Modern Languages

Introduction

We offer three main languages: French, Spanish and Mandarin.

We were awarded the prestigious Confucius Classroom status in March 2016 and joined the Mandarin Excellence Programme in September 2017, which enable us to be a lead school in the learning and teaching of Mandarin in the local community.

Contact details

Please contact the below relevant HoDs for more information. A full teaching staff list can be found under 'About Us' 'Staff and Governance'.

Mandarin: Ms J Woo J.Woo@ccfplus.com

Spanish: Ms J Goodhead J.Goodhead@ccfplus.com

French: Mrs A Kiebler-Mansard A.Kiebler@ccfplus.com

What your child will be learning (curriculum mapping)

To view the Curriculum Overview document for French and Spanish, please click here.

To view the Curriculum Overview document for Mandarin, please click here.

To view the modules studied in Mandarin, please click here.

To view the modules studied in Spanish, please click here.

To view the modules studied in French, please click here.

Aims and enrichment

Aims

Our mission statement is 'Educating the Global Citizens of Tomorrow'. In order to achieve this, we believe that all students should learn at least one foreign language. We believe this will increase their employability in an increasingly global job market, and will also enable students to gain a greater appreciation of their own language and culture.

Our specialist teachers use authentic resources such as literature, music and film to bring the language to life. Students express themselves in the target language on a range of topics, such as family, school, and lifestyle. Students learn about the interrelationship between sound and spelling and apply their knowledge to decode challenging language. Grammar is taught alongside vocabulary to give students the tools to write and speak creatively. Students are encouraged to compare their own language and culture with those of communities from the Francophone, Hispanic and Chinese-speaking worlds.

Career paths include teaching, translating and interpreting as well as international banking, business and international development. Students develop many transferable skills, such as excellent communication skills and the ability to interact respectfully with people from other languages and cultures, which would be an asset in any chosen career path.

Enrichment:

Annual language trips abroad offer students the chance to experience the language and culture first hand.

Past trips include Paris, Disneyland and Burgundy. We run regular whole-school language events, such as Languages Week, Chinese New Year celebrations, dragon dance workshops, bilingual theatre productions and cultural assemblies.

We also offer International student exchange projects and collaborations such as the government funded Turing Scheme, which enables students to spend time in target languages countries.

Key stage 3

During the first half term in Year 7, students have taster lessons for two weeks at a time in French, Spanish and Mandarin before choosing one language to continue studying all the way to GCSE.

We follow our own bespoke schemes of work, which are a hybrid version the latest editions of the NCELP SoW combined with the Pearson Active Learn resources - Viva for Spanish, Dynamo and Studio for French and Jin Bu for Mandarin.

Key stage 4

Exam Board: AQA

Students study Mandarin, French or Spanish at GCSE.

We follow the schemes of work from Studio for French and Viva for Spanish. The exam is 100% final exam – 25% Listening, 25% Reading, 25% Speaking, 25% Writing. Students develop a range of skills including reading literary texts and other authentic resources, speaking spontaneously, listening for gist and details, writing in informal and formal register and translation into English and the foreign language.