Looking back 2025

 

Inspired by Steve Smith, I have asked ChatGPT to write a summary of the blogposts that I have published this year, in my voice.  Here is what it came up with.  It hasn't mentioned all this year's posts, but more of a "greatest hits" I suppose.

Looking back on a year of Changing Phase (2025)

As the year draws to a close, I’ve been reflecting on everything I’ve shared here on Changing Phase — and, more importantly, how those posts have helped me make sense of my own practice. This space has once again become somewhere to think out loud, to make sense of curriculum developments, technology, and the everyday joys and puzzles of language teaching.

One thread running through the year has been a focus on oracy, sound and pronunciation. In April I shared some reflections and resources in my post Reading aloud in Spanish: more dabbles with AI, exploring how deliberate reading aloud practice, supported by QR-linked audio, can help learners with pronunciation and fluency, and how AI tools can support (but not replace!) teacher thinking around text creation and sound modelling. 

In May, a lovely classroom curiosity led to Lengua de Signos Española (LSE), a post born from a Year 6 pupil’s question. I shared some resources, videos and ideas for bringing Spanish Sign Language into the primary classroom as a multisensory way of reinforcing vocabulary and gesture, celebrating varied ways of communicating. 

As the year progressed, my reflections turned more squarely towards curriculum and progression. In Reflecting on the DfE Writing Framework I examined how writing - often squeezed out in language lessons - can be a powerful thinking tool, supporting memory, noticing and deeper cognitive engagement in primary languages. 

In November, two posts distilled much of the wider policy conversation into classroom terms. The Curriculum and Assessment Review: reflections from a primary languages practitioner offered a close look at what the Curriculum and Assessment Review might mean for primary languages, and what the idea of a defined minimum core content could look like in practice.  Just a few days later, Minimum core content for Key Stage 2 Languages built on that by teasing out the elements I think are most essential: phonics, vocabulary, grammar, intercultural understanding and more. 

Not all of 2025 was heavy curriculum thinking. In late November I shared a seasonal reflection alongside some creative classroom resources in Advent colouring books, a gentle way to bring language, culture and mindfulness into the festive weeks. 

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A few things that stand out looking back

• Classroom reality first. Every post, whether it’s about sign language or writing frameworks, has been rooted in what actually happens with learners — what they notice, what they enjoy, and what helps them make sense of language.

• Connecting literacies. I keep coming back to how speaking, listening, reading and writing interrelate in powerful ways, and how thinking about one enriches the others.

• Curiosity as a driver. Whether it’s a pupil’s question about sign language or a policy change that sparks deeper reflection, curiosity continues to be at the heart of what makes language learning meaningful.

Thank you for reading and for thinking alongside me this year. I’m looking forward to building on these ideas in 2026 — continuing to explore multisensory practice, curriculum clarity and joyful engagement in primary languages.

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

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!

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

Redondo y Cuadrado

 

When I taught Key Stage 2 French, my favourite way of introducing and practising grammatical gender was using the book un triangle by Néjib.  You can read about the book and what I did with it here.

With my Year 5s I've just started Unit 13 of my scheme of work for Key Stage 2 Spanish, which is all about description.

We started off by reading the poem Redondo (Round) by Gloria Fuertes, and talking about why the adjective is spelled in three different ways.

Then I showed the class the Spanish words for ten more round things.  We gave out the Spanish dictionaries, and the children worked in pairs to look up the new words, find out if they were masculine or feminine, and decide whether we would need redondo or redonda to describe them.

We put the answers in the form of a new poem inspired by the one by Gloria Fuertes.

While we were working on this activity, I had an idea inspired by un triangle and its family of books.  The next week, I introduced the class to the adjective cuadrado, which they had first met in Year 2.

I gave them the challenge of finding in the dictionary the Spanish words for things that are square and putting them into a line of poetry following the example above, and working out whether they would need the masculine or feminine form of the adjective.  The children worked in pairs on their poems and used this guide to help them.  I also showed them the book un carré by Néjib, to show them how the thing didn't have to be something square exactly, but something that had a square as a part of it.

There is also a column for a small picture, so that they could justify why they had chosen a certain word, and show me how it was square.  

The following week the children copied up and illustrated their excellent poems, and I now have the difficult task of working out which ones to put forward for the next issue of Write Away! next month.  Here's one of them as an example of the poems the children created.

 

The resources will be on Light Bulb Languages soon.

Writing by hand

A week or so ago my Google news alert led me to this article: Handwriting Is Better Than Typing When Learning a New Language, Study Finds  

In a study, a group of 42 adult learners were tasked with learning the Arabic alphabet ab initio.  One group wrote it out on paper, another group typed it on a keyboard, and a third group watched and responded to instructional videos.  It was found that the first group, who were writing the alphabet on paper, learned the letters more quickly than the other groups, and also were more able to apply their new knowledge to other areas, for example using the letters to make words and recognising previously unseen words.

The article goes on to say: 
"The research shows that the benefits of teaching through handwriting go beyond better penmanship: There are also advantages in other areas of language learning. It seems as though the knowledge gets more firmly embedded through writing."

This finding that physically writing on paper benefits and strengthens learning is not new.  A quick Google reveals other similar articles, some dating back 10 years.  Here are some of them, with information pertinent to language learning highlighted:

• Writing by Hand Boosts Brain Activity and Fine Motor Skills, Study Shows (2020)
  "'When writing by hand, you are not only activating the motor cortex to make your hand physically write, but also motor planning aspects of the visual cortex to visualize the letters in your mind, language networks in the central and temporal lobes to actually communicate, and networks associated with reading and spelling,' Wiley [Colbin Wiley PhD] explains. These processes tie into the parts of the brain that have to do with learning and memory."
  
  
• Three Ways That Handwriting With A Pen Positively Affects Your Brain (2016)
  "Handwriting increases neural activity in certain sections of the brain, similar to meditation."
  "Handwriting sharpens the brain and helps us learn....  Apparently sequential hand movements, like those used in handwriting, activate large regions of the brain responsible for thinking, language, healing and working memory."
  
  
• Bring Back Handwriting: It’s Good for Your Brain (2019)
  "The fact that handwriting is a slower process than typing may be another perk....because typing is fast, it tends to cause people to employ a less diverse group of words. Writing longhand allows people more time to come up with the most appropriate word, which may facilitate better self-expression."
  
  
• New study suggests handwriting engages the brain more than typing (2020)
  "Researchers noted that the differences between brain activity while handwriting and typewriting were more pronounced for the adults than for the children, but said the findings still 'provide support for handwriting practice providing beneficial neuronal activation patterns for learning.'"
  
  
• Why Cursive Handwriting Is Good for Your Brain (2020)
  "Data analysis showed that cursive handwriting primed the brain for learning by synchronizing brain waves in the theta rhythm range (4-7 Hz) and stimulating more electrical activity in the brain's parietal lobe and central regions. 'Existing literature suggests that such oscillatory neuronal activity in these particular brain areas is important for memory and for the encoding of new information and, therefore, provides the brain with optimal conditions for learning,' the authors explain." 
  "The use of pen and paper gives the brain more 'hooks' to hang your memories on. Writing by hand creates much more activity in the sensorimotor parts of the brain.....A lot of senses are activated by pressing the pen on paper, seeing the letters you write, and hearing the sound you make while writing. These sense experiences create contact between different parts of the brain and open the brain up for learning."
  The same article also cites a study which showed that handwriting may facilitate young children's learning to read.
  
  
• Better learning through handwriting (2011)
"When writing by hand, our brain receives feedback from our motor actions, together with the sensation of touching a pencil and paper. These kinds of feedback is significantly different from those we receive when touching and typing on a keyboard."
This article also refers to another language-based study, which had similar outcomes to the one at the start of this post.



• Why You Remember Things Better When You Write Them Down (2020)

"Your memory of handwritten words is tied to the movements required to make each letter. This might be what helps the memory of what we’ve written hang around in our brains a bit longer. Meanwhile, pressing buttons on a keyboard activates fewer areas of the brain, so we forget what we’ve typed faster."
"This makes perfect sense when you think about how humans first evolved the ability to read and write. The process was highly connected to physical touch as, for thousands of years, handwriting involved carving symbols into rock or pressing them into clay. Our minds and bodies are primed for this kind of physical interaction with the world. But typing is a far cry from creating the shape of each individual letter by hand."

There is clearly a lot for language teachers to consider here.  In the primary classroom, writing in books is done by hand with either a pen or pencil (gaining your pen licence in Key Stage 2 is a rite of passage!).  However, as I've mentioned before, there is a lot of writing and preparation for writing that is not done with pencil and paper.  Will these "writing without a pen"activities be less effective because of the way that the writing is done?  Should children be physically writing earlier in the learning process?

Children begin writing by hand in EYFS (Nursery and Reception), by "writing recognisable letters".  They develop their fine motor skills by learning how to hold a pencil correctly.  This work is then continued into Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2, where it forms an integral part of the National Curriculum for English.  

By the end of Year 6 (age 11) children should be able to write "legibly, fluently and with increasing speed".  Handwriting is expected to become automatic by the end of Year 6.  Automaticity means that children can produce the letters without having to think about the process; if they can form letters automatically, they will not have to devote cognitive attention to their handwriting, and therefore will be able to focus more on the task that they are completing.

Many of my Year 6 pupils have beautiful handwriting.  They are taught cursive, via one of the popular schemes such as Letterjoin or Berol, which is explicitly practised most days.  They can write any words to practise their handwriting, and so can write keywords from any subject area, including languages.  Others, though, do not, for one reason or another and despite interventions, have the neat and cursive writing that is required, often choosing to print and sometimes not forming certain letters correctly.  It is worth noting that all the work on handwriting is done in Key Stage 2.  Once children get to secondary school, handwriting does not feature as a skill to be explicitly practised as part of the national curriculum, so it is unlikely that these students' writing will improve.

I have heard that some secondary schools are choosing to do all writing using electronic devices, so that students will not be handwriting.  This, according to the article that I first mentioned, is also happening in schools in Norway and Finland.  This is, I think, overlooking the significant benefits that writing by hand can obviously bring, and the many years of handwriting practice and development that has taken place in primary school.

Should language learners be writing in books every lesson?

 

All teachers of languages have their lessons observed at some time or other.  It might be by Ofsted, by a school leader or by a colleague. It's quite common for a teacher of languages to be observed by someone who is not a language teacher or specialist, and who therefore has little or no knowledge of how a language should be taught.  Over the years I have heard from and about some of this latter group of language teachers (primary and secondary), who have been criticised because the learners did not write in their books during the lesson.  The assumption for some observers appears to be that learners should write in their books in every languages lesson.  Are they right?

I was taught and have always followed the rule that writing in books (not the same as all writing, as I will discuss later) should only take place once aural and oral practice has taken place, and the children's knowledge and understanding of the new vocabulary, grammar, phonics and structures are secure.

Over the last two days I have been searching for some kind of official documentation to back up this rule.  Unfortunately, there is nothing to be found.  However it's certainly worth noting (and thank you to Vincent Everett for pointing this out!) that neither is there any official documentation saying that learners should be writing in books every lesson.

So when should learners be writing, and how should they go about it?  Let's have a look at the evidence and the documentation that we do have.

I'm going to start with the documentation from Ofsted, since, like it or not, their inspection framework influences what we do in the classroom and how other professionals observe and judge our lessons.  Two weeks ago, Ofsted published Curriculum research review series: languages, "a review of research into factors that can affect the quality of education in languages".  Here are two excerpts:

The phrase "over time" is used in both these excerpts.  Ofsted have made clear that they are no longer expecting to see progress made in one single lesson, but are looking instead for planning and evidence of progress across a series of lessons.  As languages professionals, we know that it takes several lessons to introduce and practise thoroughly the new language before it is formalised in writing.  Personally, I can often go three or four lessons without children writing anything in their books.

Dr Michael Wardle, Ofsted's languages lead, said at Language World 2021 that "building blocks in each subject [should be] carefully sequenced and practised until sticky".  In other words, activities should be meaningful, in the right place in the sequence for a purpose.  They should not be tokenistic, which is how I would consider writing in a book every lesson merely to tick a box.  Dr Wardle has also said that the new curriculum and the new Ofsted framework is all about "knowing more and remembering more".  We should only plan a writing activity if it is going to help children to know more and remember more at a specific stage in the sequence of learning.  

There is further evidence on page 2 of the document Ofsted inspection - clarification for schools:

Ofsted recognises that no work in books does not mean that no learning has taken place, and it's clear that this should be shared by observers of any subject, not just languages.

There are, of course, mentions of writing in the National Curriculum programmes of study for languages.  According to the purpose of study for both Key Stage 2 and Key Stage 3, a balance between the spoken word and the written word must be struck:

In the aims of the programme of study, again for both key stages:

In Key Stage 2 subject content, we are required to offer a balance of oracy and literacy:

The word "appropriate" is crucial here - a writing activity must be appropriate to the sequence of learning and not just there because there is an expectation that writing in books must be done.  

We can also refer back to the Key Stage 2 Framework for Languages (a sadly technically obsolete but still very useful document, available here) for additional guidance as to the place of writing in the sequence of learning:

The inference here is that children will begin a unit of learning with speaking and listening, which will later be reinforced and further developed by reading and writing.  Oracy is seen as a foundation for literacy, in other words it comes first, and children move on to literacy when it is appropriate to do so.

Written work, therefore, is down to the judgement of the teacher, taking into account the age and experience of the children in the class.  It does not mention written work being done every lesson.  It's always important to consider the "big picture of learning", where you are in the sequence, and whether it is appropriate and meaningful for children to write formally (writing in books can be considered formal writing) at this time.

This further section from the Key Stage 2 Framework brings me to my next point:

On Twitter yesterday I had a response to my question from Ruth Swailes, an expert in the early years of education:

This alludes to James Britton's quotation from 1983: "Reading and writing float on a sea of talk", and the links to this can be seen clearly in the national curriculum for English for Key Stage 1 and lower Key Stage 2.  We always need to bear in mind how our learners have been taught previously, in primary as well as secondary, and to incorporate elements of those previous experiences in our lessons.  

Among the statutory requirements of the Year 1 (age 5-6) English curriculum are:

and in Year 2 (age 6-7), children should be taught to:

This is then extended into lower Key Stage 2 (Year 3 and Year 4, age 7-9), where children should be taught to:

In English, then, children are taught to discuss their compositions orally before recording them with a pencil and paper.  This strategy is good practice for language learning, and has also found its way into the primary languages classroom via Pie Corbett's popular Talk For Writing.  I would surmise that there are some English lessons in lower primary where writing in books does not take place, but where there is much discussion and rehearsal of what will be written at a future time.

As Janet Lloyd says, writing or composition can often be an invisible activity that doesn't actually involve physically scribing:

In the languages classroom we build up the learning gradually via a series of carefully planned activities.  We often show the written word early on, to assist us with sound-spelling link and phonics - we want learners' first stored image of the new word to be the correct one, and not one that is affected by English phonics.  We explicitly practise spelling via strategies like writing in the sky.  We might use sentence builders to drill the new vocabulary and the way in which it fits into our sentences.  We might "write" initially using letter cards or word cards, which are less threatening in the early stages and can be easily edited.  We also try out our first writing on mini whiteboards, which, again, can be easily edited.  Writing in books is often the last step, the summative activity, once everything else is secure, once children are confident with the new language and proficient in its use.

So, what is the answer to my initial question?  Should language learners be writing in books every lesson?  No.  Absolutely not.  Writing should take place at an appropriate and carefully planned point in the learning, as a meaningful step towards the objective.  If that means going several lessons without writing in books, so be it.  

If absolutely necessary, there are other ways of recording that the learning has taken place (although Ofsted have said that they don't expect to see it):

• take photos of children speaking and stick it in their books
• video children or record children speaking, attach it to a QR code and stick the QR code in their books
• stick a sticker in the books on which is recorded the learning that has taken place
• children complete a peer test or check activity, record the result on a post-it, and this is stuck in the book.

Let's play darts: an update

 

Last weekend I wrote about the dartbard writing activity that I had learned about via Twitter.  This week I tried it for the first time with my excellent Year 4 class.  We have done a lot of work this year on opinions of foods and drinks, and are now working on the weather.  The children are revisiting and recycling their knowledge of opinions to talk about opinions of weather.

The children said that they enjoyed the activity, and particularly enjoyed the challenge of remembering and looking for the correct words and phrases.  I asked them to do as much as possible from memory, and if they had to check the answers to note at the bottom of the instructions what they had used (they have a sentence builder and a knowledge organiser).

I divided the questions into 4 quarters of complexity, as I had suggested in my previous post.  The coloured-in dartboard on this child's work shows me very clearly that she needs a bit more practice of the more complex sentences, in particular with working out whether a singular or a plural opinion is needed.  I was really pleased to see that she had corrected her work as she checked it.

One thing I would say is that the accuracy of the marking by many of the children left a lot to be desired!  Particularly with things like me gusta vs me gustan, they hadn't checked the spellings carefully enough, and hadn't checked their definite articles.  Next lesson we will be practising checking our own work very carefully and talking about the difference that spelling errors and missed out words make to grammar and therefore meaning.

When I displayed the answers for the children, I displayed this grid and left them to it:

I think next time I will animate the answers to appear one by one, and talk the children through the things that they should be looking out for when checking their work.

I hope this helps you if you are thinking of having a go at this activity!

Let's play darts!

 

This morning I took part in #ShareStuffSunday on Twitter, offering minibooks, making a flag and the LiPS Listening Project.

I had a look through the other tweets, and was very interested in this one from the multi-talented Jasmine Kay (have a look at her Etsy shop!)

Hopefully saving an UKS2 teacher’s Sunday with this one. Maths challenge which will help you to identify gaps too #ShareStuffSunday pic.twitter.com/4rzyTq53ab

— Jasmine (@MissKay_MissKay) April 25, 2021

I could see straightaway that this was something that could be easily adapted to use in the Languages classroom.  Indeed, Jasmine says that she has used this activity in her French teaching.  I can see it being used for things that need drilling, in other words for phrases or sentences which are repetitive in structure.  It could be another activity to do using sentence builders.

I like how the completed dartboard will provide quick feedback to the teacher as to how many questions each child has got right, and children will like it as it involves colouring in!

For differentiation purposes, children could try to complete the questions without support, and could look at their books, wall displays or knowledge organisers for support.

Thinking about what my classes are doing at the moment, I've made a example of the dartboard activity for my Year 4 unit ¿Tienes hambre?

For further feedback for the teacher, I've used four different levels for the questions, and use a quarter of the dartboard for each level:

Level 1: 1, 18, 4, 13, 6

Level 2: 10, 15, 2, 17, 3

Level 3: 19, 7, 16, 8, 11

Level 4: 14, 9, 12, 5, 20

It should be easy to see at a glance which quarter and therefore which levels children have coped well with.

Things to do with sentence builders in the primary languages classroom: part 2!

 

In my last post, I talked about some of the activities that I do in the primary languages classroom with sentence builders, and asked readers if they have any primary-friendly activities that they recommend.

I'll be starting my planning for the week shortly (at the top of this post is one of the sentence builders I'm going to be using this week, with Year 5) and so will be looking to incorporate some of the activities that people have recommended:

And some others, from the Facebook group and blog comments:

• Trapdoor 
• Slalom listening - You give them a copy of the sentence builder and they highlight/ underline words they hear, then they have to read the whole sentence.
• Flippity 'fruit machine' style activity, particularly the fact that sometimes there are 'nonsense sentences appearing (with food likes and with clothes you wear in specific weather conditions.
• Pyramid translation
• Delayed repetition or writing

Many thanks to everyone who took the time to respond.

Things to do with sentence builders in the primary languages classroom

 

Writing frames, sentence builders, whatever you call them, are enjoying considerable popularity in the languages community at the moment, due mainly to the work of Gianfranco Conti.  If you are a tweeter or if you are in one of the languages Facebook group, you'll have seen lots of posts about them and ideas for using them.

You can see at the top of this post one of the sentence builders that I have been using most recently.  I nearly always use the flowchart format (thanks Joe!) in primary, as I find with the tabular format it's too easy for them to miss columns out.  I also make them in black and white, as colour photocopying is only for special occasions at my schools!  If it's not clear enough without colour, it's not clear enough, I think.

I've been experimenting with using them and knowledge organisers this academic year to facilitate our work in class at a time when I have to stay at the front and not go to help individual children.

We have been trying out different activities with them, for example (in no particular order):

• I say the Spanish sentence, children tell me the English
• I say an English sentence, children tell me what it would be in Spanish
• Children test each other in one of the above two ways 
• I say a Spanish sentence, but leave it incomplete, either just saying the first sound of the last word or stopping at a suitable place, and children need to complete the sentence with the correct word or with suitable words.
• After a little practice, I show a sentence from the sentence builder with a random extra word in it.  The children have to tell me which word is unnecessary.
• I say a sentence in English and the children write it in Spanish on their mini whiteboards and hold it up for me to see.
• I write a sentence from the sentence builder on my mini whiteboard, and the class between them have 10 attempts to guess the sentence, which I then reveal after the 10 attempts or when it is guessed correctly.
• I prepare a sentence from the sentence builder and conceal it.  The children all prepare a sentence and write it on their mini whiteboards.  The children stand up.  I reveal my sentence word by word.  As soon as the children have a word in their sentence that is different to mine, they have to sit down, until we reach the end of the sentence and hopefully there is someone left who has the same sentence as me.  Thanks to Sue Cave for this idea - Year 3 loved it this morning, although one of the boys saw through my strategy of not wanting to repeat words!

Do you have any favourite activities when using sentence builders?  There are some that I have seen that are a bit reading-heavy for primary children; I'd love to increase my repertoire!  Please leave any ideas in the comments.

The "New Normal" Classroom

Here we are at last: the new school year, the new term, and the “new normal”.  I’ll finally be heading back into the classroom next week, to earn a teaching salary after 173 days of not earning a teaching salary.  In preparation for the big return this week and next week, teachers have been discussing behind the scenes what we will and won’t be able to do in the classroom this term.

WARNING AND DISCLAIMER: The plans and strategies that I am going to discuss here are appropriate to my schools, the risk assessments that my schools have in place and agreements I have with my headteachers.  They may not be suitable for your setting.  Always check your own risk assessment and confirm with your headteacher.

I’ll be seeing all my classes pretty much as normal, as peripatetic teachers are allowed to work in multiple bubbles.  For additional protection for me, for the children and for the other adults in the schools, the way I teach is going to be different to usual. 

I will be restricted to a small area at the front of the classroom.  This means that scaffolding and supporting activities, building up the learning in small steps, is going to be even more crucial than usual.  If a child is stuck, I won’t be able to go over to help them.  The class teacher’s seating plan is not always conducive to children successfully helping each other, so knowledge organisers are going to be a huge help and provide that extra layer of security and confidence for the children.

One of the main discussion points over the summer has been choral speaking.  In the government guidance, specific mention is made of singing, chanting and shouting.  I don’t consider choral speaking to be the same as chanting, and emailed the DfE at the end of last term for ask for clarification.  No clarification has been forthcoming.  Therefore it has been the responsibility of each headteacher to decide how to address choral speaking in their schools.

I will still be able to do choral speaking activities with the children (thank goodness – I don’t know what I would have been able to do otherwise – it’s my bread and butter!) but only with a maximum of 15 children at a time.  For most classes this will be half the class at a time, but I have some classes of over 30 and so will have to divide them differently, into more than 2 groups.

I’ve been thinking, therefore, about the ramifications of choral speaking with only a small group at a time, and how to manage the activity.  What about the ones who aren't speaking?  What will they do?  I want them to physically do something so that they don’t have time or the opportunity to look out the window / fiddle / talk etc., and so that I can see that they are engaged.

Thank you to everyone on Twitter and in the Languages in Primary Schools Facebook group who responded with their ideas, particularly Amanda, Noelia, Suzanne, Vicky, Barbara, Steve, Erica, Jane, and Maria.

Actions  The children do an action which represents the word.  This is an example of a multimodal approach.  My 13 year old daughter has been teaching herself BSL (British Sign Language) over the summer; you could try one of the signs as your action.

Mute button  Children mouth the word silently, they “put their Mute button on”.  (This might take some practice with certain children!)  If the children are speaking, you can also use an imaginary volume control button with them to ensure they are speaking quietly and therefore not expelling too many droplets.  By the way, whispering should be avoided – it has been shown to expel more droplets than ordinary speaking.

Writing  The children write the relevant words on their mini whiteboard, using their knowledge organiser or other support to help them.  I like this idea as I would like to do a longer period of speaking with one small group, rather than rapid swapping between groups.  I’ll get the writers to hold up their whiteboard to show me what they’ve done!  To make the writing more engaging you could try:
- writing the words in order of length, shortest first
- writing the words in alphabetical order 
- writing the words in order of preference (could be useful for later work on opinions)
- writing the words with a finger on their sleeve
There’s also the dice activity where the number thrown tells you how to write the word.  Here are some suggestions:
1 – write the word in bubble writing
2 – write the word with your other hand
3 – write the word backwards
4 – write the word with your eyes closed
5 – write the word normally
6 – choose how you want to write the word

·     Group A Group B  You could say your word or phrase, then ask the first group to repeat it, followed straightaway by the second group.  The second group will listen to the first group and so are reliant on the first group’s accuracy.  This could be adapted to have a row speaking at a time in a Mexican Wave style.

·     Pointing  The children have a sheet with showing the words, English translations or images.  The children who aren’t speaking have to point to the correct word or image as the other half of the class say it.  Find out more about this activity here.

I still haven’t solved the problem of pair speaking activities, such as dialogues, where the children all practise together in pairs, but am hoping that most other things won’t be too different.

If you're looking for other ideas, check out Janet Lloyd's video No singing? No problem!  and these Covid-friendly activities from TheIdealTeacher.

I hope this has given you some ideas for your classroom.  There are some more ideas for choral repetition here.  If you have any other ideas, it'd be great if you could pop them in the comments.

Wishing everyone well for the new term.