La Jolie Ronde Spanish Scheme of Work for Years 3 and 4

classroom use

Context

I evaluated this product in two small schools, each with mixed-age Key Stage 2 classes (Years 3-6). A few pupils had had a limited prior contact with Spanish in a holiday context, but none of the children had previously been taught Spanish. One class is accustomed to modern foreign language teaching as French has been timetabled for the past two years. In the other class, a handful of the pupils attend an after-school French club. However, as both schools are English-medium primary schools in Wales, all pupils are used to second language learning through their Welsh lessons and consequently have few anxieties about speaking their non-hearth language in front of their peers. The children have respect for and an interest in the concept of speaking other languages, as we call the register in over twenty languages and sometimes learn songs from around the world.

Most of the children involved in the evaluation are of average or below-average ability. In one class, two thirds of the pupils are girls, in the other, 65% are boys, so I was able to make some observations about whether the lessons appealed more to one gender or another (interestingly, the boys remained as enthusiastic as the girls, even after a few lessons).

I used the scheme on an interactive whiteboard with each class twice-weekly, in fifteen minute sessions, over a period of 7 weeks. I also allowed the resources to be used on classroom PCs as a reward activity by individuals and pairs/small groups. We also used some of the activities in our after-school French club to ensure that I had observed my pupils working with as much of the product as was possible during the evaluation period. On one memorable occasion, when the Scheme was fortuitously in my bag when I needed to take the whole school one morning in an emergency, all the children aged 3–11 were delighted to spend time together learning the months of the year in Spanish and using the interactive resources on this lesson on the whiteboard.

The Scheme is designed so that it can be taught for an hour a week, or in two thirty minute slots per fortnight, or in two fifteen minute lessons per week. I decided to use the Scheme in two fifteen minute sessions per week, as I felt that this shorter length suited the concentration level of my pupils, as well as ensuring that I could undertake the evaluation without disturbing the normal timetable too much.

Student Response

When I explained that we were going to be studying Spanish for a few weeks, the pupils who currently learned French with me were all enthusiastic, whereas some of the others had reservations about whether they would enjoy the project. However, even those pupils who had initial reservations were soon joining in the activities enthusiastically. I feel that this was due to the variety of activities on offer and the fact that we could use the interactive whiteboard to present them; this raised motivation. Also, the way in which the scheme introduces and consolidates new learning allowed the children to become confident and raised their self-esteem. I was interested to observe that some of the children who had initially been less enthusiastic about trialling the product chose to use it on their own as a reward activity upon completion of their work.

I noted during the various lessons that the children concentrated well and worked productively. This seemed to be due both to the quality of the presentation and resources and to the fact that each lesson was short and well-paced. In the school where the children are taught French in curriculum time, I feel that their progress in Spanish using this resource was quicker than their progress in French for similar learning goals, where they use home-made resources. Having the opportunity to trial La Jolie Ronde’s Spanish Scheme of Work has caused me to re-evaluate my teaching of modern foreign languages.

On the occasion when the whole school (small numbers but large age range!) was involved in using the Year 3 activities relating to the months of the year, the children really enjoyed using click and drag to produce a bar chart of their birthday months. A feature that particularly pleased them was being able to choose their own colour to represent their birthday, and this encouraged them to fulfil the secondary object of the task, which was to review their learning of colour words. I was pleased to note that the next activity, which was a pelmanism game, promoted co-operative skills for it led to them making suggestions and encouraging each other. So engrossed were the children, that we were five minutes late to go in for dinner by the time we looked at the clock.

Often, boys are reluctant to learn a foreign language; I only have one boy in my French club, for instance. I noted that the boys in my class soon became enthusiastic participants in the Spanish lessons. I suspect that this is partly explained by the integration of the interactive whiteboard into these lessons, and partly by the use of a male singer in some of the songs – he certainly made Spanish seem very masculine to speak!

Personalisation

A strength of the product is that pupils can access many of the activities alone or with a friend. This is valuable for those children who find it difficult to learn at the same rate as the majority of the class (they can reinforce pronunciation and vocabulary learning at their own pace following the class teaching), or for those who are particularly keen and want to practise more.

One of the pupils involved in the evaluation is profoundly deaf. She found the visual clues on the whiteboard activities were supportive in ensuring she accessed the lessons, and the clear diction and repetition were particularly beneficial to her.

IWB Suitability

The integration of the interactive whiteboard into the teaching of Spanish was a huge success in engaging the pupils right from the start. The very first lesson involved reinforcing the learning of numbers through interactive activities. We had great fun in dragging a simple sum written in red, from a blue column into a yellow column so that the answer, written in blue, could be revealed. My pupils were really engaged by this, and it encouraged them to verbalise the numbers. The activities are appealing to the targetted age group and instrumental in engaging the boys. As the activities are varied they kept the interest of the children. I found that the less able pupils were encouraged to maintain concentration in the lessons as a result of the high quality of the interactive activities, and that they retained what they had learned. The interactive whiteboard resources helped to focus attention on the learning objectives. As I teach French without the benefit of such interactive whiteboard resources, I can confidently state that progression in Spanish was aided by the provision of these resources on the interactive whiteboard. Pupils progressed much more quickly, and retained their learning more thoroughly in the Spanish sessions than I am accustomed to seeing in their French lessons, even though I use similar strategies (repetition, singing, flashcards, etc.) in French but without the use of the whiteboard.

Navigation of the learning activities is straightforward using pen or traditional mouse. Our preference in class is to use a mouse, so the children did not find the height of the board a problem in the click and drag activities. The resources help to encourage discussion, calling out as a group and co-operation in coming up with an answer. They also help to progressively develop reading skills in Spanish as pupils move through the units.

While the resources are designed for whole class teaching on the interactive whiteboard, they are also accessible to children to use as individuals or pairs on a PC, to consolidate learning or just to have fun.

The inclusion of resources and activities for the interactive whiteboard are another positive aspect of la Jolie Ronde Scheme of Work for Spanish, and these help to motivate children and to help them consolidate and retain their learning.

Assessment and pupil tracking opportunities

Although the software does not set out to be an assessment tool, teachers can use observation of contributions to the class lessons and collaboration on activities on the interactive whiteboard to assess progress and inform future planning.

To aid those schools which want to accredit the achievements of pupils using OCR’s Asset Languages, the Scheme of Work contains material to cover the requirements for Breakthrough Level External Assessment. Lists are provided in to match the content of Asset Languages to the Scheme.