MFL
“Learning a foreign language is a liberation from insularity and provides an
opening to other cultures.” The National Curriculum.
Vision
At Our Lady’s Catholic Primary School, we intend our MFL curriculum to provide the children with an insight, awareness and appreciation of other cultures alongside fostering a curiosity and deeper understanding of the world around them. Learning a foreign language provides an opening to other cultures and is vital for children in today's modern global workplace and society. The teaching should enable children to express their ideas and thoughts in another language and to understand and respond to its speakers, both in speech and in writing. To achieve this end point, we aim, through our MFL curriculum, to inspire a love of language as part of their lifelong journey of learning.
Intent
At Our Lady's Catholic Primary School, it is our intent that the teaching of a modern foreign language (Spanish) promotes the early development of a child's linguistic competence. It is widely believed that the early acquisition of a foreign language facilitates the learning of other foreign languages later in life. We will prepare children for the Key Stage 3 language curriculum to enable them to transfer confidently and successfully.
Our intent is that at Our Lady's Catholic Primary school, in adherence to the Key Stage 2 National Curriculum, children will be taught to:
- listen attentively to spoken language and show understanding by joining in and responding
- explore the patterns and sounds of language through songs and rhymes and link the spelling, sound and meaning of words
- engage in conversations; ask and answer questions; express opinions and respond to those of others
- speak in sentences, using familiar vocabulary, phrases and basic language structures
- develop accurate pronunciation and intonation so that others understand when they are reading aloud or using familiar words and phrases
- present ideas and information orally to a range of audience
- read carefully and show understanding of words, phrases and simple writing
- appreciate stories, songs, poems and rhymes in the language
- broaden their vocabulary and develop their ability to understand new words that are introduced into familiar written material, including through using a dictionary
- write phrases from memory, and adapt these to create new sentences, to express ideas clearly
- describe people, places, things and actions orally and in writing
- understand basic grammar appropriate to the language being studied
Implementation
Here at Our Lady's Catholic Primary School, we teach Spanish across Key Stage Two, using the resources and units of work from Twinkl’s PlanIt Spanish, in addition to other resources to compliment the scheme. This year is the first year, as a school, Spanish is being taught across Key Stage Two, therefore each class is currently adhering to the Year 3 Spanish curriculum in order to embed the fundamentals necessary for language acquisition. The language curriculum delivered aspires to ensure the learning of a language is accessible to all in order to nurture a love of languages.
Spanish lessons at Our Lady's Catholic Primary aim to encourage and engage all learners to actively engage in each session.
- action songs and rhymes – to develop phonetic skills, memory skills and to further vocabulary.
- role-play – imitating situations the children could find themselves in in future.
- games – in order to develop vocabulary through repetition, reading, writing, speaking and listening skills.
- reading and writing quality materials.
- we build children’s confidence through praise for any contribution they make in the foreign language, however tentative.
Impact
Our MFL curriculum will ensure all pupils develop key language learning skills set out by the national curriculum, as well as a love of languages and learning about other cultures.
At Our Lady’s, we measure the impact through:
- observing children speaking and listening in another language.
- marking of written work.
- images and videos of children completing speaking and listening activities.
- interviewing the pupils about their learning (pupil voice).
- lesson observations
- scrutiny of MFL floor books