John Bald/language and literacy

Clicker 6 BETT Award winner and new ipad app

Cricksoft  has deservedly won yet another award from the annual BETT technology show for the latest version of Clicker, Clicker 6. (click on pic to enlarge)

Left to right, Ian Moore, Comedian and host, Ann Crick, John Crick, Andrew Burt – Technical Development Manager, Carl Vasey – Technical Support and Testing Manager, Philippa Forrester, TV presenter and host.

Many congratulations to all at Cricksoft for their wonderful contribution to education. Clicker, as regular readers of this site will know, is in my view a work of genius, and a unique bridge between written and spoken language. The latest development is an ipad app that will allow children to practise on their ipads using grids made by the teacher and "exported", via dropbox, which is installed on the home and user devices, and which offers 2gb of free storage. This does not have the full scope of the main program, but could still be useful. The cost is £15 for the sentence builder, but half price for multiple purchases by schools. Clicker was designed for use with English speakers, and is a wonderful tool for teaching the early stages of English as an additional language. This award was for special needs, but Clicker's applications extend well beyond this area. A very important development that makes me glad I bought a mini ipad. 

Oxford and Languages: Sir Robert Taylor Society

The Sir Robert Taylor Society exists to promote outreach work from Oxford University, particularly to secondary teachers. The website offers online lectures in French, German, Russian and Spanish, and links to a much wider range of contributions. The President, Dr Helen Swift, is speaking at the Wellington College conference listed below.

Snowed in.

My regular Saturday pupil's parent has lost her voice to a bug, and his school, needless to say, is closed. Needlessly too, in my view, but we won't go into that.

So, we go over the bits and pieces of tables that he is still not sure of, and he reads me the answers he's written to Susan Elkin's comprehension questions, with his mum pointing out any errors. He has misspelled business on his last school spelling test, so we discuss busy, easy, and the position of a y at the end of English words, where the downstroke helps to emphasise the end of the word. We discuss the idea of y as a "Greek i" - igrec in French - and how it often occurs near the beginning of words of Greek origin. My pupil is good at PE, so we use physical, physics, physique, which takes us into the French letter group  que  and the fact that old French did not have k in its alphabet.  The idea that la queue, a tail, gives us queue causes some amusement. We keep flashing back to the tables, in a way that amuses my pupil, as he has learned what questions I'm likely to ask, and so can defeat me by knowing the answers in advance. Curses. We read a little from The Way Things Work. A light touch for a Saturday morning, and a request to practise subtraction over the week. 

Lesson 2 is long distance, by telephone, with a bright Y11 pupil from a private school who is having trouble with spelling and French, but not with much else. The main problem is inserting extra letters, which is probably out of anxiety and wanting to do her very best. With her mother sitting in via a speaker phone, we go through Slimmed Down Spelling, in relation to errors in her own work - the teacher marks these consistently, and she averages between five and ten errors per A4 page - and give her a strategy to apply for nex time. Unsurprisingly, she gets virtually everything right first time. An email thanking me arrives next morning from the friend who referred her - "They are buzzing..." 

Association for Language Learning, Language World, 22-23 March

Language world is at Nottingham Trent University. I'll be speaking on the theme "Turning the key - using grammar to unlock languages for adult learners" on the Saturday morning.  

Modern Languages Conference, Wellington College, 25th February.

 

Conference:  "Rethinking Modern Foreign Languages Teaching for the 21st Century"  A conference hosted by Wellington College with The Holt School. Venue: Wellington College Date: Monday 25 February 2013. - 09:20 - 16:00  Price: £70 per delegate   Why attend this conference: The teaching of Modern Foreign Languages appears to face a more serious crisis than at any time in the history of British education. As declining numbers of students opt for MFL at Sixth Form,  what are the implications for schools, universities, employers, and Britain's place in the world?  Will the British be unable to communicate with our European neighbours? Or is the real story to be found in the growth of interest in languages connected to rising economic powers - such as China and Brazil - or areas of political and strategic sensitivity, such as the Middle East?  Does the rise of online translation tools make the learning of languages redundant ?  Is the future of MFL be found in the innovative research and teaching of Britain's best universities and schools?  And what practical strategies can be employed in your own schools to reverse the trend of declining uptake? An opportunity to discuss these questions with speakers including: Professor Antonella Sorace (University of Edinburgh), Professor Suzanne Graham (Reading University), Dr Helen Swift (Oxford University ) and educational consultant and writer, John Bald.  There will also be an opportunity to take part in a Mandarin class, and observe a range of innovative MFL lessons. Other speakers to be confirmed. Speakers include:  Professor Antonella Sorace (University of Edinburgh) Professor Suzanne Graham (University of Reading) Dr Helen Swift (University of Oxford) John Bald, Educational Consultant and writer  Who should attend:  A conference for MFL subject leaders and teachers; Directors of Studies; leaders of schools and colleges with languages specialisms; education journalists; academics, anyone with an interest in the future of MFL. Delegate Fee:  £70.00 per delegate, to include refreshments at registration, mid-morning coffee break and lunch. Agenda:   This will be updated as other speakers are confirmed.  Contact:   If you have any queries - please contact the Conference Organiser at [email protected] or call 01344 444085

To Register:   Once you have read this page please press on the REGISTER button above.

Venue:   Wellington College, Crowthorne, Berks, RG45 7PU.   Please click on the location/map tab at the top of this page for full directions. Please note the SAT NAV post code to follow to bring you to the front gates is:   RG45 6DY

 

 

FrenchTeacher.net

A lively and colourful website, with lots of clearly designed resources and a very reasonable subscription at £20 pa. Well worth checking out, here.  Lots of Spanish resources too. 

 

BLEN last call.

Good people speaking on this conference, and better value than most of the competition. Click on poster to enlarge.

Interlude: Honest John

This Honest John is a motoring correspondent for the Telegraph, who tells us things manufacturers don't want us to know. Here is a list of recent questions. John probably stays honest because it's his living - unfortunately, some dealers are not honest because they find it more profitable. I drive a Mondeo, and strongly recommend Marshalls of Cambridge as honest dealers.