelle gave her presentation via Skype!

Rap project for boys.  Girls reluctant to be involved as don’t identify readily with rap.  We heard a clip where the boys were rapping using simple language (their name, what pets they have etc)

Rene Koglbauer

Social Media and improving boys’ achievement

Emailing work to teacher – 1^st step  Teacher can comment easily, more personalised

Started to get a bit cumbersome with the number of emails

Looked for next step, pupils suggested Facebook

Created pages for classes in KS4 and KS5

Profiles in German

Alex Bellars

A trio of tools

Class Dojo – real time behaviour and rewards in class

Create a class group, select individual avatars for each one

Give awards to students as the lesson goes along, at the end of the class you can see who has what

Can PDF the resulting graphic and forward to colleagues, parents etc

Android app too

Lingro

Turns any webpage into a clickable resource

Students can access reading material which may be out of their reach ordinarily

Triptico

Fridge Magnets excellent for sentence manipulation work

Random group generator

Resource for putting things in order

“What’s the question” – bit like jeopardy where you give them the answers and they have to provide the question.  Can be done as a team game.




Thomas Snell
Language learning resources from Newcastle University

Thomas described the Linguacast and Universed projects at Newcastle University.


Schools can also book to use the facilities at the university, and this can be accessed via the Routes into Languages website.




Terri Dunne
Blockbusters

The scope of Blockbusters as an activity for the classroom is broader than we might think.  
For example, put a sport word in English on each square.  Starting at word level, students have to give the sport in the target language.  Then, using the same game, they have to give the sport with an opinion.
Another idea is using time phrases.  What tense do you have to use with it?  Give an example of a sentence that includes that time phrase.
It's good for plenaries, though you could easily use one slide for the whole lesson in lots of different ways.




Dominic McGladdery
10 ideas

1. Wallwisher
2. Fakebook on Classtools.net - make a fake Facebook page
3. Twister on Classtools.net - make a fake Twitter page
4. Random name generators.  PowerPoint one can also be adapted as random question generator for starters.
5. Random letter sequence generator - generate the letters, the student to find the longest word containing those letters wins.
6. Wikis
7. Blogs - everyone has something to say that other people haven't heard before.
8. Clea.nr for YouTube.  It gets rid of all the "stuff" on the YouTube page, but only works in Chrome and Firefox.
9. Puppets
10. Mug of Misery / Pot of Participation

Amanda Salt
Speak, eat, sleep Spanish - an immersion residential


Amanda takes 6th formers on an immersion residential where no English is spoken in the presence of teachers.
Activities such as Dragons Den and Which Teacher.


The videos that the students produce during the weekend are used to promote Spanish around the school.


Find out more on Amanda's blog.






And here is my presentation from the day, including audio:

Reading Books with KS1 and KS2

View another webinar from Clare Seccombe


All of these have been really useful ideas in the face of uncertain and unsettling times for MFL teachers at the moment.


In the words of Steven Fawkes - "Subvert creatively".  


In the words of Adam, when he was with The Ants - "Don't you ever, don't you ever, lower yourself, forgetting all your standards."


And in the words of the great Chris Harte - "If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've always got."