The “100 Feathers” activity is designed to encourage children to think about people’s stories, by writing a story themselves. We are hoping to collect 100 stories from children, for the 100 feathers flying through the world. This activity is part of Refugee Week and the Migration Matters Festival.
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Every year in June, The Wildlife Trusts run the 30 Days Wild challenge – a challenge to do an activity linked to nature, every day, for the whole month. When we recently met up with our local Wildlife Trust (Sheffield and Rotherham Wildlife Trust), we suggested the idea of putting together a multilingual version of 30 Days Wild, suitable both for children growing up multilingual, and for those learning another language at school.
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This activity gives pupils an opportunity to think about the act of translation, focusing on language as well as meaning. They are supported through translating a 1,300 year-old poem by Li Bai, a famous Chinese poet. The poem, “Quiet Night Thoughts”, uses a simile and simple language to explore the feeling of loneliness when being away from home.
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In today’s blog post, Kexin, one of 11 Masters students undertaking research around the Lost Wor(l)ds project, introduces the Language Portrait Activity and explains why she is hoping to work with a primary school that has used the Language Portrait Activity. If you can help Kexin by facilitating her research (which would mean running the activity in your school and facilitating access to online interviews with children, which can take place outside school hours), please get in touch at lostworlds@sheffield.ac.uk.
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If you go out in the woods today, you’re in for…an opportunity to recharge your mental batteries, to find some peace (yes, probably even if you do go with kids). And in Japanese, there is a word for it – shinrin-yoku (森林浴), literally “forest bath”, the concept of consciously emerging yourself in the woods (some of us might have to turn to parks rather than forests, but that’s okay). This blog posts suggests a way to support children through a mindful visit to the woods.
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Essentially, a language portrait is a tried and tested way to encourage children to talk about their different languages, and how they form a part of their identity. The premise is simple – you choose one colour for each language you consider part of your identity, and colour in the outline of a person, in any way you want. Language Portraits are a great way to create a classroom display, and make multilingualism visible.
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Our Winter Scavenger Hunt has been our most downloaded activity so far, so we hope that our spring version will be equally useful. With lots of opportunities to identify plants and birds, this is the perfect activity to get children outdoors, and use all their languages to explore nature around them.
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Teach children to enjoy nature without disturbing it, while also enabling them to explore colours in nature and in their home languages. Although timed for Easter, we are sharing two sets of worksheets – one with eggs and one with stars, to ensure the activity is suitable all year round. Children cut out the shape and use the hole as a frame to go on a colour hunt in nature, with space to write colours in home languages, and, if they can, to name some of the items they find in nature.
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Today in the International Day of Multilingualism – the perfect day to address a question we have been hearing a lot from teachers: is Lost Wor(l)ds just for primary? Are there ways to integrate multilingualism into secondary school? The answer to the first question is a resounding “no”, and the answer to the second question is a resounding “yes”!! This blog post gives some ideas on how to adapt Lost Wor(l)ds activities for secondary school.
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The school garden is a prime space to make multilingualism visible, get children interested in nature, healthy eating, and conservation, and to bring creativity to the learning environment. The premise is simple – encourage children to help label the plants, drawing on their language skills. This activity is so straightforward that we have not included a lesson plan as such, but below are some ideas, suitable for different age ranges and materials, for creating suitable labels – please make your own judgment regarding suitability for the children in your care. We would love to see yours, to add them to the photo gallery below!
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Our second Wor(l)d Views interview introduces the work and languages of Malgorzata Blicharska, who was born in Poland and works as a senior lecturer in Natural Resources and Sustainable Development at Uppsala University in Sweden.
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Over the past weeks and months, media has been full of concerns regarding learning, set-ups in schools, home-education, etc. But what has lockdown been like for complementary schools? With schools returning to classroom teaching this week, Alina Badescu, from the Romanian School in Manchester, gives us insights into the impact of the pandemic on learning and teaching at her school.
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Concrete ideas on how to make multilingual reading visible in school – this World Book Day and beyond. Includes downloadable award certificate for multilingual readers.
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This activity uses Christina Rossetti’s poem to engage children in listening to, reading, thinking about, and writing poetry, drawing on their full linguistic repertoire. The activity is supported by a video (below), a worksheet, and a PowerPoint presentation.
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This International Mother Day, we asked on social media what it meant for parents to pass their language on to their children, and for children to be multilingual.
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This blog post accompanies our new Rivers of Reading activity, talking about the research behind it.
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This activity is particularly suitable for World Book Day, although it can be run at any time of the year. The Rivers of Reading methodology invites children to create a collage-like piece of work which links their reading experiences to critical incidents in their lives. It lends itself very well to home learning.
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Every month, we are hoping to share schools on our blog who have used one or more of our activities, to gather examples of good practice, to showcase pupils’ language skills, and to enable schools to evidence their engagement with multilingualism in the classroom. Find out the very simple steps to become a Lost Wor(l)ds Feature School!
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This winter scavenger hunt is suitable for home learning, giving children the chance to explore the outdoors and decide what to enter in different categories on the accompanying worksheet.
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The Lost Wor(l)ds blog hosts book reviews for books which feature nature, the environment, and conservation. This activity encourages children to write a book review themselves, with the possibility of having in published on the Lost Wor(l)ds website. The book review template for download is provided in Word format, enabling children to fill it in […]
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