Modern Languages Department News


On Wednesday 22nd February, here at Poole Grammar, we invited pupils from different schools in the area to participate in different activities that improve the young students understanding of the importance of different languages and cultures. There were many diverse language stalls run by pupils that have high level of skill and effort in that language. We had many different activities ranging from Spanish word searches to writing your name in Arabic. Harry Gillion ran the Spanish stall, with the help of Adam Farrington, (2 Poole Grammar students) and here is his account of the day.


Part of the day was to run a stand that taught the young pupils about other languages. I ran a stall that introduced the children to the language of Spanish. There were lots of activities to teach the basics of Spanish to the students of the schools we invited, and some turned out to be popular both with the young and the old, the pupils at Poole Grammar. Activities, once completed, could be traded in for prizes, like sweets, or other food items from different cultures. One of the activities was a 2 by 2 Rubik’s cube that was based around matching numbers or fruits instead of colours. This was almost impossible, but the creator completed the cube in seconds! Lots of people from year 8 and above offered to give up their lunch hour and help or partake in the Language Bonanza day. Another example of an activity was a Spanish word search, which many students completed and won prizes for. I made a really difficult activity based around Spanish animals, and once the word


search was finished, an option to work out the English for some of the animals was available. If this was finished, a cookie, which my Mum made, was the prize. Overall, the activities were immensely popular with both the younger pupils and the older. I, Thomas Peacock, ran the French stall and the activities that were on offer challenged the students basic understanding of the language and culture in a


series of different including matching up films and characters like the Lion King or Cinderella, which went down very well with the younger pupils. For the older pupils there was a match up exercise that involved matching animals, numbers and colour to work out what the code meant. This challenged there knowledge and their ability to take what they learnt and transferring it to work out what the sentence meant. For the students that managed to complete the task there were prizes including sweets, food from different cultures and countries. In my opinion it was a very successful day because it extended the minds of young people and it gave the stall runners a sense of achievement when the young people succeed in completing the activities.


The food that was distributed before the activities started were amazing: the food was from all over the world, with Swedish meatballs and Asian inspired mini-meals. The children enjoyed the before activity meals and they definitely enjoyed all the sweets and treats that were the indulgent prizes. Lots of the products brought in by pupils of Poole Grammar School were a huge hit as well, and my cookies were said to be very tasty, thanks Mum!


Overall it was a fantastic taster into different cultures and languages for young and old pupils alike from all over Poole and I cannot wait for the next Mother Tongue Language Bonanza next year!


Harry Gillion and Thomas Peacock, 8N.


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