Facing the currently unknown

Don't panic- ideas to get them speaking and writing at CA Stage 1- Ryde High School

Following an indepth exam board presentation by Hilary Quigg of AQA I was asked by Languages South East to give a few ideas to help teachers on the Isle of Wight to prepare their students for the Controlled Assessments. My main message was "Don't Panic"- good teaching remains good teaching no matter what the end exam, as long as we base it on sound pedagogy. Although in my eyes there are huge issues with the current exam set-up, there are potential gains if we can get our learners to a point where they have a base armoury of language that we can build on in every stage 1 before we build up to a controlled assessment. With plenty of games, opportunities to argue and practise language in a meaningful way we can jump through those hoops that are in front of us. If any of the games don't make sense just from the slides, feel free to leave a comment below and I'll explain them further.

Example podcasts mentioned:

Imperfect grammar podcast

Lost Property

(although this was made for the old GCSE, if you know the kind of language you want for each topic, why not put your own series together, set to different musical beds?!)

Inspiring speaking and writing ideas

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Language World 2011

Last weekend was one of the annual highlights of the language year- Language World. Every year it turns into a crazy dash, balancing catching up with old friends from across the isles (and this year from Canada as well, well done Sylvia for making it over, wow) and trying to navigate the best path through the HUGE number of training sessions on offer by some of the best practitioners in the country.

My session on the Saturday afternoon aimed to look at how ICT can enhance the integration of creative contexts in the curriculum and how it can facilitate creative language use. Apologies for the fact that it turned into a manic gallop.

 

Creative technologies for creative contexts

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Rethinking the I, the C and the T- #Linguascope conference

On Friday, despite my current state of baby brain, I had the privilege of presenting twice at the Linguascope conference in Brighton. I used a title that I used when presenting for Neil Jones last December, but my own learning journey made me want to really change it to focus on the kind of learning I want to be able to facilitate. The first element was to look at ideas for use with an IWB for encouraging group work with no right or wrong answer, rather than encouraging the use of an IWB for just one learner at a time, with the others just expected to sit and watch- not my favourite style of lesson. The second element was to show a few tools that learners can use to create creative, open tasks using ICT, releasing the neat control that we all often insist on in favour of a slightly... messier form of learning where making mistakes is cherished, and to a certain extent encouraged. Nothing groundbreaking, I'm afraid- especially as in one session I felt incredibly humbled to have the likes of Eva Lamb and Lesley Welsh sitting in and, for which i was really grateful, chipping in as well.

Anyway, I also said that I'd suggest a "starter list" of blogs for some new Google Reader accounts. Well if you look on the side of this blog you'll see a list of some great ones to add- and if you want any help with anything just give me a shout.

So there we go... thanks for a great day yesterday, everyone.

 

Thinking again about the I, the C and the T

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