EAL

European Day of Languages Celebrations

Our students participated in European Day of Languages film screening and designing postcards activities to mark the day! Learning new languages while maintaining home languages is an essential part of personal and academic growth for students. It sharpens cognitive skills, nurtures cultural awareness, opens professional doors, and fosters a strong sense of identity. In a world that values diversity and cross-cultural competence, students who are multilingual and proud of their linguistic heritage are well-equipped to navigate the complexities of modern life. By embracing both their native languages and new ones, students can become global citizens with deep connections to their roots, capable of thriving in an interconnected world. Thanks to the following students for their contribution: Ibrahim, Kemarni, Ogie, Nuoh, Beatrice, Katy, Fatou, Teo, Amelia, Filip, Alex, Sara, Sevem, Ayda, Oguz.

   

 

During Refugee Week in June, we celebrated our School of Sanctuary Award with esteemed guests and students. We are proud to be the first Lewisham secondary school to receive this award. Please read our Pledge here. 

A few photos from this special event are below:

EAL Workshop for Lewisham Primary School Teachers

On Wednesday, the 12th of June we ran an EAL workshop for Lewisham Primary School teachers. Participants expressed their appreciation on the feedback forms.

What additional strategies will I implement in school and classes as a result of this session?

ESOL Classes for parents- Multi-lingual display- Refugee Week- International Mother Language Day- Substitute tables- Dual language use; 5 keywords per lesson in a visual dictionary- Online differentiation websites such Diffit and DeepL-Language surveys

What went well during the session?   

Learning more about how other schools support their EAL learners- Learning about more resources- Lots of discussion and shared ideas- handouts- slides- lots of ideas about scaffolding

See more on our tweet- https://x.com/PLSEALDep/status/1801000686101954896

COMMUNITY LANGUAGES GCSE EXAMS

Did you know you could take your Community Languages GCSE exams in 19 languages from year 10 onwards in the UK? In PLS we value diversity and inclusion therefore, we are keen to highlight the importance of language learning in multi-national London. We offer students the opportunity to take a language exam they speak at home.

This year we entered 29 students for GCSE exams in their home languages.

These languages are as follows.

Arabic	French	Italian	Persian	Turkish
Bengali	German	Japanese	Panjabi	Urdu
Biblical/Modern Hebrew	Greek	Polish	Russian
Chinese	Gujarati	Portuguese	Spanish

We also offer after-school intervention classes in Turkish, Spanish, French, Italian and Polish.  

Contact Mrs Bauhofer, the PLS EAL Coordinator, if your child is literate in any of these languages.

 

To mark International Women's Day, we visited the wonderful Baroness Meral Hussein-Ece in the House of Lords. We have also met the amazing Baroness Floella Benjamin OBE. Both incredible ladies had a very constructive chat with our students about the importance of women's participation in politics.

  

To mark International Mother Language Day, Ms Anne-Marie Dias Borges, BBC Africa's senior presenter and journalist, visited our Primary and Secondary Schools to deliver a speech about the importance of maintaining home languages while acquiring new languages. She speaks 4 languages fluently and is currently learning Japanese and Chinese. You can see our tweets about this event here.

 

 

You can see a few photos and read our tweet chain about the PLS Refugee Week celebrations here    

We thank to members of AFRIL and Lewisham Refugee and Migrant Network for visiting our schools and running a workshop and an assembly in our school. 

 

 

 

You can watch the full message from Mark Ruffalo here:

 

Here is our Refugee Week Presentation

 

 

 

 

Another year 11 student read a story called The Fool and The Donkey in Persian. Listen below: 

 

 

 

Our year 11 student read a story called 'The Bullies' written by Mateen Abdul in Pashto.

Our Year 11 student read a story called The Ant and The Elephant written by Emal Jabarkhalil in Pashto. We used the amazing resources on World Stories website. They are strongly recommended. 

Listen to Carnations and Tomato Juice written by Turkish author, Sait Faik Abasıyanık, read by Turkish actor Levent Uzumcu, who permitted us to publish this clip on our YouTube page. 

 

Discover the inspiring story of Semiha Berksoy, Turkey's first female opera singer, through the insightful book written by writer and journalist Özlem Özdemir, who also narrated it.

Listen to Hansel and Gretel in French from our EAL HLTA.

Listen to Magic Porridge Pot in German 

Listen to The Boy who cried wolf in Portuguese

The Very Hungary Caterpillar in Polish

Listen to Little Red Riding Hood in French

 

Take a look at our exclusive interview with Mark Ruffalo, also known as the Hulk. It's our first interview with him.