Our Vision and Approach in MFL

The overarching aims for pupils of languages at Buile Hill are fluid communication and a broad cultural awareness of Spanish and the Spanish-speaking world. Students will gain strong phonetic knowledge to enable them to converse confidently (and pronounce new vocabulary) and a reinforcement of many literacy skills from their first language. They will learn how to manipulate grammar to allow them to personalise information and retain core phrases that can be recycled in many real life situations. Through this knowledge and confidence, students will become resilient and competent linguists who are open-minded and versatile communicators.

Language will be taught in reusable chunks (as opposed to individual words) as this helps pupils’ fluency and long-term memory recall.

“Language learning is not simply about combining words and applying grammar rules but rather the retrieval of the patterns and combinations we are primed for.” (Michael Hoey – Lexical Priming 2005)

“L 2 research has shown that making use of formulaic expressions and memorising long chunks of text (and making substitutions within them) is far more efficient and effective than learning to assemble new linguistic strings in the process of language production.” (Nation,2013 Ellis,2015)

Chunks can then be separated by manipulation/alteration or to explain specific grammar.

“A chunk is a frequently recurring, meaningful string of two or more words either fixed or with variable slots which can be learnt as a single unit, without the need to analyse its elements. Once committed to L.T memory, a chunk can be retrieved and used ‘as is’ or with modifications, bypassing the need to generate it from individual words and grammatical rules.”(Selivan, 2018).

Websites you can visit:

www.duolingo.com (usually used as a mobile app)

www.lyricstraining.com (also available as an app – students can learn languages through music lyrics)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/levels/z4kw2hv - Select Spanish

www.memrise.com / www.quizlet.com - vocabulary learning

https://www.youtube.com/@EasySpanish

https://www.newsinslowspanish.com/ (podcasts)