Languages Discovery Day 2024

Year 10 Language Leaders run 144 workshops for primary school pupils

On Tuesday 4th June, the BHGS Modern Foreign Languages Faculty held its annual Languages Discovery Day which was delivered by 64 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 20 different languages from all around the world reflecting our diverse heritages at the school. Also included were special workshops in Flamenco dance, Cyphers, British Sign Language and Egyptian hieroglyphs. The day was divided in 27 workshops with different language and cultural foci, with 9 sessions for the 16 groups of primary pupils.

Ileri A who had run an activity to share her Yoruba heritage stated: “I enjoyed making the students smile and this experience has enlightened a passion in me, even though it may not have been down my chosen career path. I also enjoyed teaching the pupils about my culture as they may not be taught it again.”

Maryam W said: “This was a first-time experience in teaching for me, and at first, I felt uneasy and unsure about how this was going to turn out. We played a short game of French ‘Guess who’ and I was filled with doubts about whether the children would actually enjoy the game or not. These doubts were cleared by the children themselves who told me they loved the game and wanted to play longer. I excitedly await the next visit, and I have many ideas of new language games to play with them.”

 

One of the local primary schools commented: ” Thank you so much to you, your staff and your Year 10 students for organising such a wonderful languages day on Tuesday. Our Year 4 children thoroughly enjoyed the activities throughout the day, which were managed so well and so enthusiastically by your students. Our children certainly came away with a greater awareness of the many different languages that are spoken around the world. ”

By all accounts the day was a great success. Special praise is due to our Young Leaders for their infectious enthusiasm which gave the event a great buzz and celebrated the rich cultural and linguistic diversity of our school!

R J Taylor, Head of Languages Faculty