Let's work together!

I am honoured to have been asked to be the keynote speaker at the Network for Languages East Midlands Primary Languages Conference, which took place today.  Here is the script for those of you who missed it.  I also did my mini-book thing in one of the workshops.

Let’s Work Together

My languages journey

I am a Languages teacher.  I'm in my twentieth year as a Languages teacher.  I spent fourteen of those years in secondary schools, flogging away with French and Spanish at GCSE level.  The last six of those years have been in primary schools, altogether a very different experience. 

Younger children ask lots more questions.  “Can I go to the toilet?” “Is it lunchtime?” and let’s not forget “Are you from France?”  My particular favourite question was “Madame, you know the Eiffel Tower, is it in Sunderland?”  One of the most common questions, however, is "How do you know Spanish?"  

My answer is that I learned at school, the same as them, and then went to university to learn some more and lived in Spain for a while to learn even more.  I tell them that they have a head start on me as I didn't start learning Spanish till I was 16.  They are lucky to start learning when they are 5.  But then I also say that I am still learning.  I learn new things about my languages and other languages every day.  Languages adapt and morph on a daily basis, and you never finish learning them.

So I am not only a Languages teacher.  I am also a language learner.  I would say that I am in my 38th year as a formal language learner.

I started to learn French when I was seven, at middle school.  I grew up in Surrey, where there was at the time a three-tier system.  We changed schools at the end of what are now Years 3 and 7.  My learning of French in the first year of middle school (equivalent to Year 4) comprised writing out lists of things like numbers and months and colours, and sticking them on the inside of our wooden desk lid so that we could see them each time we lifted it up to get something out or put something away.  We were given a French name and a number.  I was Denise and my number was dix-neuf.

Then in the second year (Y5 equivalent) we went to the new building and were allowed access to the specialist French teacher, who we shared with the private girls’ school in the next village.  I can't remember exactly what we did, but there was a lot of chalk and talk and grammar drills, and the filling in of the little booklets which I think were Éclair.   There was certainly no technology involved.  In fact, there wasn’t any technology to be involved!   We only learned one song - Savez-vous planter les choux? - and didn't play any games.  There was no role play and certainly no pair or group activities.  

However when I left middle school in 1981, aged nearly 12, I knew avoir and être, the present tense of regular verbs, and had started the passé composé.  I knew and could explain why boys said ma cravate and girls said mon chemisier. 

Then I went to secondary school, which in this three tier system we started in Y8, and started French again, from scratch.  After half a term we moved house, to the other side of Guildford.  I arrived at my new school after the October half term holiday.  My year group was coming to the end of a carousel of second language tasters.  I did 2 lessons of Spanish and had missed the German and Latin.  The following week we had to choose our second language.  I opted for Spanish as I'd tried it and because I have a Spanish godmother. 

I was put in the Latin group.  Initially I was disappointed, but in retrospect it’s the best thing that could have happened!  Latin has been immensely helpful to my knowledge about language, to my French, my Spanish and my English.  It also helps to make me unbeatable at certain quiz games. 

Meanwhile I was continuing with French and another new teacher with whom, again, the class was starting again, but at least this time it was with Le français d'aujourd'hui and the Bertillon family. 

I remember telling my mum that I found French boring.  I fell out of love with languages for a while. 

I kept the same teacher all the way through secondary school, for all of the four years.  Gradually it dawned on me that, far from being boring, she was amazing, and had us (admittedly the top group) ready for O level at the end of the 3^rd Year (Year 9).  We spent the next two years practising, learning the past historic and writing countless 100 word essays (we did the AEB board), enjoying the challenge of trying to cram in all the great structures we'd learned.  I have spent many an idle moment trying to pin down exactly what her secret was. 

So that's my language learning journey from the late 70s to the mid 80s.  Very traditional, but it suited me and I learned a huge amount.  I went to France for the first time – on a school day trip - when I was 14 and was quite happy to have a go with the speaking.  However this way of learning didn't suit everyone. 

One of my friends was in the same set as me for French, and she also was the recipient of an A grade at O level.  She also had done Latin and so had a fair understanding of how language worked.  She should have done A level French but the thought of having to speak the language terrified her.  It was something we had hardly done in 4 years, apart from answering the odd question in class, and so the O level speaking exam with a visiting examiner was a bit of an eye opener.

Your language learning journey will have been different, and it may or may not have suited you.  Many methods have come and gone, and in some cases come again, since then.  The way languages are taught in primary schools now is worlds apart from the way I was taught in 1978.  The methods we use now suit the many different learners that we have in our classrooms, and we have many more exciting tools with which to bring the language alive.

Children learning together

One of our main aims is to get the children involved in their learning.  They are no longer the passive recipients who sit silently in rows and then complete pages of exercises in their books.  We know that children learn best when they have the opportunity to help, support and explain to each other.  They learn best when they take part in an activity that they perceive to be fun, interesting or different.  They learn best when they have the opportunity to do the things that young children like to do: singing, dancing around, playing and laughing.

Confucius said:
“I hear and I forget.
I see and I remember.
I do and I understand.”
which is further clarified in the words of this Native American proverb:
“Tell me and I’ll forget.
Show me and I may not remember.
Involve me and I’ll understand.”
Both sayings emphasise the importance of children’s participation and involvement in their learning.

 

When I was a secondary teacher, my colleagues and I had preconceptions about primary classrooms.  We thought that children were always up and down and out of their seats and unable to sit and listen.  It’s how we used to account for Year 7’s fidgeting and neediness.  But now I know differently. 

Primary children work collaboratively, in pairs and in groups.  They change activities frequently to keep the pace going and to maintain interest.  Seating patterns are important and there is also a strong culture of helping others.  Much primary learning is characterised by active learning.  Children read, talk, write, describe, touch, interact, listen and reflect.  They learn by doing, thinking and exploring through planned and quality interactions.  The child is not a passive observer, like these ones.

So what sort of activities and materials should we be aiming to include in our language lessons?  The learning set-up is a bit different to other subjects as the children rely more on the teacher as the source of knowledge than maybe they do elsewhere.

Let’s start with flashcards.  Of course they are very useful for the teacher when presenting new language to the class, but once the teacher has finished with them, they can be handed over to the children to help them to practise the new words and phrases.  Children are very good at thinking of ways to practise new language in pairs or groups with sets of small cards.

Dominoes are a pair or group activity ideal for revising prior learning or indeed for practising new language.   There is the possibility of matching up words with pictures, words with words or even words with numbers.  How about matching up the two halves of a sentence?  There are many possibilities, all of which require the children to discuss the answer together and arrive at a decision.

Moving on one step from dominoes are shape puzzles, or Tarsias, as they are now more commonly known.  Each side of each shape has a word or picture that needs to be matched with another word or picture so as to create the final shape.  When the Tarsia is finished, it can be used as a reference tool, stuck down on sugar paper and added to.

Sorting activities like Trash or Treasure or Venn diagrams oblige children to work together to find the links between words and phrases.

For practising structure in writing try a game of Showdown.  Each group of children has a set of cards with phrases or sentences in English or in picture form that need to be written in the target language.   The group captain chooses a card and puts it on the table for the rest of the children to see.  They each write on their own mini whiteboard the phrase or sentence that the card requires.  When they have all finished, the captain says “Showdown” and all members of the group show what they have written.  They discuss, looking at the evidence they now have, what the correct answer is.

For another way to practise structure, use dice, multi-link, Lego or paper chains.  Each number or colour relates to a part of a sentence or an individual word.

There is even something as simple as giving each child a post-it and asking them to test each other on the words you have been learning.  Everyone will be busy, it will only be a short activity, and there won’t be lots of children sitting bored while the teacher has to go round testing individuals.  When the class is playing a game like Chef d’Orchestre or Hide and Seek they will be enthusiastically speaking the language, but not thinking about it – the language is the means of winning the game or helping a classmate to find the answer.  And going right back to basics, every time the children repeat a word and perform an action to go with it, they are being active learners and involving themselves in the learning.

We can't underestimate the impact on children of learning alongside children in another school, whether that other school is in the UK or in another country where the language is spoken.  It is motivating and makes them feel important.  Currently the children I take for Spanish are working collaboratively with a school in the east of Madrid, but also with one of our nearest primary schools in Sunderland.

Teachers helping teachers

We know that it’s important for children to help each other and to learn collaboratively.  It’s equally important for their teachers to do the same.  For many primary teachers, Languages is a new subject. 
They are going to need help and support to assist them in their day-to-day teaching of languages. 
But let’s not forget that they also have something to give.  I am willing to share my language expertise.  In return the primary teachers can share their expertise as classroom practitioners.  We all have something to offer and we all have something to learn.

I have already described my language learning journey.  I also have a sharing journey. 

In 2004 I uploaded for the first time a little website called MFL Sunderland, which I had put together as one of my targets as an Advanced Skills Teacher. 

Just about every resource that I have made since then has gone onto the website.  Over the past 10 years it has undergone many changes, not least, most recently, a change of name.  From small beginnings it has become one of the well-known languages websites, and it remains free of charge to users.  It has over 5000 resources and is nearly 2GB in size.  It has its own blog, its own Twitter account and its own Facebook page.  All of this was inconceivable to me 10 years ago.

I am committed to sharing, not only to sharing resources but to sharing ideas and knowledge as well.  I blog and tweet as a professional, to share what I know with other professionals.  But I wouldn’t do it if I couldn’t take as well as give.

Why should we as teachers share what we have and what we can do? 

Let’s say I make a resource or have an idea.  I think “Mr X in the class next door is doing the same thing at the moment.  He might like this to save a bit of work.”  So I give it to him and to other colleagues, actual and virtual, who might find it useful.  Then I have another idea, and share it in the same way and for the same reasons.  And so it goes on.  The others end up with a pile of new resources, and I have none until I have another idea or make a new resource.  So I get drained and annoyed and sad.

This would be better.   I have a resource or an idea.  I think “Mr X in the class next door is doing the same thing at the moment.  He might like this to save a bit of work.”  So I give it to him and to other colleagues, actual and virtual, who might find it useful.   The other colleagues have a resource or an idea, and they give it to me as they think I might find it useful.  And so it goes on.  Everyone ends up with a big pile of resources and ideas to help them to move onwards and upwards, and to make their working lives easier.

This is my definition of sharing in this context.  It might still need a little tweak, but that’s the essence.

The day-to-day life of a teacher is not an easy one.  Particularly if you’re a teacher who has to add another subject to their already busy planning and teaching schedule.  It’s easy to get stuck in a rut where there are no fresh ideas, where you can’t think round a problem to find a new way of doing it that is just right for your class.  And how many times have you spent ages on a resource only to find later that you have in fact reinvented the wheel?

Remember - as they said in High School Musical, we’re all in this together.  Whether we like it or not, whether we are prepared to admit it or not, we all face the same challenges and the same pulls on our time.  We’re working towards a common goal but we all have different tools at our disposal.  We have to support and help each other.

The year before I became an AST I did a “Becoming a subject leader” course.  It taught me that I didn’t want to be a subject leader, but it did teach me some useful things too.  Like how important it is to create a culture of sharing and networking amongst your colleagues. 

Start small.  Schedule meetings where each colleague brings along a resource or an idea that has worked well for them, or a web link that they think is particularly interesting.  It may be hard to win people round.  For some reason some colleagues are very protective of what they create and are very reluctant to share.  Is this insecurity?  It’s worth stressing again that everyone will have something worth contributing, whoever they are and however much experience they have.  I have learned as much from NQTs and Foreign Language Assistants as I have from more senior colleagues.  Everyone has their own ideas which will stimulate an idea in or interest someone else. 

Share resources or links informally via email, or via the school VLE or a shared Dropbox folder.  Create some folders on the school network where everyone can save a copy of each resource that they make or use.  That way everyone will know what’s available and won’t spend ages making something new when they could have adapted something that was already there.  Set up a blog or wiki to serve as a central point that you can all access from home and from school, and that you can all contribute to and put ideas on.  It takes a bit of effort on everybody’s part, but the rewards are more than worth it.

If you want to share with a wider audience, there are different forums and other online “outlets” that you can access.  For example there is the TES Forum, where you can discuss languages and their teaching, although the Modern Languages forum isn’t half as busy as it used to be.  If you prefer an email forum, sign up to the CfBT Primary Languages forum.  I can’t recommend Twitter highly enough for keeping you up to date with the cutting-edge ideas and for the camaraderie.  If you follow my Primary Languages UK Twitter list, you can keep in touch with and get information from over a hundred primary languages teachers (specialist and non-specialist) as well as organisations, publishers and suppliers.  If you are a Facebooker, there is the Languages in Primary Schools group, which has over 700 members.

There has not been much money forthcoming for the majority of primary teachers who require upskilling, so the arrival of the Association for Language Learning’s network of Primary Hubs has been a godsend.  They exist all over the country so find one near you.  They are free of charge and allow you to link up and meet with other professionals who are in the same boat as you. 

We need to work together to ensure that Languages in KS2 works this time round.  And we need to ensure that the children are involved in high quality learning experiences to further their knowledge and understanding, as they begin their language learning journey.  Build your network, get sharing - Let’s Work Together!

Language Show Live 2012: Saturday

I stayed at Language Show Live until about 2pm on Saturday.  I called it a day then partly because I knew I was going to be returning on Sunday with my sister and I wanted to have some stands left to visit, and partly because it was going to be the only opportunity I would have to spend some time in my home town, which I don't get to do very often.

I began the day with Blurring the Boundaries...-Languages beyond the classroom, Rachel Hawkes's first talk of the day.  Rachel spoke about initiatives such as Spanglovision, Language Beatz and Language Leaders.  You can read about all of them on Rachel's website.  I won't say any more about them here but recommend instead that you read Sally-Jane Braisby's excellent blogpost about the same seminar.

It was during this seminar that I caught up with a large number of #MFLTwitterati.  Great to see them all in the flesh again!

The next seminar I attended had an intriguing title: GramMAGICal structures, and an even more intriguing description: "Amaze your students with magic and get them to learn, practise and perform tricks while using various grammar structures in a way they will never forget!"  It was given by James Stubbs, about whom I have heard good things on Twitter, and so I thought I would give it a try.  And it was actually about proper magic - James is a member of the Magic Circle and was mentored by the late Ali Bongo.  

I made the mistake of sitting near the back, and soon lots of taller people were sitting in front of me (not difficult to be taller than me) so I couldn't see most of what James was doing.  However I could hear how useful magic tricks are for repeating language and for introducing grammar like the imperative and pronoun objects, which are not the easiest things to teach.  The main thing that I took away from the seminar was the importance of using language for real purposes.  You could show the students a trick, or a 'make', or a piece of writing, or a picture, and then give them the instruction sheet - they then have a reason for reading, to see how to do what you have shown them.  Another idea I got from James was to have students learning how to do something and then demonstrating it to other students.  This has given me an idea for how to approach the next 'make' that I do.

The third and final seminar that I saw on Saturday was Top 10 tips to give a fabulous speech, by Morwenna Rowe from Speak Easily.  I was particularly interested in this one because public speaking is something that I am doing more and more, and I wanted to make sure I was on the right track.  

Morwenna began by talking about the impact that being a non-native speaker of English can have on giving a presentation in English.  She demonstrated the stress patterns of French and Spanish and the tonal nature of some Asian languages and how it can be difficult for speakers of these (and other) languages to give correct emphasis to English.  She then talked about the effects that nerves can have on the body and on the way that you speak.  I have experienced many of the 'symptoms' that she mentioned - tight voice, butterflies and blushing for example, and it was reassuring to find out that these are all a result of stress hormones produced by being nervous.  She stressed that it is important to stand properly - more on your toes than on your heels - and to breathe from deep in your belly not from your upper chest. It is vital to make good eye contact with your audience so as to really connect with them.  Your eyes should be parallel with the eyes of the audience.

The most interesting part for me was the section about PowerPoint.  Morwenna suggests writing your speech or presentation first, then creating the PowerPoint slides after that.  The slides should add visual interest with photos, diagrams or keywords, but never lists of bullet points and large amounts of text.  In that case the audience will switch from listening to you to reading the screen.  My PowerPoint slides now are usually an image and a couple of words.  When I post my presentations to Slideshare I like to slidecast them simply because people looking at the slides after the event won't get much detail from them.

I brought away some excellent handouts from Speak Easily, and also took some for my husband, who does a lot of speaking as well.

*Images by the brilliant Bev Evans

Handling Spanish data

Two weeks ago I reached the "weather" section of my Olympics scheme of work with Year 5 and Year 6, having already done a lot of work on sports and sporting equipment.  We learned ten weather phrases and a song (with actions!) to help us to remember them.  Last week I gave the children an outline map of Spain and a copy of the weather symbols.  They had to cut out the symbols, stick them onto the map and then write the corresponding weather-forecasting sentences like "En el norte hace sol."  While Year 6 were finishing theirs, their teacher came in to the room, and saw what we were doing.  He said that with last year's Year 6 he had done some data handling using a table of information about Spain, and would it be possible for me to something similar, as some of the class are still struggling with reading information from tables.  We did a very quick brainstorm and I finished the class with the next lesson pretty much planned in my head.


I spent most of last Friday researching, preparing and planning the lesson.  I found this site particularly useful for finding the data that I needed.  


Here's what we did:

1. Revised our weather phrases and song
2. Revised and practised further our points of the compass and how to put them together with the weather phrases.
3. Looked at the Spanish weather map from ElTiempo.es.  I pointed out the days of the week along the top and we practised saying what the weather is like, again using the compass points and the weather phrases.
4. Looked at another map of Spain, this time showing the regions.  I explained how the Balearic Islands are a region despite being in the middle of the Mediterranean, and we talked about why the Canary Islands were shown in a box on the map.  I also showed them a larger-scale map showing Ceuta and Melilla.
5. Gave the children an outline copy of the map of the Spanish regions with 8 questions to answer.  The idea was that they worked in pairs, using the map and their prior knowledge of countries and weather, to predict the answers to the questions such as "Which region do you think is the largest?" and "Which region do you think is the warmest?"
6. Gave the children a copy of the table of regional data and they set about using it to find the real answers to the questions. 
7. Gave the children a list of 24 questions to answer using the table, in order to practise further reading information from a table.

Afterwards I showed the Year 6 teacher what I had been doing, and he was very supportive and thought that it had hit the right note.  I mentioned that some pupils who are in the middle ability range of the class for Spanish were particularly responsive, as the Spanish work as being couched in mathematical terms, something that they are a lot more comfortable with.  It's always good to find a way of reaching those children for whom a language isn't the easiest thing.


I was also particularly pleased with the significant intercultural input of the lesson.  As well as the obvious aspect of getting to know Spain and its regions and weather, I was able to draw attention to the uses of commas and decimal points when writing numbers in Spanish.  


I said to my Year 6 colleague that I am aware that it is very important that I use the correct mathematical vocabulary when teaching this kind of lesson, and he said that yes, this needs to happen to ensure consistency across the curriculum.  A lack of consistency of this kind is something that Ofsted would pick up on.  I now have a copy of the Mathematical Vocabulary Book for KS1 and KS2 so that I can swot up on my maths before "teaching" it!


I enjoyed teaching this lesson, especially as it was truly cross-curricular. It brings to mind this recent news report about learning maths by using it for real purposes, and echoes my school's philosophy of getting maths into as many areas of the curriculum as possible.  It shows that maths is not a discrete subject but that it can be useful in all areas, and it adds validity to the learning of another language by making the link with maths.  I think it's vital that, given the new Ofsted framework and its emphasis on numeracy across the curriculum, MFL teachers know which aspects of numeracy are already embedded in their schemes of work and that they have a repertoire of ideas and resources that they can use to highlight maths in their lessons.  I have started to compile a collection of such resources and ideas here. 


My Year 6 colleague said today that his class also need more practice with pie charts and percentages.  Trying to figure out how I'll be able to fit that one in.....!

One year on......

I published my first blog post here on 28th June 2009. Over the last week or so I've been thinking about the things I have learned over the last year, and I thought I would share them with you here. These are not only things that I have learned about, but also things that I have used either in the classroom or elsewhere in my work this year.

• Storybird and Storyjumper:  First of all, two tools which almost need no introduction, such has been their success amongst the language teachers in my PLN and beyond.  All of the Storybirds that I have created appear on the fantastic MFL Storybird Wiki, the brainchild of Fiona Joyce, and you can see my Storyjumpers on this very blog (look at the tabs at the top).  I have found the programs invaluable for presenting appropriate text-level work to my KS2 pupils, but they haven't been able to try it out for themselves for ICT reasons, if you know what I mean....  
    
• Mini-books:  I discovered mini-books quite by accident while looking for something else.  I knew that it was something that I wanted to try, but determined to find the right occasion.  My KS2 pupils created mini-books containing their own stories based on a mini-book that we read together called "¿Qué veo?"  You can see the results here.  Mini-books are small and so the children know that they don't have to write very much.  They enjoy illustrating their work as well.  And their size also makes them ideal for the children to take home to show to their families.
• Wordle and Tagxedo: I wrote a post in April comparing all the different word cloud generators that are out there at the moment. Of all the ones I mentioned on that occasion, I use Wordle and Tagxedo the most. I find them particularly useful for displaying objectives at the beginning of a presentation (I paste in all my notes from the presentation and fortunately the words that come out biggest are the ones I want!) and also for helping pupils to see which are the important words amongst all the ones we are studying - the high-frequency core words come out biggest. Here is a Wordle of my Delicious tags (see below) and a Tagxedo of my World Cup resources page:


• Podcasting and Audacity: I've been using Audacity for a few years, but, as I discovered after a course with Joe Dale in December, only on a basic level. Joe really opened my eyes to the possibilities offered by Audacity for producing professional-sounding podcasts. I produced some secondary-level podcasts with our language assistants and then started podcasting in earnest when I undertook on behalf of the LA to provide a series of upskilling podcasts for non-specialist primary teachers of French. The technology side of it is straightforward for me now, and it's the scripting that takes the time. While I'm talking about podcasts, I'll recommend JamStudio for creating your own loops, and for making guitar accompaniments for your songs if, like me, you don't play the guitar.
• The RecorderPen: This was my purchase from the Gadget Show Live. I wrote a blog post after I had played with it for the first time and before I had used it in class. This term I have been incorporating Y1's theme of "Seaside" into their Spanish lessons. I wanted to show them how to describe things using colours. I picked four masculine sea creatures, made A5 flashcards of them, added recorded stickers and laminated the whole thing. I also made, recorded and laminated cards for 6 colours. When we were working in our groups of about 10, I said something like "un tiburón amarillo", and the children took it in turns to make the cards say the same thing by using the RecorderPen to make them speak the right words in the right order. They found it fascinating and were very interested to know how it works. Their class teacher was interested to see it and is thinking about buying a set for the class to use elsewhere in their curriculum.
• Wallwisher: Wallwisher has turned out to be very popular with my KS2 pupils. I think they like it particularly because they can see their contribution and other peoples'. It has encouraged them to engage with Spanish in their own time and, therefore, to explore the rest of the blog (see below) while they are there. One of our walls shows our collection of Spanish food nouns, something we haven't studied in class since before May half term, but which they are still adding to regularly. Our latest wall is about flags - please feel free to contribute.

• Calligrams: I've mentioned Calligrams a fair bit this year. Just see for yourself. I think I like them so much because they are a combination of words and doodles. I have also tried them out, and plan to do more in the future. What I am most chuffed about is that they have captured other peoples' imaginations too, and they are trying them with their classes. There is a place for low-tech, or, in this case, no-tech.

• Blogging: Before I started teaching in my current school, I had seen examples of effective school blogs. It was something I was very interested in setting up for the children at my school, especially as I am only there for a day and a half a week. I wanted Spanish to have a presence in the school even when I wasn't there, to publish and celebrate the good work that the children were doing, and give the children activities that they could access at home to help them with their Spanish. Fortunately, the Head agreed, and thus http://www.spanishstpauls.blogspot.com/ was born. The children love it, and are always telling me about what they have accessed on it at home. The school governors are impressed, as are some of the parents to whom I've spoken. It's also proving useful at the moment during this time of Y6-Y7 transition - the secondary teachers can see exactly what the Y6s have been doing without my having to send them loads of bits of paper.
• Google Reader: When I first started to use Twitter I was seeing a lot of links to people's blogposts. And many of them were interesting reads. Problem was that if I didn't follow the tweeted link there and then, I probably missed it. Following tips from Joe Dale and Graham Davies I started to subscribe to the blogs using Google Reader. I have the Google Reader widget displayed alongside the Gmail widget on my iGoogle, ready for my viewing and reading pleasure each morning.
• Delicious: I blogged about Delicious last August when I first discovered its usefulness for storing and tagging all the useful websites that I came across. I now have over 1000 links on my Delicious. I think now that I have it, I bookmark more sites than I used to paste into my Word document, but, more importantly, I actually use them.
• Slideshare: In my new role I do a fair bit of training, and in my continuing role on the international education side I give quite a few presentations. I used to upload some of the presentations to the website or offer to email them to interested parties. But as my presentation style is becoming more and more minimalist - more pictures, less text - the presentations were becoming less and less useful by themselves. I had followed links to other people's Slideshare presentations and was intrigued to see that some had the audio commentary attached and linked into the presentation. This seemed like an ideal way to go, especially as these slidecasts can be embedded in blogs. I've used it to share my presentations, but also to put songs onto my school blog as YouTube embeds and Podbean mp3s don't work at school. You can view all my Slideshare presentations here. Well, almost all - there are 3 that for some reason don't appear on this list but which you can see here.
• SurveyMonkey: In October last year I set about auditing Primary Languages in Sunderland. We only have 85 primary schools, but it was still an onerous task. Headteachers are busy people, and it was unrealistic to expect them all to respond to and post a paper survey. The audit needed to be short and quick and easy to complete. I had completed some surveys for the British Council which used SurveyMonkey and decided that it would be a good way of gathering the information I needed. I emailed all the HTs the link to the seven questions which it would take them about two minutes to complete. And then watched the responses flood in. Well, trickle in actually. But that's another story. SurveyMonkey proved to be easy to use and certainly preferable to having to collate and manipulate dozens of pieces of paper.
  
  My KS2s had whole-heartedly embraced Wallwisher and so I thought I would capitalise on this enthusiasm to carry out a survey via the blog. I set up a SurveyMonkey about likes and dislikes of the foods that we had been learning. There haven't been too many responses though. Partly, I think, because there were too many questions, and partly because they couldn't see their contribution straightaway on the blog. I think it's something to try again at a later date, in class maybe where the results can be seen immediately.
• Pop-ups in Dreamweaver: MFL Sunderland was 6 years old at the end of April. When I started it I was a complete website novice. Everything you see on the website and its sister sites now is something that I have learned along the way. When I was creating the interactive map for the World Cup over the Easter holidays, I knew how I wanted it to look, but didn't know how to do it. I didn't even know what the thing I wanted to do was called! Much googling and researching and experimenting and HTMLing later I achieved the effect I was after - the information for each country popped up as a little separate window which didn't obscure the main continent page. This may be small potatoes to some people, but for me it was a sense of achievement equalled only by the discovery of roll-over buttons several years ago!

And finally..... why the picture at the top ? Well, as language teachers we are all different, with different styles and with different tools at our disposal. But we are all progressing and moving forward together towards a common goal.  These are my tools at the moment.  Doubtless I will have some new ones this time next year!

Primary Languages Show 2010

Last night at 8.30pm I arrived home after driving back from the Primary Languages Show, which started at the ACC in Liverpool yesterday, 12th March, and continues today, 13th March.  Despite a 3.5 hour journey and White Van Man trying to drive me off the road on the M62, I was still buzzing with the presentations that I had seen and the ideas they had given me.

The day began with an introduction from Therese Comfort from CILT, and a keynote address from Dr Dan Tierney, who spoke about his philosophy for Primary Languages and research that he has been carrying out.

The first workshop I attended was Language Upskilling, led by Carmel O'Hagan from CILT.  I wasn't able to attend the meeting about this in Newcastle last week, and so used this as an opportunity to learn about the new specification for Upskilling for primary teachers.  We have identified Upskilling as a training need in Sunderland, and it was useful to gain an insight into the new specification.

After this workshop, I walked briskly round to the other side of the ACC, hoping to catch Helen Myers, who had been leading a workshop and with whom I have been corresponding virtually for many years.  Despite texting each other with what we were wearing (!) and our locations in the building, we missed each other.  We'll meet one day, Helen !  It was just after this that I bumped into Joe Dale, with whom I enjoyed coffee, and lunch later on.  Speaking of virtual friends who I finally got to meet, I had a long chat with Martin Lapworth of Task Magic fame, Jan Lewandowski, who said some very nice things about MFL Sunderland, and I finally got to meet Lisa Stevens.  I also caught up with fellow north-easterner Steve Mulgrew, who was showing off his new primary French materials.

The second workshop I went to was "Exploring non-fiction: All about animals", presented by Louise Harty, languages adviser for Northumberland.  She took us through the sequence of activities for the latest materials from Northumberland - "Tout à propos des Animaux".  It is a series of thinking skills lessons which enables pupils to discover and manipulate both basic and more complex French.  It's aimed Y6 and Y7 and would make an excellent transition unit.  It would give those Y7s who have done French before a new focus and some new challenges, while enabling those new to the language to find out about gender, adjectival agreement, regular verb paradigms....  I really enjoyed Louise's presentation, and being able to actually do all the activities !

After lunch (a tasty chicken tagine) I went to "Podcasting to upskill primary teachers", presented by Phil Wood from Lancashire LA.  He described the programme of podcasts that they have made to help classroom teachers to become more confident in their use of French and in their MFL teaching methodology.  Primary teachers are able to study in small, 5-minute chunks in their own time and at their own pace.  Sunderland teachers are very keen to have some help with their own skills in French, and I am very interested in looking at this as a way forward.  It would certainly be pretty easy for me to put together using the sound files that we already have on MFL Sunderland and which were recorded by our FLAs.  Anything is easier than trying to get them all in the same room at the same time, and we are a much smaller LA than Lancashire !

I finished my day with "La main dans la bouche - using puppets for teaching French", which was presented by Stephen Novy.  We found out how to make basic rod and sock puppets, and how best to operate them so as to make them the focus of the lesson.  I use a puppet with Reception and Nursery, and I got some good ideas for how to use him and develop his character.

I had a fantastic time at the Primary Languages Show, and am looking forward to trying out all the new things I learnt and saw.  Next year I will have to save up and go for both days !