Increasing pupil use of the target language through creative and cross-curricular contexts- an action research project focusing on a mixed top set Year seven French class.
Jennifer Morgan
PGCE Secondary (Modern & Foreign Languages) 2009
jennifer.morgan@cantab.net
Abstract
This research is based upon my teaching of a sequence of eight lessons with a mixed top set year 7 French class of 30 pupils. The research took place during the second half of their second term of French at an 11-16 language college. My research was influenced by innovations and developments in the curriculum, which emphasises the practical application of the foreign language through using authentic materials and creative contexts. Based in the context of motivational and attitudinal theories of second language (L2) acquisition, it is the practical implications thereof which influence my teaching interventions. Theories are many and varied and often logically appropriate to a curriculum concerned with pupils' communicative capabilities and cultural awareness. The project explores the extent to which demands on teachers to conform to national and school policies hinder/encourage pupil use of the TL. I chose to restrict my research to the nature of the MFL classroom, which itself engenders a cross-curricular context. If the purpose of teaching and learning languages is to communicate in various ways and encourage an understanding of cultural aspects of a country and its language, then we must encourage pupil use of the TL from the beginning of the process.
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The full paper is available for download as a pdf file: 271-310-morganj
Citation: Morgan, J. (2010) Increasing pupil use of the target language through creative and cross-curricular contexts- an action research project focusing on a mixed top set Year seven French class.Journal of Trainee Teacher Educational Research, Volume 1, pp.271-310.(Downloaded from http://jotter.educ.cam.ac.uk/, [date of access])