A thread for sad mfl teachers

[emkana]

MN is full of highly educated parents, but even here the majority view seems to be that continuing with learning a mfl is pointless. Often the advice is to go for the subject that will give you a higher grade over the mfl. Makes me feel like there really is no hope for language learning in this country...

aww at thread title
my kids school is language academy ,
dd in 4th yr doing french at uni
loads of her mates did languages at uni, I can think of 4 of her close friends

ds is only in yr 7 and dong spanish for the first time and loves it

its successful and popular subject at this school which we're lucky I guess

I am a sad MFL teacher! I teach in a sixth form college where every year our department is under threat of closure because of low student numbers. If it does close there will be no A level MFL provision in town.

I teach lovely, motivated students with a huge range of abilities who have a keen interest in the wider world, many of whom go off to do languages at uni and travel /get great jobs out of their languages. But numbers of students are in free fall and management don't seem to care much. So many more students could widen their horizons and get key skills if more were encouraged to carry on with MFL in some way.

Such a shame large parts of our school system don't value languages and they are increasingly becoming an elitist subject again.

I'm the opposite, OP! Have been looking at secondary schools for dd, and have been appalled at the relative lack of provision in mfl - both in the state and the private sector! Most of them offer French and either German/Spanish, but it seems like it's quite difficult for them to do more than one language at GCSE if they want to.

Makes me sad - I loved languages at school! :(

Progress 8 has hit us hard in my school, it's now very difficult to do two mfls at GCSE (now leaves only one option after you've chosen them) and we are in danger of moving from teaching two in ks3 to only one. It is also no longer expected that all bright dcs will do ateast one for GCSE.

I did three languages at GCSE - back in the day!

I am not a sad MFL teacher - not a teacher at all, but I totally support MFL-learning. Fortunately my son's school says everyone has to do at least one language at GCSE. The top 25% at languages are given the opportunity to do two.

He did Spanish at primary school and was pleased to be able to do it once he went to secondary as well (it could have been French). My main concern is that he gets to do German next year, as I studied it, have friends there, and can support his learning much better than if he does French. Crossing fingers.

In my school you could do French, German and Latin GCSEs and then Spanish in the sixth form if you'd wanted. It's so short-sighted to sideline languages :(

My DS is about to apply for PGCE MFL - mad I know but there you go.

He is intending to teach Spanish and French and perhaps some German. When I read teaching threads I feel afraid for him despite the fact he has a good bit of classroom experience so knows what he's letting himself in for to some degree. It's all the other non teaching c* that comes with it.

If it's any consolation to you all, dd1 is choosing options and was dithering over Spanish or Geography. She's already opting for History.

The overwhelming consensus from EVERY teacher (and my friends and I) was that not choosing a MfL would be a mistake.

I might be in the minority but there are some of us out there who value you

At DD1's school (she's Year 10) they had to have a language - not necessarily an MFL as she chose to continue with Latin and drop French. Some girls are doing two languages for GCSE - in Years 8 and 9 they all studied 2 languages.

DD2's school, which used to have a language specialism (!), has not been as good at teaching languages in my opinion - they started with Spanish and then changed to French - but not both at the same time. She is in year 9 and has just chosen her options and there was no requirement to take a language - she will be doing French.

I'm a sad MFL teacher. Numbers are dwindling at options time. Students doesn't want to chose it as it is perceived as 'hard' because it involves rote learning and dedicated practice. Results aren't in line with the rest of the depts (in our un-academic school), SLT are on our backs and it is swept away into the corner of the curriculum.
Also, the GCSE (AQA exam board anyway) is not fit for purpose and is frankly, uninspiring and also worringly, open to abuse.

Language teaching is demanding. It is probably the most teacher led subject in the school, and involves a lot of performance. I've done it for 12 years and I'm tired. I want to sit down and have a rest.

No no no no. Don't be sad. DD3 loves both German and Spanish and takes both of them very seriously (but then she does this for all her subjects).

Many years ago I learned Spanish at school - for one term - and the teacher left so the classes stopped. in those far-off days it was only ever German or French. For the brief time I studied it, I really, really enjoyed it and actually I've always been pissed off that the teacher left! I was crap at German. I learned French at my primary school and when I got to Grammar school I was so good I was top of the class. Unfortunately it all went downhill from there.

(One of) my biggest bugbears is that I firmly believe MFL should be taught properly at primary school - the earlier the better. Then we would be so much better at it.

I spend my working life in a European role, talking to people on the phone an awful lot. We never, ever speak anything other than English. And that's pretty shaming..

Ah, this explains things.

We were given the option this week for our Y7s to register for a second MFL.

DS (I) jumped at it and signed him up for German (he wants to learn German as it's "the language of engineering", he's into engineering and cars )

The school said there may not be sufficient interest to start the class.

So what is that about? are MFL perceived as too much work? Or simply not valued?

German was DS1's only definite. All the advice he's had has been that it's best to do a MFL. It does worry me though, that he's already done 2.5 years of German and couldn't begin to use it in a RL situation.

I got and A at O-Level French and it could never be said that I could "speak" French. We went on a family activity holiday last year and were paired with a lovely German family. Their boys were 8 & 10. Both could make themselves understood at the start of the week and by the end of the week I would have described the older boy as fluent. What do we do wrong?

No no no, you do nothing wrong.

It si just that on the continent we are inundated with English language culture (pop songs, TV programmes, films), so it is everywhere.

It is never going to be like that for native English speakers. Imagine how quickly you'd learn French if all the songs on the radio here in the UK were sung in French, all TV comedies (with subtitles in English) and almost every movie!

Don't say this! We are just about to move back to the UK from the States, partly because I want to get back to teaching. I think my age and career break are going to count against me getting a job, aren't they? Desperately bringing my Spanish up to give me at least a fighting chance!

Please don't be sad. I'm sorry that you are unappreciated and underfunded by your employers, but you do an excellent job.

I was only able to complete 2 MFL (i specialised in sciences) GCSEs, but the 4 MFLs that I studied have meant that I have been able to communicate with lots of different people without fear.

You do a really good and necessary job. I'm sorry it's not appreciated properly by your employers.

My specialism is MFL, but as a secondary supply teacher I get to teach all subjects from humanities, sciences, art, drama, PE... (actively teach I mean, if there is some kind of vague lesson plan or resources left ).
And MFL definitely requires more effort for the teacher and the DC. Much harder to get proper differentiation over a mixed ability class, and to ensure the ablest are stretched and the weakest supported in a class of 30, and also much harder to get the pupils able to work independently.
Maths is the easiest subject for all the above - at the end of a day teaching maths I am much calmer, can reflect back on what progress the DC have made, and the DC also find it easier to explain what they have learned.
And the DC do seem to forget MFL learning faster..
Shame, because I love languages, but prefer to teach other subjects...

I'm a sad MFL teacher.
I'm so exhausted- just wish I could give them a task and they get on with it. All we do is play games, short exercises, I'm at the front miming everything out and doing silly voices... Come on summer holidays!

GCSE groups are tiny and they just don't put the work in. The attitude is that it's 'only' an MFL. It takes so much work that they are not willing to put in.
Set a CA, they don't learn it off by heart, refuse to speak in speaking exams and that's if they turn up: usually I'm wandering round the school collecting kids while they say 'theres no point me doing it miss, I just haven't learnt it.'

There is also a completely unrealistic expectation by SLT that DC should be miraculously able (and willing) to spontaneously converse in TL, and seem surprised to come into a lesson and not find them all chatting away fluently.
They don't seem to have the same expectation in other subjects - eg expecting to come in into a Year 7 science class and see them competently and independently building a large hadron collider (to steal from another thread )

I'm a sad MFL teacher too. Numbers falling and so many of those who have chosen it just not willing to put the work in.

Plus hassle from SLT for recruitment but no support. For example, super bright student being advised to do Business Studies instead. Student now bored in a class of not very well-behaved or motivated students. But at least she'll get her A* easily.

Sad MFL teacher here.

We'll be wiped out at A level when the new specs come in.

Lemonsole complete wasted opportunity to revamp the A level specs.
Sadly there were not many participants in the consultation.
I have just come off a webinar where the changes and implications were discussed.
Lots of MFL HoDs were saying the same thing - the bright pupils taking MFL want to study areas that relate to business, economics, current affairs, whereas the emphasis on 'great literature' in the new syllabus will put off a lot of potential candidates...

I hope you don't mind hearing from someone who does have doubts.

I think that doing MFL in England with a non-native speaker and 29 other English people is going to produce poor results because of the dominant culture issue.

What I would support is having you take the kids to Spain/France for a whole term in a local school - split up so there was no-one to speak English to.

For A level, I would suggest the students took up a real role in a local hospital or school in the target country.

Do you fancy running a " school within a school" overseas? :)

Sleepy - I completely agree! And in fact , when DS passed the 10+ deferred for his secondary school, we were thinking of sending him to a boarding school in France or Germany for the year before he could join the secondary. In the end I couldn't bear to be parted from him, so we canned that idea...

This is so depressing to read. I thought the Ebacc might make a difference. Hasn't it?

It is my impression (nothing more) that this is one of the major differences between state and independent schools, and it's deplorable that this should be so. In all the academically selective independent schools I know of all pupils have to take at least one language to GCSE and it's still very common to take two or three. My son, who's 21 now, did four languages to GCSE and carried on with two to A level. At his school they had a pretty high take up of MFL at A level, greatly helped, I suspect, by the fact that the school offers no -ology subjects except Biology and DT (in the words of the headteacher).

It's been useful to him in his history degree and, leaving aside all the non-monetary benefits (considerable, of course), it will, I hope, also be well regarded by potential employers.