Modern Foreign Languages

'Studying a foreign language opens up new worlds and helps you to appreciate other languages, countries, cultures and communities.  Exposure to music, films, food, festivals and literature are all integral parts of language learning, as well as trips and visits.  We live in an increasingly global environment, which we need to be able to access through openness and understanding.

Opportunities are provided for some Key Stage 3 learners to learn Chinese as well as French. Our Chinese Whispers Choir, organised by the Confucius Institute at Hull University, practises weekly and participates in performances, as well as national and international competitions.' 

^{Miss V Brownlee, Head of Languages}

 Learning a foreign language is a liberation from insularity and provides an opening to other cultures. A high-quality languages education should foster students’ curiosity and deepen their understanding of the world. The teaching should enable students 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 students to study and work in other countries. Adapted from National Curriculum, DfE, 2013.

At Howden School we aim “to broaden horizons and to ensure learners can produce and understand languages quickly” - Dr Gianfranco Conti

We will empower all our students to develop a global perspective. We provide the language skills, cultural knowledge and understanding to enrich our students’ experience and to provide global opportunities, such as our Chinese cultural competitions, choir and events. We aim to foster a lifelong passion for other languages and cultures and an appreciation of diversity.

The Howden School curriculum for modern foreign languages aims to ensure that all students:

• 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
• Read aloud with authentic pronunciation and accurate use of sounds-spelling correspondences
• 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.

Key Stage 3 Curriculum

Key Stage 4 Curriculum