25.01.22.
Many thanks to Kim Bower who hosted this webinar with Dr Ian Collen and Vicky Gough, promoting participation in the Language Trends Survey 2022. Please make sure that your school responds! If you cannot find the link, please contact Ian: languagetrends@qub.ac.uk
Recording:
Chat
00:28:40 Elizabeth Lord: Hi everyone from Southsea, very happy to be here!
00:28:47 Sarah Schechter: Hi!
00:39:40 Anna Grainger: I have emailed all schools in the Coventry MFL Hub network, and also asked the School Improvement Primary lead to badger her network too!
00:42:58 Vicky Gough: @AnnaGrainger thank you !
00:45:52 Joe Mehrabian: what can be done to stem the demise of German …..?
00:47:23 Helen Myers: Q From Vincent on Twitter: “Should someone in school have passed this on to me? Or is it specific selected schools who are asked?”
00:48:03 Helen Myers: Another Q from Vincent: This would be a good opportunity to email all the Primary coordinators in our feeder schools. Will someone in the school have received the survey?
00:48:46 Ruth Magee: Could you please remind me of the email address to contact if you haven’t received the link?!
00:48:53 Vicky Gough: the survey is sent to all schools – but to the publically available address – often the school office It has a header saying please forward to the head of languages. if you cant fin th email- Ia can send you a link
00:48:54 Anna Grainger: @Vicky Gough sent me a link to forward to my contacts. Perhaps she can send Vincent that too?
00:49:24 Jean: Many of the teachers I know are telling me they haven’t received the questionnaire either.
00:49:27 Joe Mehrabian: languagetrends@qub.ac.uk
00:49:28 Kim Bower: All are asked via an email usually to main office. If you’d like a link sent directly to your department, email:languagetrends@qub.ac.uk
00:50:15 Anna Grainger: The problem with school offices is that anything that doesn’t look like anything they recognise is deleted and never goes any further.
00:50:28 Vicky Gough: also if schools have changed their email address for some reason – we cant reach them..
00:50:28 Ruth Magee: I’ve just popped it on the North East Teaching Languages group on facebook x
00:51:21 Ruth Magee: @vickyGough, may I paste those links on to the facebook page too? I’ve not spotted anything on the open pages but I’ve not been on facebook for a while!
00:51:25 Helen Myers: Q: Can we publish those links to survey monkey publicly?
00:51:54 Vicky Gough: eg we found that all the primary school email addresses in Warrington LA bounced back.,,. so if anyone has any contacts there please share those links !
00:52:18 Helen Myers: (Would you not get responses from too many people.. not necessarily representing their school?)
00:52:23 Ruth Magee: We lost some contacts when we became an academy!
00:52:39 Vicky Gough: you can only submit one response per URN..
00:53:12 Ruth Magee: Question for Ian: what do you expect will be the response from government when they read this?
00:53:21 Vicky Gough: But we do encourage to tak to others in the department to check that only one person is doing it !
00:55:20 Ruth Magee: Can we help amplify that response? Should we write to MPs or something else?!
00:55:37 Vicky Gough: @Helen we have published via ALL and ISMLA newsltetters and Anna sent in Coventry and others in other locations. we haven’t published on social media – in case multiple people try to complete for one school.
00:55:42 Joe Mehrabian: But 75% uptake at GCSE is unrealistic
00:57:39 Jean: I don’t know about other ITT providers but I’m not sure if we will have very many applicants this year. Are there any questions about turnover of staff in schools? I fear there will be lots of teachers retiring and not many replacements, especially in particular areas of there country.
01:00:12 Helen Myers: Thanks for answers!
01:01:03 AFLeeds: 75% uptake at GCSE is unethical.
01:01:18 Anna Grainger: @Ruth – we have engaged our MPs and cabinet member for education, Lord Mayor and Deputy LM in Coventry. They have been really supportive and really helping us to push the importance of languages in Coventry. If more MPs will club together in Westminster that would be fab!! Do write to them!
01:03:39 Crista Hazell: Ian, You just referred to the Big 3, do you think that these will change from F,G,S to something else S and… disappear completely?
01:09:14 Helen Myers: Ironically, an aim to get continuity across KS2 and 3 could squeeze out German even more …
01:09:18 Joe Mehrabian: what can be done to address this though??
01:09:21 Joe Mehrabian: re german
01:10:10 Joe Mehrabian: what is that programme for German ??
01:10:31 Joe Mehrabian: get you
01:10:46 Joe Mehrabian: thanks
01:10:59 Ruth Magee: Do you see the picture for transition between primary/secondary improving? That’s been a bit tricky in the past!
01:11:25 Crista Hazell: Thanks Ian for your honesty and telling us about the data. Progress is important and the feeling and sense of that is vital for any language to survive. Building on what our brilliant colleagues do in KS2 to reinforce key knowledge throughout KS3 to entice learners in to KS4.
01:11:40 Ruth Magee: Uh oh!
01:12:27 Ruth Magee: Absolutely Kim!
01:12:45 Joe Mehrabian: The truth is that lots of primary schools due to timing constraints don’t do much teaching of languages or they miss a week or two
01:12:49 Jean: Yet Ofsted see MFL as a 7 year course starting in KS2.
01:13:14 Anna Grainger: There are ways to improve it in your area. We have a good network now in Coventry although it’s been hard work and unpaid, but it has been well received. We’re lucky that our school improvement lead is very pro languages so has really helped us to build the network.
01:13:19 AFLeeds: In December we organised Mocks & our grades/results are not looking good.
01:13:37 Anna Grainger: We have set up Coventry City of Languages and in the process of making it a charity so we hope we can get funding to improve it locally.
01:14:07 AFLeeds: Students disheartened by the difficulty of the subject.
01:14:12 Crista Hazell: Interestingly funding and support is available from the Goethe Institut and UK German Connection so anyone interested in engaging or restarting up German so warm up areas of the UK could look in to that. https://www.goethe.de/ins/gb/en/sta/lon.html and https://ukgermanconnection.org/
01:14:19 Anna Grainger: The big problem with PMFL is that Senior Leaders don’t understand it – how to teach it or its importance – I say that a lot to headteachers and at HT meetings!!!!
01:14:30 Anna Grainger: Not been sacked – yet!
01:14:44 Crista Hazell: Anna that’s amazing! Well done that is something to celebrate.
01:15:33 Jean: What’s the deadline? Sorry I arrived late.
01:15:47 Anna Grainger: We have had meetings with people in other areas too who want to replicate it. If anyone is in Leeds or somewhere else that I’ve forgotten, then I can put you in touch.
01:16:08 Anna Grainger: Manchester have set themselves up too as City of Languages
01:16:19 laura d: Can you put the link again please? I have missed the first part of the webinar, sorry.
01:16:27 Vicky Gough: and Newcastle have a festival of Languages !
01:16:34 Elizabeth Lord: We have such a golden opportunity to sow the seeds of language learning and encourage cultural curiosity in KS2 – view the language learning journey as starting in Year 3, or younger. Can’t help feeling this is where we should be focusing our efforts.
01:16:37 Crista Hazell: You can forward this to ALLNet Special colleagues which Ian has approved! https://mailchi.mp/all-languages.org.uk/all-british-council-language-trends-2022?e=9ae7e0ea04
01:16:52 Anna Grainger: Yes, and I can’t for the life of me remember who the other university was that we met with
01:16:54 Joe Mehrabian: languagetrends@qub.ac.uk
01:17:31 Joe Mehrabian: thank you so much v informative
01:17:35 Elizabeth Lord: Very informative and lovely to be in a languages community – thank you!
01:17:39 Silvia Bastow: Thank you very much
01:17:39 Joe Mehrabian: appreciated
01:17:44 AFLeeds: MERCI!!!
01:17:45 Jean: Thank you.