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Modern Foreign Language

Modern Foreign Language (MFL)

French is the modern foreign language that we teach in our school. The curriculum that we follow covers a range of topics. Class teachers or PPA teachers deliver lessons to all classes from Y3-Y5.

Intent:

Our curriculum offers a carefully planned sequence of lessons, ensuring progressive coverage of the skills required by the national curriculum. Our chosen themes provide an introduction to the culture of French-speaking countries and communities. It aims to foster children’s curiosity and help deepen their understanding of the world. A linear curriculum has been chosen to allow opportunity for children to gradually build on their skills. Our French curriculum enables children to express their ideas and thoughts in French and provides opportunities to interact and communicate with others both in speech and in writing.

In Lower KS2, children acquire basic skills and understanding of French with a strong emphasis placed on developing their Speaking and Listening skills. These will be embedded and further developed in Upper KS2, alongside Reading and Writing, gradually progressing onto more complex language concepts and greater learner autonomy.

Through our French curriculum, we intend to inspire pupils to develop a love of languages and to expand their horizons to other countries, cultures and people. We aim to help children grow into curious, confident and reflective language learners and to provide them with a foundation that will equip them for further language studies.

Implementation:

At Orchard Fields Community School, we have a Specialist French teacher to who plans and delivers 30 minute French lessons weekly to all classes Years 3 -6.

Lessons are sequenced so that prior learning is considered and opportunities for revision of language and grammar are built in. At Orchard Fields, lessons and resources help children to build on prior knowledge alongside the introduction of new skills. Lessons provide structure and context as well as offering an insight into the culture of French-speaking countries and communities. The introduction and revision of key vocabulary and grammatical structures is built into each lesson. This vocabulary is then included in display materials and additional resources so that children have opportunities to repeat and revise their learning.

Impact:

The impact and measure of this is that the profile of languages will increase across school. The learning environment will be consistent with key French vocabulary displayed, spoken and used by all learners. We want to ensure that French is loved by teachers and pupils across school, therefore encouraging them to embark on further language studies. Impact can also be measured through key questioning skills built into lessons, child-led assessment such as success criteria grids and summative assessments aimed at targeting next steps in learning.

Assessment for learning and Recording:

We assess the children in order to ensure that they make good progress in this subject. We do this informally during the lessons, when marking written work and also by regular testing to evaluate what the children have learnt. Our formative record takes account of the 4 skills of listening, reading, speaking and writing. We encourage the children to reflect on how they personally learn best. During each lesson, we encourage the children to evaluate their personal achievement in relation to the lesson’s learning objective.