With the impact of Covid-19 and the absence of trips abroad, our MFL department has been finding new ways to encourage our linguists to use their languages with a number of new initiatives this term.

Our Spanish department is giving girls the opportunity to join Spellian, an innovative online language conversation exchange programme designed for students studying Spanish at GCSE / A level. Participating students will be paired with a Spanish student from a school in Barcelona and will have weekly conversations online to practise their Spanish listening and speaking skills with a native speaker.

Spellian conversations are done from home, by video conference, using the Spellian online platform. Each session follows specially designed resources to keep it instructive (ensuring the use of a broad range of vocabulary, expressions, and verb tenses), meaningful (based on the GCSE/A level syllabus) and fun. Each conversation lasts around 20 minutes, with half of the time spent speaking in Spanish and half in English. 　

In a continuation of our German language collaboration with Greenford High School, our German A Level students met up virtually with their Greenford counterparts this week. Aiming to encourage German speaking outside the classroom, the group enjoyed discussions, debate and games, including a scavenger hunt – all in German!

The German department has decided to offer students an ‘in-house’ conversation exchange experience by partnering up with the Helmholtz Gymnasium in Karlsruhe, Germany, a co-educational secondary school with an attached Sixth Form and specialisms in Music, Languages and Science (helmholtz-karlsruhe.de). Starting with our Y9 classes, student’s participation has been phenomenal with 98% participation. Students are matched-up by Frau Schindler-Smith with a German counterpart in Karlsruhe. Students are busy emailing each other and writing about their everyday life, learning German and teaching English at the same time. The partnership has had great feedback already from pupils and parents and we are already in the process of rolling this out to other year groups – watch this space! 

The French department is launching a series of similar opportunities. A penpal exchange programme is in the making with Year 8 – we are all excited about the imminent launch and exchange of letters or postcards with French students from our partner school Jean Baptiste Say in Paris (XVIeme arrondissement). This exchange is aimed at boosting the girls’ confidence and giving them a sense of purpose. They will be able to use everything they have learnt in French in a meaningful way. This is something that has proven very successful and enjoyable in the past.