Hello and Bonjour from everyone here at Finchale!

Statement of Intent - What do we intend to do?

We believe learning a language can open doors to the world for children. This can in turn open up the world to our young linguists, leading to opportunities and experiences which would otherwise be impossible, and we want give our pupils every opportunity in life. Learning a language can help children to understand the culture, similarities and differences another country. It can help them to be successful in the modern world and may open up a world of personal and career possibilities. In teaching French, we make links across the curriculum so that our children are able to make connections with countries studied in Geography and History. We are giving our children their first step into a world full of languages and opportunities. Children at Finchale Primary begin formal French learning in Key Stage Two. As a school aware of the internationalist future of our children, we recognise the significance of learning another language. We aim to raise awareness of our multilingual and multicultural world, and introduce an international dimension to learning. Learning a foreign language also provides opportunities to reinforce the knowledge, skills and understanding developed in other subjects. Through learning another language, pupils are able to develop communication and literacy skills which lay the foundation for future language learning. They extend their knowledge of how language works, develop linguistic competence, and explore similarities and differences between French and English. 

MFL in school- Take a look at some ways we implement this!

Miss Johnstone and Mrs Lennox recently spent their half term holiday in the beautiful city of Salamanca, in Spain. We worked hard each morning from Monday - Friday at 'Colegio Delibes' immersing ourselves in the Spanish language and we were also given the opportunity to develop an understanding of the culture and way of life in Salamanca. Whilst we were in Salamanca, not only did we learn some of the Spanish language but we saw lots of amazing sites, tried many different traditional foods and met some amazing people. This week was a fantastic opportunity for us to develop our knowledge of the Spanish language and it has made us both feel a lot more confident to now transfer our knowledge and understanding to the classroom and to our pupils. We both now have a passion for language learning and will continue to develop our knowledge of Spanish. Miss Johnstone created a blog of our time away in Salamanca and you can view this blog by visiting the link below. Please feel free to take a look at this. 

https://salamancadurham.travel.blog

This year, on our annual celebration of European Day of Languages, as a school we celebrated 7 different European languages. These included; Spanish, Italian, German, French, Greek, Hungarian and Polish!

Take a look below at some of the fun we had participating in this celebration.

Did you know?

Listed below are some fun language facts about Finchale Primary School!

• Did you know, Mrs Whitton studied Latin and Greek at school? These are both 'dead' languages, so don't ask her to speak them, although she can read Greek!
• Did you know, there are 10 different languages spoken by pupils at our school?