Thank you for visiting this website!
My name is Claire and I am a languages teacher in Derbyshire (currently Head of German and teacher of Spanish in an 11-18 comprehensive school). I have also recently worked as an educational consultant and writer for BBC Bitesize (KS3 German) and have delivered some CPD webinars on the topics of technology for MFL and motivation/culture. Please do get in touch if you have any questions!
My name is Claire and I am a languages teacher in Derbyshire (currently Head of German and teacher of Spanish in an 11-18 comprehensive school). I have also recently worked as an educational consultant and writer for BBC Bitesize (KS3 German) and have delivered some CPD webinars on the topics of technology for MFL and motivation/culture. Please do get in touch if you have any questions!
Twitter @LeoLanguages Instagram @_leolanguages
CPD
Here is a list of some work I have been involved in:
Linguascope Show & Tell Webinar: A starter (quatschen) and plenary (poker).
Linguascope were amazing over lockdown, providing a series of free webinars with some amazing speakers! I have pages and pages of notes and ideas from these brilliant presentations! For their first show and tell, I decided to submit an idea and I was then selected to give a five minute presentation on two of my favourite low prep ideas 'quatschen' and 'poker.'
All webinars can be accessed via the Staffroom section of the Linguascope website
All webinars can be accessed via the Staffroom section of the Linguascope website
TiLT webinar: Interactivity, Creativity & Community. Websites and Ed-tech ideas for remote learning and beyond.
In this webinar I shared some of my favourite interactive websites such as live worksheets.com and class tools.net and also talked about how I have used bitmoji and canva to create more attractive resources. I also shared how I store my resources.
Motivated Classroom Podcast by Liam Printer
Thank you to Liam of The Motivated Classroom Podcast for mentioning me and the 'pointless' quick-win in ep 6 about Retrieval Practice. If you haven't checked out this brilliant podcast, then please do! An absolute must for languages teachers!
Top MFL blogs by Sanako
I was delighted that my website got a mention in a Sanako top MFL blogs by languages teachers article (Aug 2020) after only just starting up. So glad some of my tips have been useful!
MFL icons teachmeet webinar
We were treated to a fantastic morning of free CPD courtesy of TM MFL icons on Saturday 26th September. Three hours of excellent speakers and lots of ideas to take away. I had a quick five minute slot to discuss a couple of my current favourite 'quick wins.' I also shared a slide with a few low prep 'do nows' or plenaries which people seem to have found quite useful. Check out the slide here and also my 'quick wins' page which I update weekly.
BBC BitesizeOver the last 18 months, I've been very proud to work on a few projects for BBC Bitesize KS3 German. In April 2020, the new KS3 German online content went live, for which I wrote a lot of the grammar and topic articles, as well as the interactive quizzes.
During lockdown, I also prepared a series of lessons for Bitesize Daily on iPlayer, presented by Radio 1 DJ, Katie Thistleton. It was really exciting working with the scriptwriter and then seeing my lessons 'taught' on the TV. The most recent Bitesize project which I've worked on is the new KS3 game FestiLingo which went live in September 2020. |
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Teacher Planning Podcast
Earlier in the year, I was asked by Rob at the Teacher Planning Podcast to record a Podcast on a successful MFL lesson. I found this quite tricky to think of as MFL teaching is quite unique in that lessons tend to include a variety of activities, lots of pace and can often go off on an unexpected tangent! I decided to share a lesson plan I have used over and over again and one which helps students include detail in a piece of writing. I have been observed a few times using this lesson (for both performance management and twice by OFSTED and it has always achieved good feedback). I call it Colour-Coded writing as students analyse a reading text with AVOCADO and then have a go at writing their own. It involves modelling and scaffolding which in turn helps students see what a good one looks like. Search for the Teacher Planning Podcast on various platforms to have a listen to how it plays out.
Linguascope #teachlang conference 2021
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Thanks to @BotonesSalgado for the image taken from Twitter
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I had the absolute honour of presenting at the 2021 Teach Languages conference (online) alongside the inspiring Dannielle Warren (@morganmfl), Crista Hazel (@CristaHazel) and Paula Mourelle (@PMourelleMFL) on a topic I am extremely passionate about: Motivation in MFL! Thank you to anyone who came along and if you would like to catch up, you can access all of the recorded presentations in the Linguascope Staffroom or by downloading the Linguascope Webinar app.
Instagram Live with Kate Jones
My first ever Instagram Live was with Kate Jones @Katelanguages and we chatted for an hour all about lesson planning, sharing good practice, motivation and culture. I am a big believer that planning should involve more time thinking about the intent of the lesson and what you want students to achieve, rather than creating all resources from scratch. Here I talk about using pre-made resources as a starting point and how the teacher really is the BEST resource in a classroom. We also shared a few strategies on how to best engage and motivate learners and how to introduce culture into lessons. Have a listen - it is saved on @katelanguages IGTV!
ALL Language World online conference
I was humbled to present a workshop at the 2021 Language World conference for ALL. Having attended many ALL seminars in Sheffield and also Language World in the past, it was wonderful to be part of it this year, albeit remotely. My session was called 'Turn that frown upside down' and I focussed on motivation and uptake. What can we do as teachers, departments and also school-wide to promote our subject and get more students learning languages beyond KS3?
