MFL
FRENCH and SPANISH
KEY STAGE 3
The language studied in KS3 alternates every year between French and Spanish. All students will study one language over 3 years in KS3. Following this they have the option to continue to GCSE.
Y7 French
Students in Y7 will cover several topic areas including talking about themselves and saying what they like to do. They will also learn how to describe their classroom and talk about their school and school day. They will learn how to discuss sports and free time activities as well as the weather. Students will give and understand information about their families and homes and be able to talk about food and drink at breakfast time. They will learn how to buy snacks using the language and talk about future plans for holidays. In addition, students work on listening, reading, writing and speaking skills, improving their confidence through repetition and identifying gist and detail in spoken passages, stories and songs. Students use familiar structures and vocabulary to build short paragraphs and identify main points in written texts. There will be references to cultural differences and similarities in Francophone countries.
Y8 French
Students learn how to talk about, past holidays, festivals and celebrations and free time activities. They will also discuss their local area and life at home, as well as sports and how to lead a healthy lifestyle. Students also participate in unrehearsed exchanges and organise their ideas and information into a sequence of paragraphs. They will begin to use a range of verb forms referring to the past, present and future time frames.
Y7 Spanish
We are keen to build student confidence in Y7, both with sounds and with speech. We do this through the various topic areas we cover. In Term 1 we look at Mi Vida (My life) where students develop the skills to describe themselves and their family. In Mi Tiempo Libre (My Free Time) we learn about the things we love to do. In Term 2 we learn about school and family, and in the final term we look at Mi Ciudad (My Town).
Y8 Spanish
In Year 8 we cover holidays and the past tense in Term 1, food and making plans in the second term and summer plans in Term 3.
Each topic area we cover builds on the knowledge learned in previous work, and students are expected to cope with increasingly more complex concepts, structures and grammar, such as the present tense and the future tense. In addition there are many opportunities to learn new things about the many differences between our cultures. Students are assessed in the 4 skill areas of Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing.
Y9
Students work to achieve accreditation through the AQA FCSE exam The FCSE prepares students for GCSE with an introduction to simple translation from English into the target language (Writing), from the target language into English (Reading) and role-play (Speaking) as well as reading and listening. Students will understand longer sequences of speech and deal with unexpected responses in order to sustain conversation and discussion. They will use their knowledge of word order, phrases and clauses to understand and build a wider range of extended sentences. They will also be able to use and identify a range of tenses.
All students are given the opportunity to begin their GCSE studies in Y9 in order to complete the exam in Y10.
KEY STAGE 4
The course follows 4 main themes which are:
Theme 1: My World,
Theme 2: Holidays and Leisure,
Theme 3: Lifestyle,
Theme 4: My Community
CURRICULUM TIME
KS3: Y7 3 hours , Y8 2 hours, Y9 1 hour or 4 hours (GCSE Early Entry)
KS4: Y10 2 hours, Y11 3 hours
ASSESSMENT
Students sit all their exams at the end of the course. The examination has two tiers – Foundation (F) and Higher (H).
Listening: (25%) Written paper – F 35 mins, H 45mins
Speaking: (25%) Written paper – F 7/9 mins, H 10/12mins
Reading: (25%) Written paper – F 45 mins, H 1 hour
Writing: (25%) Written paper – F 1 hour, H 1.25 hours
HEAD OF DEPARTMENT: Mrs. D.M Bassnett and Mrs. K. Hensby