We now have a vertical tutoring system in our school, with Houses as the focus rather than year groups. In order to strengthen sense of House identity within the new system a series of challenges are set across the school where pupils can earn points towards their House Cup, presented at the end of the year.
This seems to work well, particularly among the younger years, who have found it much easier to buy into a new system than the older years, who seem to be struggling a little more with the changes.
So, in MFL it was the perfect opportunity to try something new and a little crazy :)
For year 8 'normal' language lessons were put on hold for the week and they were split into small groups according to their Houses (I just told them how many needed to be in each group and let them get on with that bit themselves!) In the first of their two lessons they were given points accoring to team working skills and the quality of their final product, which was to be an original game to help people learn a language. There were some fabulously creative ideas - and some games that I would never have been able to come up with, the vast majority really were fantastic and grading them was tough.
I purposely didn't give out scores at the end of that lesson - just told them it was very close. The second of their two lessons was best, in my opinion. In the same groups, teams were awarded points for cheering skills, behaviour & cooperation, a QR treasure hunt (post coming soon...), a dressing up relay and then either a tongue twister challenge or a spelling bee, all in the target language. It was SO much fun! I don't think I have ever seen pupils so motivated!
This is definitely something that I would like to run again. There were a few teething issues (getting the QR codes to work, getting pupils to not disturb the rest of the school....) but I am confident that these would be ironed out next time. And I think it's activities like these that help us to hold the attention of our younger pupils and keep them eager and ready to learn in year nine.
Bring on the next challenge!!
