MFL at Rugby High School

MFL Department Vision Statement

The aim of the RHS MFL curriculum is for students to develop a life-long love of languages. Our curriculum is designed to ignite in students an interest and enthusiasm that will lead them to be confident communicators who understand the importance and practical value of speaking a foreign language.

In lessons our students are exposed to the target language and are encouraged to use it themselves as much as possible. We focus on developing an understanding of the culture in the countries where the language is spoken, as well as the skills to be proficient language learners. We want to develop our students’ confidence to take risks and express themselves creatively and spontaneously, as well as their independence and resilience when faced with challenges.

Our shared goal is for students to experience and feel the sense of achievement and joy that comes from being able to communicate in another language - whether one that they are learning now or in the future – and that language learning equips us with a practical skill that truly enriches your life.

Year 7 Spanish

Course content:

• Introducing themselves
• Understanding instructions
• Say what colour something is
• Say what subjects they study
• Count up to 20
• Look and listen for cognates and clues to help them understand authentic texts
• Use key Spanish sounds (ll, ñ, j)
• Talk and write about their teachers and school subjects and give their opinions of them
• Talk and write about their family and pets
• Recognise numbers up to 100
• Look up new words and be able to understand whether nouns are masculine or feminine
• Hold a conversation about themselves and their family
• Understand a wide range of questions
• Use their ICT skills to describe their home and their bedroom
• Use infinitives after opinions

Assessment:

Autumn term - Baseline assessment: reading and writing skills

Spring term - Grammar assessment

Summer term - General conversation assessment

Year 8 Spanish

Course content:

• Describing themselves and others, both personality and physical description
• Describing clothes and school uniform
• Describing pets
• Talk about the Christmas traditions in Spain
• Talk about New Year traditions in Spain
• Talk about countries and nationalities
• Invite people out, respond to invitations and give excuses
• Talk about different places in a town
• Talk about Easter traditions in Spain
• Ask for and give basic directions
• Talk about Barcelona
• Write an extended text about holidays, referring to the past, present and future
• Speak in detail about holidays
• Talk and write about past events using the Preterite Tense

Assessment: 

Autumn term - Reading and listening assessment

Spring term - Writing and translation assessment

Summer term - Speaking assessment

Year 9 Spanish

Course content:

• Talk about people’s jobs
• Talk about future plans using the Near Future Tense and Conditional (would like to)
• Ask questions using a range of time frames
• Write an extended text about work to include the past, present and future
• Express opinions in the past, present and future
• Write an extended text about jobs using a wider range of vocabulary
• Talk about food and drink
• Give opinions about sports
• Tell the time
• Talk about their daily routine
• Talk about the key features of Easter in Spain and in Latin America
• Discuss children’s rights
• Express opinions about the lack of some children’s rights
• Discuss workers’ conditions

Assessment:

Autumn term - Written assessment using three time-frames

Spring term - Speaking assessment using three time-frames

Summer term - Listening, reading, translation from English into Spanish and from Spanish into English

GCSE Spanish

Introduction to the subject at GCSE

The GCSE examination assesses all four skills equally: listening, reading, speaking and writing, and exams are taken at the end of Year 11. Most importantly, through the GCSE you will develop your ability to speak spontaneously and with confidence and will learn to write on a variety of topics, building on the grammatical knowledge you have gained during KS3.

Why choose this subject for GCSE?

With the global nature of holiday travel, business and industry and the shortage of language skills in the UK, it has never been more important to have a sound knowledge, understanding and confidence in another language. A Modern Language is a useful and relevant option, highly valued by employers, and studying Spanish at GCSE will equip you with the necessary skills to learn other languages with ease in the future.

We aim to make your language lessons fun, interesting and relevant, and to equip you with useful, lifelong, practical skills which will be of benefit to you whenever you travel and wherever your chosen career takes you.

Course content:

The topics you will study are organised into three main themes and include the use of technology and social media, music and cinema, lifestyle and global issues.

Assessment: 

The GCSE examination assesses all four skills equally - listening, reading, speaking and writing exams are taken at the end of Year 11.