How Your Class Can Celebrate European Day of Languages
A recent survey found that there are 149 languages spoken in Scottish schools. That’s worth celebrating!
The 26th September is a day just for that. It is European Day of Languages, the day many people in Europe celebrate the diversity of languages spoken on our continent. All European languages are celebrated; the widely spoken ones such as English, French and Spanish, to the lesser-known ones like Calatan, Maltese and our very own Scots and Gaelic, as well as British Sign Language and its European counterparts. In addition, the many languages brought to our continent through migration are celebrated in equal measure.
We may all smile and laugh in the same language but how do we celebrate the assortment of languages we hear in our communities every day?
Embrace Many Different Languages Throughout the Whole Day
This is a day to celebrate many languages, not just the one on your term plan. This may sound daunting but with a little tweaking your usual lesson plan can become a Language Celebration Plan.
- Pick a language to start your day, perhaps French. Just like the teacher in this Education Scotland video, spend those first moments of the day discussing the date and weather in French.
These resources are perfect for this time:
Days of the Week Flashcards in French
French Months of the Year Word Cards
Weather Display Poster in French
- Do your register in German. The register is a really comfortable space to learn a few key words in a different language. Doing so in German will also show how similar some words are to English, therefore helping us all to feel confident as we step outside of our comfort zone. If the children usually answer ‘here’, they simply need to answer ‘hier’ in German, as demonstrated by Peppa Pig in this video.
This German Word Posters resource is great for helping to incorporate other greetings and some more basic German vocabulary.
- Lesson starters are a great way to squeeze in some new vocabulary without intruding on a lesson’s core learning. We can’t all boast perfect pronunciation in other languages but there are many experts just waiting to be unleashed in the classroom. Children are amazing listeners and can mimic accents a lot better than adults. Why not try this maths starter on European Day of Languages below?
Show the class these resources for simple 2D shapes and colours in Gaelic:
2D shapes in Scottish Gaelic (Cumaidhean 2D – Postairean)
Scottish Gaelic Colour Word Cards
Have a go at trying to pronounce some of the words.
Gaelic pronunciation can be tricky, so now listen to this short video.
Once it has finished, see how well the class cope with the pronunciation of the colours and shapes. They may have also picked up some other Gaelic from listening to the video too.
- A day of celebration is not complete unless it involves singing and dancing! European Day of Languages is no exception. At the end of the day, make a dance floor, crank up the volume and as a class enjoy some classic music in its native language. Why not start off with Abba’s Dancing Queen in Swedish?
Learn About Your School’s Languages Throughout the Day
Over the course of the day, your class can become language detectives. How many languages are spoken in your school? Where do people have family around Europe? Which countries have people visited in Europe? Do they know any words from these countries’ languages? There is so much language data just waiting to be collected. You may choose to incorporate these detective activities into your maths lesson, for example, gathering data and displaying it for the whole school to see by making a large pictogram using flags.
Alternatively, use a literacy lesson to write about what was discovered. Design and write postcards from different European countries, display all the words collected in different languages in speech bubbles or write a non-chronological report.
Diversify Classroom Displays
Look around your classroom displays. Can you change the titles, information or labels to be a different language? Change your classroom resource labels to Spanish. If you have a human body display, change the labels to Italian. Challenge the class to translate their maths working wall to Ukranian using this handy Numeracy Word Mat.
Don’t Stop Creating Language Fun
Only your class’s imagination will limit the fun you can have exploring and celebrating language discovery and learning on this special day. Here are ten more ideas to incorporate into your classroom:
- Ask a native speaker from your community to share some of their language and to have a question and answer session about their country.
- Invite a learner who speaks another language to tell or read a story to the class in their native language.
- Have a go at some digital language learning by exploring different apps or websites.
- Have an online lesson from a specialist language teacher in your learning community.
- Watch a cartoon in a different language.
- Take language flashcards outside and see how many items you can label.
- Use a parachute to introduce colours in different languages.
- Record today’s weather report in as many different languages as possible.
- Research the European language Esperanto, its history and why it was invented.
- Make a pledge to have a bilingual or multilingual classroom. Decide as a class which activities you’d like to do to keep celebrating languages all year.
Celebrate All Week
European Day of Languages falls on a specific day each year but the celebrations do not need to stop on that day; after all there are so many languages to discover! By the end of the week, your class may have discovered a new language they love, a language many of them are familiar with or simply a language they may want to learn more about. Take this opportunity to celebrate this discovery and reward your Stars of the Week in this language. Twinkl’s Whole School Star of the Week Certificates are editable and so can be written in any language you wish. Why not have an assembly takeover and reward the whole school’s stars in the language(s) your class has discovered.
Overall, the European Day of Languages is all about experiencing the different languages and cultures that make our continent so unique. Doors will be opened to new opportunities of learning and awareness, just like when we have days of trying a variety of new sports or new musical instruments. Ultimately, this is just another day of wonder on our learning journey through life. So, embrace your growth mindset and create a day to remember. Bonne chance!
More language resources can be found here:
European Day of Languages PowerPoint
European Day of Languages Research Booklet
More information on the European Day of Languages can be found here.
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