The EAL (English as an additional language) group from Unity College and Duston School who attended the Study Centres' Summer Challenge at Steelbacks returned during the October half term at the Cobblers Study Centre for a 'top-up' language day. There are 6 different nationalities and languages between them and they are from years 8-11.
Study Centre manager Jean Limpitlaw led a speaking-based stadium tour. In pairs, the students listened to information about all the stadium's rooms and facilities and prepared a short piece to camera summarising their usage and talking about who uses them. The children learnt some new vocabulary and practiced their speaking, listening and presentation skills. The task was to transfer the knowledge and information from the tour into sentences. Some students overcame their fear of speaking on camera and improved their sentence structure. Others were happy to speak and used their commentary to show a great deal of knowledge about Sixfields. They later watched the first and youth teams training. Previously, the group were offered tickets to watch NTFC play against Rochdale.
Stadium orienteering came next, with pupils working in small groups to solve numeracy clues to find the right stand, row and seat number in order to collect letters. This activity required learners to use their knowledge of prepositions, directions and compass points. Using the letters to make anagrams was a follow up, and then speaking in front of the group to show how to put the various words found into a sentence.
2010's Football World Cup in South Africa was the theme for the most exciting activity of the day. Jean showed the group a powerpoint presentation about the World Cup (complete with African music) and asked everyone to play along and imagine they had tickets to go there. But due to very expensive flights and tickets, they would have to camp when they got to South Africa. The youngsters had to put up a tent, taking photos of every stage, according to the instructions. Some 'expert campers' became obvious immediately. As well as speaking, (English is the common language for this group) some great social skills were evident: teamwork, communication and co-operation. Photos of each stage were put into a powerpoint presentation and students were asked to write their own version of the instructions according to their photos, whilst sitting in their new homes! They were to focus on some specific aspects of their writing: tenses, prepositions and time connectives. There was quite a lot of tent and camping vocabulary to incorporate too. A group presentation was last, with some confident speakers.
The day was a great success, a great opportunity for our EAL students to experience a different sporting environment, as well as practice their English in a different way. Everyone enjoyed it and it is clear to see individual's confidence is growing.
For more about this projects, visit: http://ontheroad.northantsstudycentres.org/english-as-an-additional-language
