Modern Languages - Keele University
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School of Public Policy & Professional Practice

 

Education

PGCE Modern Languages

The PGCE Modern Foreign Languages course is designed to be flexible. This means that you can train to be a teacher of:

  • French1
  • French and German
  • French and Spanish
  • German (as your main language) and French
  • Spanish (as your main language) and French
  • Urdu (as your main language) and French

All Associate Teachers on the Keele PGCE course study two foreign languages.

We provide a thoroughly professional grounding in the teaching of Modern Foreign Languages. This encompasses an understanding of the learner in the process of language learning of past and present MFL teaching methodologies, of the demands of the National Curriculum and the new Framework, which promotes an analytical approach to language learning in a communicative context.

The course has a strong focus on Information and Communications Technology. By the end of the course, you should be confident in the use of ICT to enhance learning and teaching, including use of the interactive whiteboard and associated software, and be able to design and produce some of your own teaching material.

Although the Keele course necessarily focuses on the compulsory school years of 11-16, we also provide some preparation for, and engagement with, teaching at 16-19 level. Our course aims to produce teachers who are capable of working successfully with pupils of all abilities. We regard it as equally important that you should be sympathetic towards and able to stimulate pupils who do not find the subject particularly easy as well as extending the most able pupils to the full extent of their abilities.

Within the course, we offer a short element that addresses MFL at Key Stage Two, which encourages some of our Associates to work at both primary and secondary level. It is our experience that many of our ex-Associate Teachers advance relatively quickly in the profession. It is therefore important for us to equip you with sufficient critical understanding of the nature of language and language learning to enable you to fulfil a more senior role effectively.

Supplementary Studies

This is an important feature of the PGCE MFL course at Keele. It gives you the opportunity to start learning German, Spanish or Urdu or to develop your teaching skills in a language in which you already have competency (French, German or Spanish).

The aims of the Supplementary Studies course are:

  • to enable you to learn a new language (German or Spanish) or to develop an existing second foreign language (French, German, Spanish, Urdu)
  • to develop insight into the experience of secondary learners faced with the challenge of language learning
  • to enable you to acquire the knowledge and skills base to teach a second foreign language to Key Stage 3.

You will be expected to begin work on your second foreign language as soon as you have accepted a place on the course at Keele. A particular route will be suggested to you to suit your individual needs.

You will be expected to undertake self-study work on the language before and during the PGCE year. Direct instruction is not given on the PGCE course, but language modules are available to Associate Teachers in the School of Languages.

We would normally look for a second class Honours degree in Modern Foreign Languages, or a degree in which Modern Foreign Languages features as a substantial part (usually where Modern Foreign Languages features as a major subject, occupying at least 40% of the taught course). It is helpful where the other subject is relevant to Modern Foreign Languages study in schools – for example, Linguistics or European Studies.

You should contact the Course Tutor (Victoria Door) for further advice if you are unsure that your degree meets these criteria.

In addition, we consider applications from graduates who can demonstrate through their professional experience, their degree and any postgraduate work that they possess the necessary knowledge, skills and understanding to equip them for teaching Modern Foreign Languages. You do need to have expertise (both spoken and written, with cultural knowledge) in one or more of the target languages.

We welcome native speakers of French, German, Spanish and Urdu. However, it is important that a native speaker can demonstrate an appropriate knowledge of the structure of the language in order that s/he can teach successfully at secondary level.

A decision about the suitability of your profile can only be taken by considering your application as a whole.

Candidates need to have GCSEs in Mathematics and English Language at grade C or above (or equivalent qualification). Keele does offer Institutional tests for candidates who do not have these qualifications.

Candidates must have GCSE or equivalent before they can commence this PGCE course.