From Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphs, Beowulf, Secret Codes and Sign Language to Languages from every corner of the globe.

On Tuesday 3th June, the Bishop’s Modern Foreign Languages faculty held its eighth Languages Discovery Day which was delivered by 66 Year 10 Young MFL Leaders who shared their cultures, languages and linguistic interests with 120 Key Stage 2 boys and girls from Oak View and St Philip Howard RC Primary Schools.

The primary school pupils had the opportunity to experience 16 different languages from all around the world reflecting our diverse heritages at the school. Also included were special workshops in Greek dance, Cyphers, British Sign Language, Old English and Egyptian hieroglyphs. The day was divided in 24 workshops with different language and cultural foci. By all accounts the day was a great success. Special praise is due to the Young Leaders for their infectious enthusiasm which gave the event such a buzz and celebrated the rich cultural and linguistic diversity of our school!

Holly N said: ” The Young MFL Leader’s role was a character-building experience, as I had to work in a group and thoughtfully develop a workshop to teach a language and also make it fun, which required a lot of planning and consideration. We also had to adapt to the needs and attitudes of different children to make the experience exciting for everyone. My group taught Old English through pointing out the differences between the modern and Old English alphabet then telling the story of Beowulf, the first story ever written down in Old English and acting it out to create a more thrilling experience. We then finally got the children to work together using their new knowledge of Old English to spell certain words. I feel this was a great experience for not only us, but also for the children who got to be exposed to a range over different languages all over the world through fun and engaging activities, which brought a sense of joy to language-learning and open doors in the future and I am so glad I was able to take part in this experience.”

Katie R found the Languages Discovery Day really exciting and a fun experience with her friends. “My group did a variation of “Guess Who” in Polish, focusing on pronunciation. I think it was really good for the children to get an experience coming to another school, especially as I never really got the opportunity to do events like this when I was in primary school. I hope the children enjoyed it as much as I did. I am very grateful I was able to be a part of this day, and really loved the fact that when groups did not have a lesson scheduled, we were able to look at the other groups in different classrooms – It made it a lot more enjoyable to see what my friends were doing too and them watch mine!”

Mr R J Taylor, Head of Languages Faculty