Welcome to Modern Foreign Languages Dept...

Bonjour!     Hola!     Guten Tag!

 Every student at Shirley High School learns French. At the end of Year 8, students can choose to learn Spanish in addition to French. The majority of students will take a GCSE in French and some will take a GCSE in Spanish as well.

There are five language teachers:

Miss Thomas (French, German, Spanish and Head of Department)

Mrs Newland (French and German and 2^nd in Department)

Mrs Nagra (French)

Miss Collins (French, German and Spanish)

Miss Pater (French and German)

We also have a French Assistant, called Pascale, who helps students mainly at Key Stage 4 as well as running the Year 7 French lunch-time club (see the photos below) and revision classes for Year 11 students.

 In December 2008, GCSE students studying German went on a day trip to visit the historic town of Aachen in Germany and its wonderful Christmas market.  (See photos)

In February 2009, students in Year 10 studying German saw a production in German called ‘Nichts zum Anziehen’ and in June 2009, students in Year 10 studying French saw a production in French called ‘Cache – Cache’ from the Onatti theatre group,. (See the review)

The department offers two main language websites for fun activities (ask a language teacher for the relevant usernames and passwords):

www.atantot.com/

www.linguascope.com/

Why should you learn other languages?

Anyone who has told you that learning another language is impractical, unrewarding, or simply a waste of your precious time, is doing you a great disservice. Take advantage and enhance your life ... learn a language!

Learning a language can broaden your employment opportunities, increase your educational options, and even make you smarter.  

Research shows that knowledge of other languages boosts students' understanding of languages in general and enables students to use their native language more effectively. This applies to specific language skills as well as overall linguistic abilities. Foreign language learners have stronger vocabulary skills in English, a better understanding of the language, and improved literacy in general. Higher reading achievement in the native language as well as enhanced listening skills and memory have been shown to correlate with extended foreign language study.

Also, schools and employers tend to prefer candidates who speak one or more foreign languages. Even though English is widely spoken in much of the world, the fact is that the global economy depends on communication. When dealing with France, for example, someone who speaks French will have an obvious advantage over someone who doesn't.

French is the 11th most spoken language in the world. It is an official language of 25 countries around the globe, and there are French-speaking minorities in several other countries. Worldwide 77 million people speak French as a native language, and another 50 million speak French as a second language.

With approximately 350 million native speakers, Spanish is the fourth most widely spoken language in the world. It is spoken in most countries in Central and South America, as well as in Spain, Cuba, and United States. While the official language of 20 countries, it is spoken by groups of various sizes in more than 20 other countries. As an Indo-European language of the Italic branch, Spanish is the linguistic descendant of Latin, the language of the Romans who once occupied the Iberian Peninsula. The language spread throughout the world during Spain's age of colonialism.

German is the official language of Germany, Austria, and Liechtenstein. In addition, it is one of four official languages in Switzerland, and one of three commonly used in Luxembourg. There are over 120 million native speakers of German, primarily in Europe, though it is spoken regionally by native speaker minorities in 40 countries. As an international language of business, scientific research, publishing and tourism, it's estimated that German is spoken as a foreign language by an additional 80 million people worldwide.
 

Some possible fields of employment

The following list provides examples of career titles and fields that language learners may wish to contemplate. This is only a sampling and does not represent all careers you might consider. Some occupations may require education beyond a bachelor's degree and/or may require experience/education in another field. In each of these fields, your language skills will give you an edge in a competitive job market:

Business:

Communications:

Education:

Government Services:

Humanities & Arts:

Sciences:

Technology:

Travel Services: