Coordinators' May Checklist

Welcome back after Easter. This is a short half term but also a powerful language learning half term when your young learners will be at  the point in the learning year where they can revisit  and re-use language you have practised during this year and can also reapply , manipulate and strengthen their growing understanding of the skills of target language phonics, bilingual dictonaries,sentence structure and also at the same time explore the culture of the target language countries.You can look back too at previous checklists from this academic year too if you want to see how far you have all come this year!. Click here on the Coordinators' April Checklist for previous academic year and months' blog posts.

We will be considering how to make good primary progress in language learning at our annual conference.Network members for 2017-18 have a free place available at the conference, so it is time to register for your place.Network members have received emails aboit this week or simply click on the link here .Primary Languages Conference 29 June 2017

Here are some resources, activities and points to consider during this Whit half term.

• Take time to build on knowledge the children have laready gained either during this year or across several years and revisit and practise familiar core language and high frequency words or use of nouns or asdjectives or verbs with this series of activities.The activities can be used with different stages of learners. Chain Reaction blog post
• This half term why not take the children outside to learn their language and access our PE with languages folder to use the lesson planning for Boccia, Volleyball, Fencing, or PE Games. This folder is in the Teaching Resources area of the VLE.
• It will soon be Eurovision (13 May) and what a great opportunity to set up your own classes as voting panels for the song contest You could also learn some key language and facts about the partcipating countries too.Take a look here at the offical website.Kyiv 2017 Eurovision Song Contest
• You may like to use this idea in a recent blog post to wish children in Y6 good luck with their SATs.The idea is based on the gift of lilly of the valley on 1st May in France to wish friends and family good luck for the year. It could be an activity done in any language and all language learners could learn about this kind hearted French custom too. Good luck and a gift of le muguet  

• You may be interested in taking a look at the festival in Seville at the end of April/ beginning of May - la feria de abril , where the city celebrates all things artisan - horses, parades of dancers and flamenco .A great way to prepare your own children for a Summer Spanish festival too.You will find our lesson planning and activities based upon this in Seasonal Specials Summer 1 in the Teaching Resources area of the VLE.
• Last year I was asked for quiet and calm activities during SATs week that could be used at different levels across year groups.I was deloghted with the reaction to the "Sunshine Sparklers" quiet individual work activity here. Hope it might help some of you this year too.
• You could also celebrate French Mothers' Day, ready to take cards home over the Whit half term , as the French will celebrate this in Sunday 28 May .Our Mothers Day poem on our You Tube channel may be really useful and our materials to create your own Mothers Day booklets are in Seasonal Specials Spring 2.  
• Watch out for a simple reports' pack being currently created by the associate teachers and linked to the PLN SOW. This will be in the Subject Planning  area in the MFL Coordinators' Tools folder by the end of May.You will also find a simple pupils' voice questionnaire in this area and folder too,should you wish to review the year's learning with your classes too.
• Should you be in the process of drawing up a presentation on PFL for governors or SLT then take a look in the Subject Planning area of the VLE and access the governors presentation file folder in the MFL Coordinators Tools folder

• We now have native speaker German listening sound files and transcripts for the Puzzle It Out activities and these are in the Tracking and Assessment folder in the generic Puzzle It Out file. French and Spanish are already up on the VLE too.
• Summer 1 independent creative writing sheets for Y3,4,5 and 6 are now up on the VLE and are directly linked from the Ready Made French and Spanish SOW and are in the appropriate year group folders for German too. We hope you enjoy using these.Here is a sample.

• ADVANCED NOTICE! Over the last 6 years we have tried to keep on improving and developing the PLN service for all our network members.This year we are busy updating and reorganising our Ready Made SOW to make the medium term teaching and learning overviews for each focus very teacher friendly .We are amending and adding to our areas for specialist or non-specialist teacher support , offering teachers possible alternative focuses,cross curricular and seasonal special options and ensuring that we help you to cover all language learning skills with your children. Below is a brief look at an example overview.We will be launching this at the conference on 29 June, ready to be used next academic year.The cost of membership for next academic year is the same as this year and we welcome new members either full member schools, online schools or individual teacher members,Membership details are here. Network membership details