"Music, Rhythm and Grammar-Supporting Recall", TM Modern Foreign Languages Icons event, Saturday 26 September 2020

 

I had a great time at the TM Modern Foreign Languages event this morning. There certainly was a great variety of topics and presenters and now I am truly buzzing with new ideas...

Please find a link here to my presentation on " Music, Rhythm and Grammar-Supporting Recall" :

Really looking forward to try in my classroom all the new ideas that were shared!

Ofqual Consultation: Suggested Changes for the Assessment of A Levels and GCSEs in Modern Foreign Languages in 2021

Ofqual is currently conducting a very important consultation including proposals tomodify the assessment requirements for some GCSEs, AS and A levels in response to disruption to education caused by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

In the face of “lost” teaching time during lockdown, the proposals aim to free up teaching time and, in some instances, reduce what needs to be taught and take account of any public health restrictions relating to coronavirus (COVID19) that might be in place during the next academic year.

A “recovery” curriculum?

There have been lots of discussions about how current Year 10 and Year 12 pupils have been affected by the pandemic in the preparation for next year’s exams as they have had limited access to face-to-face teaching since the end of March. In particular, the debate has been around the need of a possible “recovery” curriculum or at the very least a “responsive” curriculum to deal with the knowledge gaps that may have developed and that could hinder students’ further progress. This has highlighted the differences between school settings and the pressure on some schools to narrow the curriculum for some pupils to ensure standards in Maths and English were not put at risk.

Consultation about assessment NOT Curriculum review

What this consultation is not, is some kind of a statement about the importance of subjects and their respective content and skills. However, you would be forgiven for believing this was the case, reading some of the online debates it has created.

Suggestions for Languages A Level and GCSE 2021 exams

Whereas no modifications have been put forward for A Level, the proposals for Modern Languages GCSEs are quite controversial : the Speaking examination would be replaced by a teacher “endorsement” for Speaking but it would not actually count in the exam, with the overall grade only taking Listening, Reading and Writing into account.

Although there is no denying that cancelling speaking exams would result in gained teaching time, this proposal also causes a number of issues:

Students do usually well in speaking even though it can be stressful for some ;

There would be a noticeable imbalance in the overall grade between the productive and receptive skills ;

Although speaking would still be taught, it may lose its priority in the face of further time constraints and the pressure of imposed subject targets ;

The class focus moving away from speaking would particularly affect pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds who may not have opportunities for further practice ;

The decision would most likely impact on A Level recruitment for 2021-22 as the perceived success in speaking the language is key for motivation and enjoyment. However, given that the basis for the decision to carry on with languages for many students is still “success” measured by exam outcomes, ensuring a fair exam and best outcomes might be just as important for A Level recruitment ;

There is also a worry that dropping the speaking exam could have a negative impact on attitudes towards speaking and languages in general in the future.

So, what is the way forward?

Look at the coverage of topics? The teaching of the Social Issues topic is usually kept at the end of the course and maybe could be scrapped to make up for lost curriculum time during the pandemic.

Go the “Welsh way”? Keep the assessment standards in all 4 skills and at the same level but make amendments such as streamlining the coverage of some of the topics or skills assessed. For instance, no translation in the reading paper or no Role-Play and Photocard in the speaking exam. I would still be against using dictionaries in any of the exams as I feel this could be very distracting for students.

We will all agree that students must not have their qualification devalued and it is important that the standards remain the same even if some aspects of the assessment are simplified. For this reason, I believe that the overall standard of GCSEs in modern languages cannot be maintained without any speaking being counted at all in the overall mark.  

Want to share your own views? Have your say and respond to the consultation before 16July at 11.45pm

Now is the time to join ALL, the Association for Language Learning, our subject association, to make sure our voice is heard.  

ALL is also organising a consultation webinar on Friday 10 July for all language teachers. To register, please click here.

Technology In Language Teaching SANAKO Conference, Altrincham Grammar School for Boys, 22nd October 2015

I had a lovely morning today at Altrincham Grammar School for Boys with fellow language teachers and the SANAKO team.
As promised, here are  the slides I used for the session...
 

Technology in Language Teaching from Isabelle Jones

Review: Languagenut, a Language Subscription Site with a Difference

Created in 2009, Languagenut promotes a fun, simple and engaging approach to language learning for KS2 and KS3 pupils. Although Languagenut has its HQ in the UK, it now has users all over the world in 32 countries, from Puerto Rico and the US to Asia and it has adapted its platform to meet the curriculum needs in those different countries.

The range of languages offered is truly global but also supports heritage languages including Gaelic and Te Reo Maori. This is complemented by a unique range of EAL resources which supports the children in the UK who do not speak English as their first language.

The MFL and EAL resources rely on simple games, engaging students in simple, fun and effective learning activities. Students explore a set of words or phrases through the “presentation” feature, and then reinforce the language working across the key skills of reading, writing, listening and speaking. All resources are organised by topics and graded by difficulty, with each topic also offering a song and a story to practise key structures in a different way. Each topic can also be assessed via the platform.

Teachers can also track and reward pupils’ progress through the activities whether they are completed in class or independently at home. All progress data can be exported into an Excel spreadsheet and progress reports including graphs can be produced easily. Reward certificates can also be generated automatically.

In addition, the “My content” allows teachers to use Languagenut’s framework of presentations, games and assessments for their own words and phrases. Sound and pictures can also be uploaded and the newly created exercises are automatically trackable by teachers as soon as they are published.

All exercises can also be assigned to specific groups of pupils or individuals, which can help differentiation for class work and homework.

Healthy competition is also encouraged via the lingualympics board, which displays the sign-in name of the top 20 students and 20 schools worldwide.

I was lucky enough to be taken on a guided tour of this excellent platform by the delightful Liz Brewer and I would advise to get in touch if you are considering languagenut as it does offer a lot more than your usual language subscription site…

Liverpool MFL Conference, 6th July 2015, Jaguar Rover

I had a great day in Liverpool at the conference organised by Hilary Jones of  Network for Languages North West. Other speakers included OFSTED inspector Liz Kelly and the fabulous Juliet Park.
A fantastically productive day!

As promised, here are the slides I used for my session:
 

MFL INSET at The Rastrick School, Monday 3rd November

I had a very reflective day discussing best MFL practice at The Rastrick School today. It certainly reminded me of "things I used to do and I have not done recently" and I hope this was beneficial to the rest of the group too.

As promised please find below materials on:
-developing pupils' independence in MFL
-Strategies to develop the use of target language and a wider range of speaking activities
-Differentiation

Rastrick developing student independence in mfl from Isabelle Jones

Rastrick speaking session from Isabelle Jones

Ict tools for oracy from Isabelle Jones

Motivate all your language learners from Isabelle Jones

All differentiation handout from Isabelle Jones

Speaking Activities & Using Technology to Develop Oracy in the MFL Classroom, MMU, 25th October 2013

I had a great morning talking to ITT trainees at Manchester Metropolitan University. As promised, here is a copy of the slides I used for the session. Do consider joining ALL and Twitter too to carry on with the (learning) conversation...

Speaking Activities & Using Technology to Develop Oracy in the MFL Classroom, MMU, Friday 25th October 2013.

Please find below the handouts needed for Friday's session. I will upload a copy of all my slides after the session.

 

Speaking session mmu handout from Isabelle Jones

Ict tools for oracy from Isabelle Jones

Motivating Students in the Languages classroom: Language is Music

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lambertwm/4648945403

Over the past few months I have been looking at different ways to use music to engage my students with French and Spanish language learning.

I started on the premise that music is a powerful mood-modifier and even I was amazed at some of the students’ responses…

Why music? I have always had this idea that if music is a language, conversely, language is music-and languages represent a range of music with different pitches and rhythms.

I have used music in a wide range of ways to grab students’ attention, sneakily modify their moods and get them engaged with the language and its related culture.

Just music-no words

It is up to the students to come up with words! The music is then used as a brainstorming tool.

Music associated with key parts of the lesson

Great to minimise instruction time and reinforce routines

Music as a link into a new topic

Students listen and/or watch and figure out what the new topic is. The clues can be in the lyrics or in the video. I have a French and Spanish playlist on Youtube (isabellejones)

Just music and words

I have used karaoke versions of music video for students to concentrate more on the words and to reinforce the learning of specific structures.

Made-up songs

I have used songs with a clear or repetitive structure as a stimulus to get students to write their own made-up song/ rap/ poem. Playfulness with words is the beginning of serious language manipulation.

 

Singing pronunciation

Go off-piste and slow down-sing to the students and help them remember the pronunciation of longer/ trickier words to a tune.

Parallel texts, translations  and cover songs

If the song studied has a cover version in English, compare the two versions and get the students to spot the differences as they are listening. Is it a straight translation? Why isn’t it a straight translation? Any important differences in meanings?

Students’ responses were varied but largely positive. Although I am passionate about using music in languages lessons, I do understand that some people will not respond to it. What I have tried to do is to use music in such a way that it cannot just be associated with a specific type of listening, speaking, reading or writing activities. Music is a very versatile tool and using it as a way to reinforce patterns or routines or as a mood-modifier is just as powerful.

A number of ICT tools have supported my use of music in the classroom:

I really like Amara, which can be used to subtitle videos. The only issue is that subtitling a music video is extremely challenging for non-natives and there is a lot of typing involved. An alternative activity would be to use background music and subtitle a short video in the style of old-fashioned silent movies. The choice of background music could reflect the characters’ feelings or the ups and downs of the story.

Freeplay music is a great site with free music to match moods (select by key words/ instrument/ style of music).

If you want to keep it simpler go for ibeat, free beats you can use to practise new vocabulary and key words-great to focus on pronunciation.

A good rhyming dictionary-online or as a mobile app- is essential to support the writing activities and it will also help students memorise the correct pronunciation of the new words if they are learnt in rhyming clusters.

Finding the words of up-to-date songs can be tricky but I found that using mobile apps like Lyrics + saved me a lot of time: find the sound, get the lyrics, copy and paste into a word document and use for cloze exercises and more…

Downloading YouTube videos was also of use, particularly as online tools like Amara do not really work well directly with You Tube. Using Keepvid.com  or the mobile app iboltdownloader were the easiest way to do this.

 

Last but not least, how do you keep up to date with the music of the different Target Language countries?  I found a great mobile app called MusicTube to do just that. You can visit the top 20 songs for a range of countries and each song is linked to a corresponding YouTube video. As the lists are updated regularly, this is a fantastic up-to-the-minute resource ready to be used in the classroom…         

More resources can be found here

Language World 2013: Music to my ears

As promised, please find below a copy of the slides and reference sheet for my session on using music in the languages classroom:

Music to my ears slideshare from Isabelle Jones

Music to my ears handout from Isabelle Jones

Memory Joggers-Practising Speaking and Writing

This week in the Times Educational Supplement (TES), I reflect on different ways to encourage active language learning when students are able to go from their mother tongue to the target language and the other way around.

Anybody who has ever tried to learn a foreign language will know that receptive skills such as listening and reading always develop first. You may be able to understand a conversation between native speakers, but you will find it a lot more difficult to take part.

Using cognates and near-cognates helps students to develop their confidence and builds up their vocabulary. In addition, they are easier to understand and commit to memory.

Introduce students to the concept of "word families" and get them to look at the most commonly used prefixes and suffixes. Getting students to "invent" words by playing around with prefixes and suffixes is also a fun way to get them to understand how words are formed. The "invented" words can then be checked in the dictionary and points can be awarded to the team that "created" the most correct words.

Simple visuals can be associated with key sentence starters to scaffold extended oral or written answers. For instance, a "V" is a great prompt to encourage students to use the near future in French (Je "vais"). And visuals created by students can be used as mnemonics to help them remember key language structures.

Tools that can support the development of both writing and speaking skills include: Spell with Flickr, a source of pictures of individual letters; Memorize Now, which takes letters or words out of a text; and Mindomo, a mind-mapping site.

Students are more likely to try to speak if they are given some privacy to experiment with the phonic system of the new language. Opportunities to record themselves with Audacity or use Text-to-Speech can really help.

CuePrompter, an online autocue, or the LineLearner mobile application, which can easily produce gapped recordings, can encourage students to practise larger chunks of language.

Students often assume that if they understand a word or a phrase in the language they are learning, they will be able to use it. But when they are searching for a word, it doesn't always come to them because they are thinking first in English. To cement it in their minds, try using the read/cover/write/check approach used to teach young pupils how to spell. It's simple, but effective.

Later, you can use a simple translation test of short sentences from English to see if they can actively use the language.

Language World 2012: Embedding Phonics in Language Learning and Teaching, Sue Cave

The principles of Jolly phonics in can be applied in French through creating an association between sounds and images with phonics being introduced right from the first lesson.

No one usually alert language learners to the fact that letters make different sounds in different languages. Phonics makes students more independent as it allows them to try out and transfer pronunciation rules by themselves.

Sue Cave presented the 7 steps to her approach to embedding phonics in language learning and teaching, with the first three steps focusing on Oracy and steps 4-7 focusing on Literacy development.

Steps 1 and 2: Identify and practise the individual sounds in a word (1) and practise blending the sounds to create the whole word (2).

Start with the basic sounds and get students to blend the sounds together. This is a very similar process in students’ mother tongue and in a foreign language-even if the pronunciation rules can be very different.  

Once the word is sounded and blended, students can concentrate on its meaning.

The spelling is then revealed and a correct pronunciation given with the support of sound files.

New key sounds need to be introduced every lesson and be related quite tightly to the content of the lesson.

The French version of the phonics programme focuses on colours, numbers, days of the week, months and animals and 24 sounds that do not exist in French or are spelt different in English

Children came up with pictures to illustrate them and example of sounds. Then they use cards with graphemes on one side and pictures on the other side to practise.

Student practise blending with known consonants and some students can be put in charge of specific individual words. Games to help to consolidate the knowledge of individual sounds can help like the “Throw the beanbag if you hear your sound” game.

Step 3 is to practise connecting the meaning of the word to its sounds.

Step 4 is to identify and practise the graphemes for the individual sounds.

Get children to draw the graphemes in the air as it is a way to strengthen the sound/ writing link

Phonic bingo

Splat with sounds

Blockbuster

Sing the phoneme-music helps focusing on specific sounds and slowing language down.

Step 5 is to practise reading, saying and writing the word.

Bring up the issue of silent letter and encourage the students to develop a bank of silent letters as well as a bank of sounds.

Phonic hangman with letters sounded out.

Grapheme scrabble encourages students to try to make new words.

Step 6 is to practise connecting the meaning of the word to its written form.

Step 7 is to practise putting words together to say and read a sentence.

For instance, do not teach numbers on their own.  If you count things e .g chien/ araignée, students can also find out about “liaisons”.

Busy bees can represent “z” liaisons or Light blue silent e.

As phonics comes along every time students meet new words, phonics is being taught in every lesson rather than specifically at the beginning of the year.

MORE PRACTICAL WAYS TO IMPROVE STUDENTS’ PRONUNCIATION

I was delighted to be able to share a few strategies to improve students' pronunciation in the Times Educational Supplement (TES) this Friday as I view good pronunciation as one of the most effective ways to boost students' confidence in their own ability as linguists. Indeed, if their accent in the foreign language is not at least understandable, performance in exams and in a real life context will be poor and lead to demotivation.

 

 

As mentioned in the article, practising pronunciation is a challenging activity for teenagers who often perceive it as a threat to their own British identity at a time of their lives when they are not too sure about their identity anyway. Using puppets or drama techniques like role-play can help but what else can be done to help students improve their pronunciation in the foreign language?

Phonics Phonics Phonics

Teach basic pronunciation rules through examples and regularly re-visit key sounds through starter activities. Use mirrors and discuss with students how some sounds come through their noses or from the back of their throats.  Focus on how foreign language speakers stress certain words and do not pronounce specific letters e.g. “s” for plural in French or “nt” at the end of verbs. For Spanish and German, show how "regular" the sound patterns of language are and get students to decode and pronounce sophisticated words they have learnt in other subjects.

Practise Practise Practise 

Provide opportunities for students to practise individually, in pairs and small groups. Tongue twisters and rhymes are great for starters, with students listening to a model and then practising in pairs to encourage self and peer correction.

Make practising pronunciation into a game. Play vocabulary games like noughts and crosses with two teams or in pairs and make accurate pronunciation one of the criteria for scoring points. Encourage students to correct each other’s pronunciation and step in if needed to clarify pronunciation rules. Some students could volunteer to be "pronunciation expert", in charge of reminding the class of a specific sound e.g. i always sounds "ee" in Spanish, "oi" always sounds "wa" in French...

Use poetry, riddles and rhymes to make students more sensitive to pronunciation patterns. A simple exercise where students have to match rhyming words can really get them to reflect on pronunciation patterns.

Music is a wonderful tool to get students to look at language in terms of sounds and rhythms. Get your students to sing difficult words, they will slow down and their pronunciation will improve instantaneously.

Songs and raps in the target language can be used effectively as pronunciation models. Students listen to the song or rap, the teacher identifies a repetitive structure as a model and students write their own lines and practise them. The raps or songs can then be peer-assessed with a focus on pronunciation.

Using Technology such as Voki, the speaking avatar site, can provide a good model in the target language through its text-to-speech facility. Students can also give their avatar a voice by recording themselves and get their pronunciation assessed by their peers verbally or through comments. Other sites like Blabberize can enable students to make a photo "speak" and will also motivate them to try different sounds and voices. 

Get students to practise at home by recording speeches using Audacity, the free audio recording software, or listening to model answers and making notes about the pronunciation, like where silent letters are or which part of the word is stressed. Making them aware of inflection, the patterns of stress and intonation in a language, is the most difficult unless students are quite musical. Students could just demonstrate whether they think the intonation is going up or down.This can be very good to get them to realise that in Spanish, for instance, the penultimate syllable is often stressed whereas in French it tends to be the last syllable, which explains differences in how the language sounds.  

Finally, getting students to improve their pronunciation will not only mean better exam results in languages but also students developing a more positive self-image as linguists.  This should also lead to improved self-esteem and impact on their overall school achievements.

What strategies do you use in your classroom to make your students more aware how the language inflections, rhythm and specific sounds?