The London Borough of Hackney's initiative to improve language subject uptake and retention through to A-level, by teaching Spanish as its First Foreign language across all its primary and secondary schools, is mentioned in the latest issue of the Linguist.
In 'Joined-up Thinking', Hackney's educational consultant Bernadette Clinton explains how thinking strategically across the Borough, and implementing the Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) teaching technique in some schools, has meant that more than 1,000 students took GCSE Spanish last year, while the numbers of those taking A-Level also rose.
Through its Small Grants scheme Language Acts has been helping Bernadette to research the effect the initiative has had on schools, teachers and pupils so far. Researchers from the Language Transitions and Diasporic Identities and the Politics of Language Teaching strands have been conducting a survey with some of the teachers involved in the initiative. The research will be completed later this year and Language Acts hopes to publicize its findings in 2021.
In the meantime, readers can access the August issue of the Linguist here, to read Bernadette's article and learn all about the project, turn to pages 26-27!