Faculty Staff

·         Mr C. Deane                                    Head of Faculty (C6)

·         Mrs H. Purcell                                   Lead Practitioner (C4)

·         Mrs L. Hachad                                  Teacher of MFL (C5)

·         

Courses (2021 to 2022)

 

Year 7	2 lessons of French per week. Mixed ability groups taught in bands.
Year 8	2 lessons of French per week. Mixed ability groups taught in bands.
Year 9	2 lessons of Spanish per week. Mixed ability groups taught in bands. Ab initio French class available to students once a week.
Year 10	3 lessons of Spanish per week (option). Mixed ability groups taught in option bands. Ab initio French class available to students once a week.
Year 11	3 lessons of French or Spanish per week (options). Mixed ability groups taught in bands.​

 

 

Aims

At Emerson Park Academy we teach Modern Foreign Languages to:

• Equip learners to understand and communicate in French and/or Spanish.
• Improve competence in receptive and productive language skills.
• Provide a platform for learners to express their ideas and personal interests through speech and writing.
• Develop analytical and interpretive capacities.
• Broaden each learner’s understanding of how the English language works.
• Develop memory, self-discipline and resilience.
• Provide an opening to other cultures and traditions.
• Enhance each learner’s intellectual curiosity towards local, national and global areas of interest.
• Expand personal horizons.
• Provide a foundation for learning other languages.
• Equip learners to visit, study in or work in another country.

It is our aim to make French and Spanish lessons as accessible, interesting and exciting as possible. Members of our faculty work hard at preparing engaging resources and challenging lessons which motivate all learners throughout their language learning journey.

All students at Emerson Park Academy have the opportunity to study a language at GCSE and are strongly encouraged to do so. GCSE French and Spanish are now very popular subject choices and we are pleased to see Emerson Park’s students enjoying their language study and achieving excellent results. We reiterate that the benefits to students of studying a foreign language are endless.

 

If your child is proficient in another language, for example, mother tongue Mandarin, Russian or Arabic, it may be possible to take an additional GCSE. Please contact the Head of Faculty for more information.

Programme of Study at Key Stage 3

Students will develop listening, speaking, reading and writing skills in various contexts. We continually focus on developing grammar skills in context and practising new vocabulary unique to each of the themes or topics studied in class. Please refer to the attachments below for a more detailed overview of what your child will be studying this academic year.

Programme of study at Key Stage 4 (GCSE)

Your child will be offered the option to continue to study Spanish or French at GCSE.

We follow the AQA GCSE specification. Preparation for this qualification builds upon many of the topics covered at Key Stage 3 as well as introducing more advanced vocabulary and skills within a variety of topics.

The 4 skills are still assessed equally. The new GCSE will grade your child from 1-9 (9 being exceptional performance) and all of the examinations will be sat at the end of Year 11. There are no resits.

Listening: 25%    Reading: 25%     Speaking: 25%     Writing: 25%

Please refer to the curriculum overviews below for more information about what your child will be studying this year.

Homework and Independent Learning

Your child will receive weekly homework tasks throughout their MFL studies. These will comprise of reading and writing tasks, as well as online homework and learning vocabulary for tests. Homework will always be set by the teacher on the Show My Homework website.

Resources

• A multilingual team of specialist teachers.
• Interactive whiteboards in each of our 4 MFL classrooms.
• 32 Google Chromebooks exclusively for MFL use.
• Brand-new ‘Allez’, ‘Studio’ and ‘Viva’ course books and interactive resources.
• Google Classroom e-learning.
• A collection of authentic reading material .
• Subscriptions to online learning and revision tools.
• Authentic  DVDs.
• Access to foreign language assistant for GCSE preparation

Extra-curricular

At Emerson Park Academy we pride ourselves on giving students the opportunity to develop cultural capital by promoting a love of learning beyond the classroom. Over the past couple of years, enrichment activities have included:

 

• Day trips to France.
• Residential trips to France and Spain.
• A partnership with a French school.
• French and Spanish theatre company visits.
• Language leadership programme.
• Cultural enrichment ideas shared with students: online series and songs.
• Taster sessions in other languages.
• Film studies.
• Assemblies on the diversity of languages spoken at Emerson Park Academy.
• Sharing links to authentic online articles and podcasts.

Contact us

In the event of any issues to do with your child’s French or Spanish studies, please try to resolve queries with their classroom teacher in the first instance. Alternatively, please contact Mr Deane, Head of Faculty.

The faculty also has its own Twitter account. Please follow or tweet us @MFLFacultyEPA