Devon Regional Support Group

Coordinator: Chris Wakely, Devon Curriculum Services, Great Moor House, Bittern Road, Sowton, Exeter, Devon EX2 7NL
Tel: 01392 384361  
Email: cwakely@devon.gov.uk

Regular sessions are held at two parallel groups; one covering schools in the south and west of the area (including Torbay) and one in the north and east.

Date: 20/11/2007
Title: Using Music to Teach Primary Languages
Venue: The Parkway Inn, Sampford Peverell
Time: 14:00 - 16:00
Speaker: Lead Teachers

The session was led jointly by Lyn Brimson, AST and KS1 teacher from Ashleigh CofE Primary School, Barnstaple and Helen Morrison, lead teacher working in mid-Devon primary schools. Helen opened the meeting with a warm-up routine taken from Take 10 en français, a new resource developed by her with Devon LA integrating PE and French. Lyn ran a practical workshop showing how music can be linked not only to languages, but also to art, PE and even S.E.A.L objectives. Examples were also shown from the Training Zone website. The session finished with a discussion and sharing of resources linked to Christmas celebrations. The session was very successful; 100% of the participants rated it "very good"!

Date: 21/11/2007
Title: Using Music to Teach Primary Languages
Venue: Ivybridge Community College
Time: 14:00 - 16:00
Speaker: Lead Teachers

The session was led jointly by Maggie Peacock, Lead Teacher and KS2 teacher from Milton Abbot Primary School, Jo Rhys-Jones, AST/Lead Teacher from Kingswear Primary and Graeme Hankin, Lead Teacher working in Bradley Barton Primary School. Graeme opened the meeting with a discussion and sharing of resources linked to Christmas celebrations. Maggie ran a practical workshop showing how music can be linked not only to languages, but also to art and PE objectives. Examples were also shown from the Training Zone website. The session finished with a warm-up routine taken from Take 10 en français, a new resource developed by Devon LA integrating PE and French. The session was very successful with all the participants very positive in their evaluations.

Date: 26/03/2008
Title: A Year of Celebrations and Traditions
Venue: Ivybridge Community College
Time: 2.00 - 4.00
Speaker: Maggie Peacock

The focus of the RSG was "A Calendar of French Festivals". 10 delegates attended across the two Devon groups. Teachers were taken through the year month by month with key festivals and celebrations explained and exemplified. There were ample opportunities for delegates to contribute their own ideas and experiences of celebrations in school and of experiences abroad as well as joining in with songs and games for particular festivals.
Ideas for a whole school event on Bastille Day were also explored. Delegates were shown key pages, resources and video clips on the Nacell and Training Zone websites and were also introduced to the Devon Languages pages of recommended websites on del.icio.us. All evaluations were "good" or "very good" and delegates also responded positively verbally and are looking forward to the summer session.

Date: 27/03/2008
Title: A Year of Celebrations and Traditions
Venue: The Parkway Inn, Sampford Peverell
Time: 2.00 - 4.00
Speaker: Helen Morrison

See above for report

Date: 08/07/2008
Title: Using Football as a Theme in MFL Teaching
Venue: Ivybridge Community College
Time: 14:00 - 16:00

This Regional Support Group looked at football as a theme to use in MFL teaching. Resources used in a Euro 08 project were available and lots of cross-curricular links that use football as a theme to motivate and facilitate language learning. Participants shared resources and ideas and looked at active learning examples on the Learning Zone website. The session was run by Devon lead teachers for primary languages and was well received.

Date: 09/07/2008
Title: Using Football as a Theme in MFL Teaching
Venue: Tiverton Hotel
Time: 14:00 - 16:00

Report as above

NACELL Regional Support Groups are funded by the DCSF and co-ordinated by CILT, the National Centre for Languages in support of the National Languages Strategy.