Intent

Learning a foreign language is a necessary part of being a member of a multi-cultural society and provides an opening to other cultures. A high-quality languages education should foster children’s curiosity and deepen their understanding of the world. The teaching should enable children to express their ideas and thoughts in another language and to understand and respond to its speakers, both in speech and in writing. It should also provide opportunities for them to communicate for practical purposes, learn new ways of thinking and read great literature in the original language. Language teaching should provide the foundation for learning further languages, equipping children to study and work in other countries.

The National Curriculum for languages aims to ensure that all pupils:

• understand and respond to spoken and written language from a variety of authentic sources
• speak with increasing confidence, fluency and spontaneity, finding ways of communicating what they want to say, including through discussion and asking questions, and continually improving the accuracy of their pronunciation and intonation
• can write at varying length, for different purposes and audiences, using the variety of grammatical structures that they have learnt
• discover and develop an appreciation of a range of writing in the language studied.

It is intended that when children leave Heathrow Primary, they will have a natural curiosity and confidence to explore, other countries, cultures and languages, accepting that, in a multi-lingual society it is a valuable skill to be able to communicate effectively with others in another language. They will be engaged and prepared to continue language learning at secondary school.

Implementation 

At Heathrow Primary School, children have weekly lessons in French throughout Key Stage 2, using the resources and units of work from LGFL’s Rigolo scheme, in addition to other resources. 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. Children progressively acquire, use and apply a growing bank of vocabulary organised around topics, which include: greetings, numbers, a day at school, animals, food, times, days of the week, weekend activities and celebrations. Children are encouraged and supported to develop their speaking and listening skills through conversational work, singing activities and games.

Impact 

We measure the impact of our curriculum through the following methods:

• Observing children speaking and listening in another language.
• Marking of written work
• Interviewing the pupils about their learning (pupil voice)
• Learning walks
• Scrutinising books from across the school for consistency and continuous progress.

At Heathrow Primary School the development of French language skills will encourage our students to pursue an interest in other cultures and will expand their desire to travel and engage with other global languages. Children will learn empathy for those working to learn a new language within our school community and work collectively to hone their Speaking and Listening skills.