The overarching aims for Moorside pupils are fluid communication and a broad cultural awareness of Spanish and the Spanish-speaking world. They will gain a strong phonetic knowledge to enable them to converse confidently (and pronounce new vocabulary) and a reinforcement of many literacy skills from their first language. They will learn how to manipulate grammar to allow them to personalise information and retain core phrases that can be recycled in a large number of real-life situations. Through this knowledge and confidence they will become resilient and competent linguists who are open-minded and versatile communicators. 

The long-term map of the Curriculum is founded on a set of Communicative Functions, (See SoW), so that pupils can communicate in a wide-range of real-life situations. 

Language will be taught in reusable chunks (as opposed to individual words) as this helps pupils’ fluency and long-term memory recall.  

“Language learning is not simply about combining words and applying grammar rules but rather the retrieval of the patterns and combinations we are primed for.” (Michael Hoey – Lexical Priming 2005) “

“L 2 research has shown that making use of formulaic expressions and memorizing long chunks of text (and making substitutions within them) is far more efficient and effective than learning to assemble new linguistic strings in the process of language production.” (Nation,2013 Ellis,2015)

Chunks can then be separated for manipulation/alteration or to explain specific grammar.

“A chunk is a frequently recurring, meaningful string of two or more words either fixed or with variable slots which can be learned as a single unit, without the need to analyse its elements. Once committed to L.T memory, a chunk can be retrieved and used ‘as is’ or with modifications, bypassing the need to generate it from individual words and grammatical rules.”( Selivan, 2018).

Through thorough and frequent exposure to the language of that topic or Communicative Function they will be able to pick up subtleties such as Phonemes, Syllables, Lexis, Grammar, Syntax and Meaning. 

Curriculum Overview