Modern Foreign Languages
Key Stage 3
- Attempt all extension activities for homework and classwork. Aim high – don’t settle to achieve your target level, but to exceed it.
- Extra-Curricular Activies, such as ‘Culture Club’ on Tuesdays at 12:45pm in L10
- Extension tasks that push your learning into GCSE or even A Level standard
- Correspondence with French pen pals in Year 9.
- Taking part in study visits to France.
- Independent tasks such as working out a specific grammar rule and explaining it your peers. Write your own rule and produce an exercise for the rest of the class and even your teacher!
- Make use of Language Perfect even in a language you haven’t studied (yet!)
- The promotion of studying 1 language at GCSE.
- In a listening exercise, write down what you hear, transpose what you hear into another tense.
- Ask your teacher to mark a speaking or written piece as a GCSE grade in Year 9.
- Find a podcast to support your pronunciation and your general understanding
- Take an interest in festivals or the culture of the language that you are learning, such as Mardi Gras.
- Change the language of your phone or other device to understand simple instructions.
- Teach a relative something that you have previously learnt.
Key Stage 4
- Use mark-winner/ A* phrases and ‘Power phrases’ in speaking and written controlled assessments.
- Make sure you know the success criteria for speaking and controlled assessments. Ask for a copy of a blank mark sheet and ask your teacher to explain how this is marked.
- Include more tenses. Find out about the subjunctive, pluperfect, past conditional and make sure that you include them in your speaking and writing!
- Make use of Language Perfect even in a language you haven’t studied (yet!)
- Speak to former students who are now studying languages at university.
- The promotion of studying 1 or 2 languages at A Level and even Degree Level. Universities often give out lower offers to language students. You are in demand!
- A Level questions for Reading and Listening exercises.
- Be prepared to speak more spontaneously and fluently.
- Understand language from a range of contexts. The language and grammar that you learn are not confined to just 1 topic!
- Listening and Reading exercises – note down new vocabulary and learn it independently. Use this in the next speaking or written homework.
- In a listening exercise, write down what you hear, transpose what you hear into more than 1 tense.
- Ask your teacher in advance of the lesson for the vocabulary you will hear and learn it in ADVANCE of the lesson.
- Read for pleasure, do a review of a film or find out about a cultural or linguistic feature that particularly interests you.
- Listen to music in another language from you tube. Can you find examples in English and the TL from YouTube?
Also of interest:
- Learn a language at The Brasshouse. http://brasshouse.birmingham.gov.uk/
- GCSE catch up
- FRUNCH (French at lunch)
- www.languageperfect.com