Developing a Love of Language 

At The Mount Junior school, we believe in equipping our girls with the knowledge and skills that will allow them to confidently navigate and achieve their goals in our global world.  

For this very reason, it is important that we instil in them a love of learning languages from a very young age. Learning a new language improves listening, attention, and communication skills in girls as young as 3 years old. Through games, songs, and stories our youngest children enjoy weekly French lessons taught be specialist teachers.  

As they progress into Key Stage 2, German is added to their language learning, offering them the opportunity to extend their communication in reading, writing and oral work. Providing the girls with such a breadth of language experience enables them to develop their awareness of different cultures. They begin to make cultural connections and they embrace diversity from an early age. In September, older girls will have the opportunity to learn Mandarin in addition to our core language curriculum, further developing their desire to engage in new languages and cultures and broadening their horizons.

Language lessons at The Mount School are engaging and interactive, enabling the pupils to fully immerse themselves in the subject. During their French lessons this week, Key Stage 2 have been learning the song, ‘Mama Africa’ by Kids United. Kids United is a French singing group created initially in 2015 by children to support UNICEF campaigns. The girls discussed strategies to develop their listening skills as they worked to complete the missing words from the lyrics sheet.

Listening strategies to adopt:

“We could write the words down as quickly as we can and circle each bit, especially the first and last letter, or we could just concentrate on one line at a time” – Clemmie 

“We could highlight the bits we don’t hear, so that you can check back over them when we listen again” – Melanie 

“Just listen to the first letter of the word” – Agnes 

The girls followed with their fingers as they listened before coming together as a group to check through their work. Highlighting the depths of their understanding, pupils were also able to signify cognates in the text, which further helped them to undertsand the meaning of the song. 

“The word Le Soliell is connected to the sun” – Lizzie 

“The connection is to the English word solar” – Agnes 

For the second verse, the girls were asked to write in the missing word, choosing from a list of options. To help them write down the words quickly and so they didn’t miss the next line, India shared a useful suggestion, “Each word has a number so you could just write the number in instead to save time.”

Watch the video:

To test your listening skills, practice your French pronunciation, or to simply enjoy the catchy music, you too can enjoy Mama Africa by Kids United below:  

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