Modern Foreign Language

Why you teach it - your purpose of study.

French is taught from EYFS through to Year 6 at Smallwood CE Primary Academy as we believe that when children learn a foreign language from a young age, they retain new vocabulary easily. They also develop an interest in and a thirst for learning about other languages and cultures. We foster pupils’ curiosity and deepen their understanding of the world by learning about both the French language and culture within France. We aim for all children to leave Year 6 being able to engage in basic conversation and to be confident in approaching more language learning.

INTENT

What you teach - your programme(s) of study

• To foster enjoyment and enrich the children’s experience.
• To develop the children’s language learning skills and foster a positive attitude to language learning.
• To enable pupils to understand and respond to spoken and written language from a variety of sources.
• To enable pupils to speak with increasing confidence, fluency, and spontaneity, finding ways of communicating what they want to say, including through discussion and asking questions, and continually improving the accuracy of their pronunciation and intonation.
• To support pupils in beginning to write at varying lengths, for different purposes and audiences, using the variety of grammatical structures that they have learnt.
• To help pupils discover and develop an appreciation of a range of writing in the language studied.
• To increase the children’s cultural awareness.
• To lay the foundations for further study in KS3 and beyond.

IMPLEMENTATION

How you teach it - your delivery of the above

In both key stages, French is taught by a specialist teacher as a half-hour lesson every fortnight, following a clearly sequenced and progressive curriculum. A variety of teaching and learning strategies are used, depending on the age and ability of the pupils, individual needs, and the purpose of the lesson. In both key stages rhymes, songs and games help to embed the language learning, with lots of repetition and recapping of new vocabulary. At Key Sage 2, there is opportunity for both written and oral practice of the French language. French is spoken outside of lesson time across school, to get the children used to using the language on a daily basis.

IMPACT

So what - your evaluations of the above

French forms part of the school curriculum policy to provide a broad and balanced education to all children. Through our French teaching, we provide learning opportunities that enable all pupils to make good progress. We strive hard to meet the needs of those pupils with special educational needs, those with disabilities, those with special gifts and talents, and those learning English as a second language. We take all reasonable steps to achieve this aim. 

Children enjoy taking part in French lessons and are confident to demonstrate their language skills. Children build each year on the previous year’s learning—recapping and revising. By the end of Key Stage 2, children understand French culture and can talk confidently about French.

Assessment of pupils’ achievement in French is made by informal judgements in speaking and listening activities during lessons and videos/ audio tracks of pupils’ spoken French/ conversations which are taken each half term and kept as evidence of progression. Written work for Key Stage 2 pupils is assessed each half-term to inform judgment of progress and future planning.  At the end of each half-term, an informal assessment is made on Classroom Monitor for Key Stage 2 pupils, as to which learning objectives have been achieved and which need further re-enforcement. These judgements are used as a record of achievement and to inform future planning.