Welcome to the Modern Languages Support Service

Welcome back for the academic year 2011/2012.  We hope you have an enjoyable and rewarding year in the Modern Language classroom.  Here are some of the highlights of the programme of support year we have planned for you. 

Communicative Language Teaching.  We are offering a series of workshops on CLT.  The workshops will provide participants with an opportunity to revisit theory in the light of practice.  These workshops will be facilitated by Dr. Celine Healy.  Courses take place in the following venues.

Talking up a Storm.  Our dynamic team of local facilitators will showcase successful approaches to encouraging students to use the target language in the classroom. Courses will take place in the following venues.

Digital Media Project.  We are working with a number of schools on developing e-portfolios for language students.  Check the website for update on these and other initiatives.

Teaching Modern Languages.  One edition of this new magazine will be published online shortly.

Erasmus Initiative

'Sharing the Erasmus Experience' -  Sharing the Srasmus Experience is a pilot project organised by the Higher Education Authority, in conjuction with the Department of Education & Skills and the Association of Teacher/ Education Centres in Ireland (ATECI) which will enable teachers to arrange a visit by a former Erasmus student to speak to their class.   Click here for more details

European Day of Languages 2011

The European Day of Languages is a Council of Europe initiative celebrated throughout Europe on 26th September each year and we are delighted to announce that 2011 marks the 10th Anniversary of this special day.

The aim of the European Day of Languages are to:

• Alert the publice to the importance of language learning
• Promote the rich linguistic and cultural diversity of Europe
• Encourage lifelong language learning inside and outside the classroom

Léargas is the national relay for the European Day of Languages in Ireland.  We have lovely promotional material available to help you celebrate the European Day of Languages (posters, stickers, lanyards).  If you would like a parcel of promotional material for your organisation, please send an email request to Ariane Seitz languages@leargas.ie by Tuesday, 20th September 2011 and a parcel will be sent to you by post.

If you are organising an event to celebrate the European Day of Languages, please add this information to the European database here.  On the same page, you'll also be able to view events happening in other countries and get inspiration from past events.

Léargas are also organising two special competitions for interested schools in the Republic of Ireland.  The two competitions allow pupils to showcase their talents while celebrating the European Day of Language.  The competitions comprise:

• Calendar Competition
• Video Clip Competition

The closing date for both competitions is Friday 7 October 2011.

For more information, download the relevant documents from the Resources  page.  For inspiration, check out last year's video winners of Klee Paper's wall calendar also available on the Resources page.

Best wishes for a successful European Day of Languages

Expressions & Useful Phrases for the Classroom

Italian Useful Phrases

Spanish Useful Phrases

French Useful Phrases

German Useful Phrases

Authentik

Authentik launches new interactive website for English, French, German and Spanish.  Check out http://www.authentikinteractive.com

New Competition 

As part of the celebrations of the European Day of Languages 2010 the European Commission has launched a competition to hightlight how speaking foreign languages can make a difference in people's private and professional lives.  Participants can tell their favourite stories with foreign languages - funney, touching, or simly unusual stories.   The stories can be about any language in the world and presented in one of the 23 official languages of the EU.

Stories can be submitted in video, audio, text, photo or poster format and will be published on the competition website. The public will choose the best stories by voting online until 31 January 2011, which is also the deadline for submitting entries. The authors of the best stories--one national winner per country--will be invited to Brussels for an award ceremony around Europe Day in May 2011.

The competition is open to all citizens over 18 who are residents in an EU country, Turkey, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein.

For further details please see http://www.tonguestories.eu

Klara’s Kiste

The Austrian Embassy has developed an exciting project for German teachers and their students in Senior Cycle in 2010/2011.  Learning and Teaching resources for the novel, Klaras Kiste, written by the Austrian / Dutch author, Rachel van Kooij, are now available to all teachers of German in Ireland.

The author may also be contacted by email, by students studying the texts. Contact klara2010@gmx.ie 

Further details on the project are available from the Austrian Embassy (Phone 01-2694577).  Additional support material, including podcasts, can be accessed through www.german.ie.  H ere is the link for one podcast: http://www.german.ie/podcasts/Ch1_Monster im Bauch.mp3  

Click here for a copy of the resources:Klaras Kiste Resources

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Do you know that there are two major DES initiatives to support and extend the teaching of Modern Language in Irish schools?

The first is the Post-Primary Modern Languages Initiative, with an emphasis on Italian, Spanish, Russian and Japanese. You can sign up for access to the free resources.  Check out the website at http://www.languagesinitiative.ie/

The second is the Modern Languages Primary School Initiative.  The website has excellent resources suitable for students in First and Second Year: http://www.mlpsi.ie/

Graz supports a range of projects aimed at encouraging excellence and innovation in language teaching.  For further information, check out their website: http://www.ecml.at/ If you would like to learn more about becoming involved with an ECML project, the contact organisation for Ireland is Léargas (www.leargas.ie). For more on the ECLM, click here.

Language Teachers

The Second Level Support Service is looking to work with English teachers and teachers of Modern Languages interested in facilitating events in their local education centre for fellow language teachers. We are looking to meet teachers who love teaching their subject and who would like to share their enthusiasm with colleagues. If you are interested in becoming involved as a local facilitator, you are invited to contact Dr Kevin Mc Dermott, National Co-ordinator of Languages, Second Level Support (kevinmcdermott@pdst.ie) with your contact details and you will be added to the mailing list for future events. Initially, we will be holding three one-day events around the country (Cork, Athlone and Dublin) in October and November. So, if you would like to meet other dynamic, creative teachers of language and attend one of our events, forward your details without delay.

Kevin Mc Dermott, National Co-ordinator for Languages, PDST, Navan Education Centre, Athlumney, Navan, County Meath.