Foreign Language

Foreign Languages

 

At Bishop Martin CE Primary School our Guiding LIGHT Curriculum is built around the National Curriculum, enriched to reflect the children and community we teach.

We strive to provide a curriculum that is underpinned by our Christian Values, which are embedded in the life and work of our school, and to allow all our children to 'Let their Light Shine'. 

Let Your Light Shine Before Others So They May See Your Good Deeds' (Matthew 5.16)  ​

 

National Curriculum - Purpose of Study

Learning a foreign language is a liberation from insularity and provides an opening to other cultures. A high-quality languages education should foster pupils’ curiosity and deepen their understanding of the world. The teaching should enable pupils to express their ideas and thoughts in another language and to understand and respond to its speakers, both in speech and in writing. It should also provide opportunities for them to communicate for practical purposes, learn new ways of thinking and read great literature in the original language. Language teaching should provide the foundation for learning further languages, equipping pupils to study and work in other countries.  

The National Curriculum for languages aims to ensure that all pupils:  

• Understand and respond to spoken and written language from a variety of authentic sources.

• 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.

• Can write at varying length, for different purposes and audiences, using the variety of grammatical structures that they have learnt.

• Discover and develop an appreciation of a range of writing in the language studied.

 

Intent 

Our aims in teaching Foreign Language are that all children will: 

• To instill a love of language learning and an awareness of other cultures. 

• Develop the confidence to communicate in Spanish for practical purposes, using both written and spoken Spanish.

• To give pupils a foundation for language learning that encourages and enables them to apply their skills to other languages, facilitates further language study and opens future opportunities to study and work abroad.

• Prove pupils with a firm foundation of language learning through teaching phonics, vocabulary and grammar.

 

Implementation

Curriculum Planning

We begin the teaching of Spanish (our choses foreign language) in KS2. We follow the Kapow Scheme of work, selecting units of work for each year group, to ensure all objectives from the National Curriculum are covered. Pupils are given opportunities to communicate for practical purposes around familiar subjects and routines. There is balanced opportunities for communication in both spoken and written Spanish. Pupils first develop confidence and accuracy with oral skills then increasingly apply their knowledge to extended reading and writing as they progress through Key stage 2. The Kapow Primary’s Spanish scheme is a spiral curriculum, with key skills, grammar and vocabulary revisited with increasing complexity, allowing pupils to revise and build on their previous learning. Cross-curricular links are included throughout our Spanish units, allowing children to make connections and apply their language skills to other areas of their learning. Our curriculum focuses on developing what we term ‘language detective skills’ and developing an understanding of Spanish grammar, rather than committing to memory vast amounts of Spanish vocabulary. 

Following the long-term plan, the Subject leader will create unit overviews for each unit of learning, for each year group. These unit overviews show teachers the learning that has come prior and what will follow, as well as key vocabulary; skills; knowledge and the tasks that should be completed to ensure the leaning objectives are achieved. 

 

Spanish Subject Overview

 

 

Impact

  We measure the impact of our Spanish curriculum by:

• Observing children at work, individually, in pairs, in a group and in class during whole class teaching.

• Using differentiated, open-ended questions that require children to explain and unpick their understanding.  

• Teacher/pupil conversations about their ideas and understanding. Facilitating and listening to discussions.  

• Providing effective feedback to engage children with their learning and to provide opportunities for self-assessment.

• Children’s completion of end of unit quiz. 

• End of unit ‘Knowledge Catcher’. 

Teachers then record their assessments onto askEddi each half term. Assessment statements are outlined at the bottom of the medium-term planning documents for children working at ARE and above alongside the highlighted cover sheets and end of unit quizzes in children’s books.