Papplewick School Language Conference

On Wednesday 22nd February, the Language department at Papplewick school hosted its annual conference under the banner of sharing good practice. The conference called ‘Language skills in a modern school: sharing good practice’ brought together teachers from both the prep and independent school sectors.

Attendees (from Pangbourne College, West Hill Park School, Hall Grove, Charterhouse, Caldicott School, Lockers Park, Thorngrove School, Brockhurst and Marlston House, Hoe Bridge School. Amesbury School, Durand Academy Boarding School, Dragon School, Hampton School, Ashdown School, Bishopsgate School and Fulham Prep) spent most of the days discussing and applying to bring good impact in their classes.

Delegates took part in 4 workshops:

Maïmouna Cissé, Head of MFL, presented “Reinforcing sentence structure and
complex grammar rules”
Jeremy Ward “Using target language from the start”
Laëtitia Langue “Using games to embed speaking and writing skills”
James Smith, CEO of Schoolshape, presented CloudCaster and CloudWriter

The school is equipped with a language laboratory as well as iPads constantly used for the delivery of the 4 Modern Foreign Language skills (reading, writing, speaking and listening). The MFL department teachers hosted each a workshop aimed at covering the various aspects of the language skills in the classroom and the best ways of implementing them. Throughout the day, teachers engaged into workshops ranging from instilling the use of target language from the start to using interactive games and activities to challenge speaking and writing in the classroom. Delegates also shared tips on the various ways of supporting their students and much focus was spent on lesson tips with starters and plenaries as well as useful websites.

A session in the afternoon was also dedicated to working together on Schoolshape Language Laboratory which is especially effective in supporting mobile assisted language learning as well as teaching with the communicative method.