Tuesday 31 March 2009

Monday 30 March 2009

Gender Issues

Gender issues

Anecdotal
seen as feminine subject
parental attitudes -subject for girls
role models - few male MFL teachers
boys like challenges, tasks, rules to follow
boys like sport, facts, ICT
boys like German more than French

Need to find evidence to support or refute some of these "facts"

Amanda Salt 2009, Belfast
"One of the great success stories of my year has to be the boy who showed an open dislike for Spanish last year yet has sent me the last two homeworks (created on Goanimate) early, and is visibly more relaxed in class."
http://amandasalt.blogspot.com/2009/03/creating-buzz.html

Mica 2009 on Comic Life
I am not sure if anyone of you has come across this software but it is great for MFL. This creates pages like a typical comic. I have used this to complete ER verbs and reflexive verbs unit. Pupils used cameras to take picture of their daily routine and added speech bubbles to their story. This really engaged some of my boys.

Australia
http://209.85.229.132/search?q=cache:K9rKigKw8PoJ:education.qld.gov.au/curriculum/area/lote/docs/boys-lote.doc+boys+primary+languages&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk&client=safari
Languages are boring. Boys, in their own opinion, are less prepared to be bored than girls. Many of the boys talked nostalgically about their experience in primary school when languages had been more interactive and task-based, where they did things with the language rather than just ‘copy from the board or read out of the textbook'.

Concentration span (twice as long for girls Kruse 1992)

Jones and Coffey, Modern Foreign Languages 5-11 (course book)
ch 6pp95-96
use variety of methods

LOW, JOHNSTONE CONNACHER Evaluation of the Visiting Specialist
lower achieving boys tend to do better in German (than French) p28

Other possible sources in books
Clark, A. (1998) Gender on the agenda Factors motivating boys and girls in MFLs London: CILT
Doublier, M, Green, S. and Haworth, S. (1998) On est fou du foot/Football crazy London: CILT
Harris, V. (1992) Fair enough? (PF14) Equal opportunities and modern languages London: CILT
Jones, B. and Jones, G. (with Helen Demetriou, Peter Downes and Jean Rudduck) (2001) Boys’ performance in modern foreign languages. Listening to learners.London: CILT
Jones, B. and Swarbrick, A. (2005) It makes you think! Creating engagement, offering challenges (NPF4) London: CILT
Jones, B. (2005) Boosting boys’ motivation in MFL London: CILT
English government site:
Thanks o today's researchers
If you have any more references or points please add them in comments!

Interactive exercises on clothes

quia matching from Mairi


here are some from elsewhere

Sunday 29 March 2009

Best sites for language help (updated)

ULTRALINGUA Dictionary and much more eg conjugation - all tenses of verb; numbers- type figures, converts to words; grammar
Wordreference Dictionary with lots of examples and a forum

pronunciation with audio files
database of  sound files, French here but other languages too 

Primary languages
Talkabout Primary - English based network
Primary Languages - English based, training for primary MFL, now incorporates NACELL, video clips

RadioLingua Network (based in Ayr) award winning language learning podcasts to download for free or listen online. (small charge for additional notes, if you want them) eg Coffee Break French and Spanish, Walk Talk and Learn French,  School Run French for primary pupils, One Minute Polish, Russian and lots more.

French about - vast American site - excellent resource on French language and culture

the MFLE - part of ltscotland. Lots of resources and a discussion forum

SCILT the Scottish Centre for Information on Language Teaching and Research, based at Jordanhill. They publish the Scottish Languages Review  and
Scilt wiki

My delicious links tagged and frequently added to

Saturday 28 March 2009

Audio files

I have started to upload old audio files to Podomatic. So far I've done the French sound system that I have mentioned before from my French Early Years Course, 2002. Listen here There is a six second pause before I get going!

Sunday 22 March 2009

Clothes

For the next 2 weeks we will be exploring ways of teaching clothes in French. We will revisit skills in presentation, look at resources  and try to move beyond the topic based approach.

Capture pupils' imagination with nice resources
These Sparklebox resources - dress the children, bear and pig habille les enfants, le nounours et le cochon are very colouful and beautifully drawn.
If you have a supply of doll's clothes or baby clothes or dressing up clothes, that is so much better than flashcards!
Pegs and a length of clothes line (or skipping ropes) can be put to good use.

You need to teach the content and practise it, then you can progress to a challenge.

gender: American videos studio 4 learning

parts of speech Grammar Ninja, good for whiteboard. Can be downloaded and customised.

revision of possessive adjectives fits in well here 

adjectives - colours, beautiful etc  suit the topic too

Songs
promenons-nous dans le bois click
washing machine song on CD3 Français français track 09

HW online exercises 



Wednesday 11 March 2009

Comic relief - learn Scottish


Former colleague Mark Pentleton who runs the very successful languages podcasts Radio Lingua Network has produced a tongue in cheek course in Scottish for Comic Relief. For £3 donation all of which goes to Comic Relief you can download 3 lessons, plus you get a 25% discount off your next purchase.