What people are saying about Language Driven Pedaogy Resources and CPD

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Katherine Milton French Teacher and IB Diploma Programme Coordinator, Swiss International School Qatar (SISQ), February 2023

As a language teacher returning to the UK after teaching in international schools for 10 years, the NCELP course has been an essential step in updating and rebuilding my understanding of current language pedagogy. I was hoping to understand the research behind the new curriculum, and come away with practical applications for my classroom and department. Both of these objectives have been successfully met, and I am in a position to share a wealth of research and activities with my department and wider school community.”

Kellie Waterworth Head of MFL, Brixham College, February 2023

We had already been using NCELP resources but felt that our progress had been inhibited by COVID so I felt that this CPD course would deepen mine and my team’s understanding of the NCELP approach and allow us to plan our curriculum around NCELP. Although, due to other commitments such as an NPQ, the course has taken me a while to complete, it has been of value as I now feel that we are on the right lines with what we are currently doing and that we can amend the SoWs to suit our own context and curriculum time.”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

“I had heard about NCELP from various sources but had not fully looked into it. We had never used any NCELP resources in our lessons before doing the course. I undertook the course as a B11 review in our school found that they did not feel we were placing enough emphasis on the explicit teaching of phonics and grammar or that this was not evident enough in our SOW and it was recommended that both colleagues in the department undertook the course with a view to improving this. I hoped to be able to take away some tips as to how to include more phonics especially either through integrating into our existing SOW or potentially through following parts of the NCELP schemes (though I didn’t know too much about them.) I have found the advice about teaching more explicitly and the approach to frequency based learning of vocabulary and phonics to be particularly useful. In school we are now working imbedding and evidencing explicit phonics into our SOW for years 8 and 9, following the order as recommended by NCELP. We are considering a fuller approach in year 7 from September, perhaps following all of the NCELP elements.”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

“I read about NCELP on social medias. I signed up to the CPD to develop a better understanding of how to plan a more effective SOW to enable students to achieve better and learning more in foreign languages.”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

“I heard about this through social media and sharing of ideas about the new spec for 2024. We are re-designing SOL in light of the new spec and decided to use it as an opportunity to develop and explore our knowledge and understanding of the latest research. The sharing of research in a concise and relevant way as well as the fantastic resources and models to apply these strategies are going to be the foundations for our teaching going forwards.”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

“I found the NCELP CPD course by chance, I was looking for free CPD for the MFL classroom. Before this course, I had never used any of your resources. I am now regularly using your materials in class and sharing them with my colleagues. I wanted to invest in my professional development and I am glad to be able to access your free CPDs. I found your module on phonics the most helpful as there aren’t many resources available on the web on this topic. I will continue to share what I learn with my colleagues.”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

I did my teacher’s training in Hungary, currently I do not teach, only give private lessons mostly to young adults. I tried to find out about possibilities for teaching in the UK. I signed up to Return to Teaching Advisor Support Service where my mentor told me about NCELP and particularly about this course. I have used some materials during my private lessons, especially regarding the teaching of phonics. My objective was to gain more knowledge about teaching approaches in the UK and find out whether there are fundamental differences between the UK and Hungary regarding the expectations towards teachers, lesson design, planning, etc. For me the most valuable elements were the clear and logical principles in teaching. For example the idea of teaching vocabulary from the most frequent words, etc. I did not have a chance to discuss this with fellow teachers. I learned a lot during this course and I would like to say thank you to All who participated to the course design, it was incredibly useful and inspiring.”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

I have found the course very interesting. I signed up to this to develop my awareness in the changes to MFL teaching as I have been teaching for 28 years but have a son starting in year 7. I wanted to make sure that I was keeping up to date with the changes related to the new GCSE so that I can support the students I teach. We have started to introduce phonics at KS3 and will gradually be including more details. I found the evaluation of the viva 1 assessment useful as we use this though we chose this as our topic to start with year 7 students due to the cognate recognition. I would like to discuss this further with my colleagues and prompt discussion on what and how we assess going forward”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

I have found the NCELP CPD training very informative. I particularly enjoyed looking through the pre-reading material. This is now to be discussed and cascaded with my department with a view to introduce it from September prior to the new GCSE specification coming into place.”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

I first went on an NCELP course run by ALL and got thinking about its new approaches. Before going on the course, I had looked at the online materials and felt completely out of my depth. The only way I can describe the approach is to teach language learning from the inside-out and it seems I have spent most of my career focussing on an ‘outside-in’ approach! I have found it really refreshing to actually think and reflect on ‘how’ learners actually acquire language as opposed to ‘what’ they are ‘learning’ or curriculum coverage and content. It has made me realise how poorly constructed and ill-thought out many textbooks and courses are and has been very illuminating in this regard. I have already undertaken some training with my colleagues before we started teaching this year in Year 7 and look forward to taking this further into Year 8. There is so much we are learning and at the moment we are really ‘slow’ at getting through things as it feels quite new and a bit clunky in places but I know that as we become more proficient in the teaching and increase our understanding of the approach, we will continue to improve. It’s has been really fascinating and I look forward to taking my knowledge and practice to the next level.”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

I have found the NCELP approach and research to teaching in preparation for the new GCSE enlightening. The amount of work that has gone in order to prepare SOWs and resources so meticulously is astonishing and I am sure, will prove very useful. I have found all the modules very interesting and have appreciated the ability to do the course in the asynchronous self study way. I am hoping to start using these resources with our Y7 and 8 pupils, starting with the phonics materials.”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

I was recommended to do this course as part of my teacher training in order to allow me a different insight into another way of teaching Spanish. Prior to this I had not even heard of NCELP. I have found the research in the pre-reading to be very informative and helpful.”

Becky Sawyer Head of French, Stafford Manor High School, February 2023

Great to meet like-minded language teachers; helpful course looking at actual resources”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2023

I heard about NCELP from my Head of Department. We are adapting our Scheme of Learning to incorporate NCELP lessons into KS3 in preparation for the new GCSE. I signed up for the CPD in September 2022 in the hope that I would improve my teaching style of the NCELP resources. I have found the online Teach Meets really useful. I have discussed some of what I have learnt with my departmental colleagues.”

Lynne Kay Newcastle University, January 2023

“First of all, I would like to thank Jane Wood and Gill Piazzi for their warm welcome and being our hosts for the morning. At the start and end of the morning, both Jane and Gill demonstrated and talked us through segments of their schemes of work, which were extremely well-organised, showing a very clear roadmap of progress. Apart from systematic retrieval and phonics practice in each lesson, and the teaching of grammar features in pairs, there was also a strong focus on culture and use of extended texts. In line with NCELP’s principles, as part of their progression model in lessons, there was ample receptive input practice prior to productive use of the language. It was clear that using NCELP schemes of work was very much a departmental approach. All team members had collaborated on adapting and further refining NCELP’s lesson resources, (including the very supportive and engaging language guides and work booklets), thus building in further differentiation to suit their own learners’ needs, especially their lower proficiency learners. This served to strengthen consistency of approach across the department and ensured that their learners had a parity of lesson experience. As guests, we had the pleasure of observing 4 classes from Y7-8, sets 1 and 5, in both French and Spanish. In each lesson observed, pupils were provided with opportunities to incrementally build on their phonics knowledge, which impacted positively on their willingness and ability to speak the target language. Their pronunciation was indeed impressive, including that of lower proficiency learners, who not only clearly enjoyed showing off their phonics knowledge (SSCs, SFCs) and pronunciation, but also their good recall of previously learnt vocabulary and grammar. It was impressive to observe learners’ confidence in applying their grammatical knowledge to build sentences independently in interaction tasks and using ‘metalanguage’ to explain such grammatical concepts as the difference between ‘ser’ and ‘estar’, plural forms of ‘tener’ and even, in set 5, revising the full verb paradigm of ‘comer’ in different contexts, for a forthcoming assessment. Other examples of grammatical terminology included pupils explaining and using infinitives, verb conjugations, adjectival agreements, intensifiers, BAGS & position of adjectives. The higher proficiency learners responded to questions in the target language (e.g. Que significa…en ingles? with rubrics also in the target language. In each lesson observed, both lower and higher proficiency learners appeared fully engaged, demonstrating not only resilience and perseverance but also high levels of confidence and enthusiasm, clearly enjoying success and a sense of fun and achievement. As is typical of most language learners, they enjoyed playing games such as ‘beat the teacher’, taking their points scored very seriously. This overall sense of achievement seemed to further strengthen their motivation and enjoyment, especially when completing tasks that required high levels of concentration and good recall of vocabulary and sometimes quite complex grammatical knowledge. This would certainly stand them in good stead for their imminent planned assessment, for which they had been revising. Thank you for the opportunity to observe first-hand how NCELP SoWs and principles are being delivered in the KS3 classroom.”

Miranda Fowler Head of French, Maidstone Grammar School, January 2023

An extremely useful opportunity to see the NCELP resources in use in the classroom – I was particularly struck by their French accents in year 9 which were remarkably accurate. Clearly this approach leads to confidence with speaking skills. I also really enjoyed observing a German lesson as a non-speaker and working through the phonics activities. I was able to put myself in the shoes of a student and felt really confident with the sounds by the end of the activity!”

CPD Teacher feedback January, 2023

I am a Lead Practitioner designing a Trust wide Spanish curriculum using NCELP’s principles and high-frequency core vocabulary. This course has very much cemented my understanding of the NCELP approach and rationale and given me further context especially in the thinking behind designing assessments. I found the cultural capital element most interesting and engaging as this is something I feel is very important for the socio-economic context of our learners (one of most deprived in UK). I have discussed NCELP’s rationale and curriculum design with MFL colleagues across the Trust and my manager, and we are now looking at designing and sharing new assessments following the NCELP guidelines, in line with the new GCSE format.”

CPD Teacher feedback January, 2023

I found out about NCELP resources while doing supply work in a secondary school. I was impressed with some of the materials used and the methodology was different. I signed up for the course in order to find out if I could get new ideas that I could use in the classroom. The module, I found very useful was the phonics. It should be incorporated into the curriculum and in my case I think it will increase my students’ confidence especially for the speaking activities.”

Karen Davey Deputy Headteacher, The Malling School, January 2023

Our school recently adopted the NCELP curriculum with year 7 students following a visit and recommendation from Ian Bauckham last year. On behalf of our MFL teachers, students and leadership team I just wanted to pass on our gratitude for the enormous amount of thought and meticulous planning that has gone into the curriculum resources and corresponding CPD. Our MFL team have revolutionised their teaching as a result of your programme and training and we have seen students’ progress and motivation improve dramatically in a short space of time. Staff and students are much more enthusiastic about teaching and learning languages again as a result of your programme and how easy it is to deliver, so thank you. We are excited to see how this develops in the future as we embed the course into other year groups.”

CPD Teacher feedback January, 2023

I have found this course extremely informative. The research documents were well chosen and I would not have come across them in my own reading. My particular interests have been on the vocabulary and grammar learning modules and I will take away a lot of information to cascade across the department.”

Angel Mina Head of MFL, Stoke Newington School, December 2022

“I wanted to let you know that we do not regret at all having fully adopted your methodology and informally becoming an NCELP school.

Students are engaged and they can see their progress taking place in an effective sequence. You have produced resources and a rationale that allow students to move towards language manipulation.

I have been in this Hackney school for 20 years and we have used all kind of approaches. Some of them really good and some on the other extreme. However, NCELP is making a major difference because students who historically rarely engaged or gained proper access to language learning are now more motivated and there is a noticeable difference in their performance.

We believe there are no magical formulas, but NCELP deserves our full praise.

Jon Merrison PGCE lecturer at Plymouth, December 2022

As lead practitioner for primary languages at the University of Plymouth’s Institute of Education, I am responsible for ensuring that our primary BEd and PGCE students are exposed to the most relevant research and resourcing at this formative stage in their career. I draw on NCELP’s resources to design my sessions, and use the Key Stage Two schemes of work hosted on Rachel Hawkes’ website to exemplify best practice in primary languages pedagogy. The students I work with are committed to the development of primary languages teaching and excited by the ambition in these schemes of work. They feel supported by the careful sequencing of a language-driven approach to curriculum design, and by the integration of native speaker modelling; the latter is hugely supportive of non-specialist teachers, both in the delivery of their teaching but also in the development of their own subject knowledge.”

A Nearn MFL teacher, KEVI LSG, December 2022

The course was extremely insightful and delivered in a way that was accessible and engaging. Thoroughly enjoyed.”

CPD Teacher feedback December, 2022

It is always refreshing to hear Rachel as she clearly and professionally sets a compelling vision for how languages can be taught. Thank you!”

CPD Teacher feedback November, 2022

The rationale of how you can teach Grammar is truly enlightening and I really enjoyed working through the resources provided and analysing their structure and sequencing”

Lynne Kay Newcastle University, November 2022

Very engaging and interesting. Useful reminders of rationale, key principles, and engagement with practical strategies. Good to hear about individual school contexts and their experiences of implementing the SoWs and the gradual impact on students’ motivation, progress and achievement. I feel I have gained insights that i can usefully share with my student teachers, who will in turn spread the word in their MFL departments.”

Sophie Summers Head of Department, King Edwards VI Northfield School for Girls, November 2022

Really useful and informative CPD session which will definitely have a major impact on the planning and development of our KS3 curriculum.”

CPD Teacher feedback November, 2022

I signed up for the course as I wanted to develop my knowledge around this way of teaching an also in order to help my students to prepare for their GCSEs in the future. As a result of the course, I have trialled some of the material with my classes which has been successful. Now that I have completed the course, I will start to train the other members of my team and I wanted a holistic view rather than just feeding back to them after every unit. I have found the course to be very useful.”

Invana Stanley Melbourn Village College, Cam Academy Trust, November 2022

Really thought-provoking and interesting. Very useful indeed. I would recommend to anyone planning for the new GCSE.”

CPD Teacher feedback October, 2022

I really like the thought process and the layout of the slides for the individual SSCs. These are easy to use, great for anyone who isn’t already deeply familiar with the linguistics of the language and easy to incorporate into teaching.”

Lindsay Morlock Education Lecturer, Northumbria University

“I will definitely be drawing on several of these slides in my sessions with incoming MFL trainees over the summer. I find the NCELP presentation of research so accessible, and it’s extremely useful to have so many of the key ideas we use and engage with distilled into a format that’s ‘ready to go’.”

Ashleigh Jackson Assistant Head, Swanmore

It was amazing and I am very motivated to take on your teaching and learning practice. I feel more confident on the new gcse specification and the reasoning behind it.”

Megan Gritti MFL teacher, Crofton School, October 2022

I have just started at a school using the NCELP SoW and this session has helped me a lot understand the pedagogy behind it. Very helpful”

CPD Teacher feedback October, 2022

“My Principle sent me the course as she had heard about it. After researching the course and NCELP, I was very keen to take part. I knew it would benefit me as a MFL curriculum lead. I appreciate the structure of the course, it was very clear and dealt with the key areas relevant to our posts. I am particularly keen to focus on phonics and to keep improving our culture offer. Thank you very much.”

Brogan Matthews KS3 Lead, Bay House

I found the course extremely helpful and feel I can apply what I have learned to make the learning journey more successful for the pupils.”

CPD Teacher feedback October, 2022

Very good to have ready made resources to use in the classroom or to adapt them”

Hedina Benzina MFL Teacher, October 2022

I am in awe of the research, meticulous planning and resource making of the NCELP team and the commitment of the course leaders. In what has become a very challenging teaching context, it really is motivating to be able to share our passion for MFL teaching.”

CPD Teacher feedback September, 2022

A very comprehensive introduction to the rationale behind your approach. I am so impressed with the level of details gone into these resources – it makes our textbook look rubbish and it’s all free! Amazing! Thank you so much”

James Rivett Head of Spanish, Whitley Bay High School

This was such a useful session, building upon my previous synchronous instructor-led CPD NCELP course from last year. The spotlight on phonics can never be underestimated and NCELP have saved teachers hours of work by providing readily adaptable resources to meet a wide range and variety of different teaching contexts for French, German and Spanish.”

KS3 Student Feedback

I found the phonics lessons important because it was hard to revise and learn at home (for example I could easily practise reading and writing from the textbook). I also think that pronunciation was quite hard in German because of long and short vowels and the difference in umlaut sounds. Overall, I enjoyed phonics!”

CPD Teacher feedback September, 2022

I heard of NCELP on social media, I did the course as I was curious to find out about it and how it related to the new GCSE. I found the course informative and something to consider as to how languages could be taught in KS3 to assist in progress of learning and in preparation for the new MFL GCSEs.”

CPD Teacher feedback September, 2022

Loads of very useful and helpful information shared. Jane explains the content really clearly and has made the session very accessible.”

Jordan Wilson MFL Teacher

The use of NCELP has been extremely beneficial in the delivery of MFL lessons. As a maths teacher teaching Spanish as a 2nd subject I have found the resources that the HoD [who is involved in the NCELP project] has come back with to be extremely helpful.”

CPD Teacher feedback September, 2022

I have really enjoyed engaging with this excellent course provided by NCELP. I congratulate NCELP members on their meticulous research into language pedagogy and their ability to synthesise this information and communicate it clearly and effectively to MFL teachers. I have found the modules to be thought-provoking and chime with what I learnt during my PGCE many years ago. It has revitalised my wish to continue to be a reflective practitioner. The NCELP materials have been beautifully designed and well put-together and stand up to robust scrutiny. We have started to use the phonics materials in our school and hope to use the principles if not more of the NCELP materials in the classroom.”

CPD Teacher feedback September, 2022

The course leader is knowledgeable and approachable, made sure we could follow the materials, understood the information being presented, shared their own experiences and views, commented on ours. I found the session engaging and enjoyed sharing my own experience and hearing about the others.”

CPD Teacher feedback September, 2022

Very clear presentation, which included rationale for the thinking behind the scheme of work. Easy presenter style which made the content easy to follow.”

CPD Teacher feedback September, 2022

I like the fact that it is not only research based but also provides very practical examples and ready-to-use activities in the classroom from the very next day. An excellent module and an excellent set of resources.”

Jerome Teacher of Spanish and French. James Allen’s Girls’ School

Many thanks for the perfect pace of presentation and clear and informational PowerPoint. I learnt all I needed in this short session and feel that I know enough to start preparing for this next GCSE in MFL.”

CPD Teacher feedback

I liked to see the different resources and activities shown and the fact that it gave us so much food for thought about our curriculum and how to embrace changes.”

CPD Teacher feedback

I found NCELP online when looking for support with changes to MFL GCSEs. I hoped to be better able to plan, prepare and teach the necessary language to encourage, equip and enable my learners. I found it very comprehensive, full of valuable research that can be applied in the classroom, along with plenty of useful resources for any size/type of school. As a HoD in a very small school, I found this invaluable to help me appreciate what we already do well, but where we might improve and do things differently – especially when selecting resources and types of task.”

CPD Teacher feedback

Highly engaging and informative. I appreciated the presenter’s passion and enthusiasm, which was very inspiring. Great to hear about other school practitioners’ experiences and impact of NCELP resources and strategies on their pupils’ phonological understanding, decoding and sense of achievement and agency.”

CPD Teacher feedback

I have been impressed by the detailed planning of every word, the vision of what the end product will be as far as the resources and the Pedagogy are concerned. The Phonics pillar is a huge success as far as I can see. It has made us wonder why we haven’t done it before. It is helping all other skills. It is perhaps the easiest to use with other materials, has a big impact quite quickly and it is easy to have an overview of it all. It is good to know that the resources are ready made and you don’t have to make yet another PPT but you can’t dip in and out without a real understanding of the approach. The Grammar works. Year 7s can do plural nouns better than Year 11 and I am convinced they will be in a better position at GCSE to tackle a range of task and texts on a variety of topics even if they are not prepared in the usual way. The new approach has given me new energy for teaching MFL. I am enjoying the challenge of a different approach. Teaching phonics and listening to the students’ lovely pronunciation is a joy. Even if they forget some SSCs, I know we can recap and it will work again! It is highly motivating for them and me. Tongue Twisters have become such fun because they can do them. Vocabulary learning is something we have all been doing for ever. The expectation that it should remain in their heads for instant recall is what we have aimed for but the NCELP materials have this built in. The research-based approaches work!”

Kelly Furness Head of MFL

I am Head of Modern Foreign Languages in a private school in Dubai, and we are currently in our second year of introducing Spanish to the curriculum. I was very excited to learn all about the work of NCELP, and jumped at the chance to learn more about this approach and its basis in academic research and literature. We are now changing to an NCELP-based approach across KS3 Spanish and if all goes well with this pilot, we will shortly adapt our French teaching also. A huge thank you to all the team at NCELP!”

CPD Teacher feedback

We have been using the NCELP resources with our Year 7 and Year 8 German classes this year and are blown away by what our pupils can already do. They are more accurate in their pronunciation and their writing is really accurate and creative!.And all this without teaching them topics! Plus we as teachers are using more target language than ever before so that’s another box ticked. In short, the resources are fab, the kids feel successful and it has truly transformed our teaching!”

Alice Harrison Head of Languages, Reddish Vale High School

Thank you NCELP. Merci! Danke! ¡Gracias! This course has answered many questions and I wish I had known all this years ago! The NCELP approach is so different to they way I have been planning and teaching for many years. I was very concerned about the old style curriculum with its reliance on topics with their potential for disadvantaging those with less relevant experience to draw on. I also felt that most pupils had a veneer of fluency but in reality had little ability to build their own sentences and pronounce new words confidently. The course has helped me to understand how to avoid these pitfalls and I am very optimistic about the future of language learning!”

CPD Teacher feedback

We have been using the NCELP resources with our Year 7 and Year 8 German classes this year and are blown away by what our pupils can already do. They are more accurate in their pronunciation and their writing is really accurate and creative! And all this without teaching them topics! Plus we as teachers are using more target language than ever before so that’s another box ticked. In short, the resources are fab, the kids feel successful and it has truly transformed our teaching!”

CPD Teacher feedback

Thanks – a really useful session and great food for thought. As a new MFL teacher whose school is very keen on sentence builders, I’m very interested to hear an alternative approach about the importance of teaching grammar explicitly (as I was taught at school and an approach I personally favour). Also, it’s really interesting that there is a trend for going back to the idea of teaching individual words which can be applied to different contexts rather than ‘chunking’. I wonder if there is space for both approaches to be used alongside each other – or whether they are incompatible? Thanks again – some really interesting stuff.”

Kathryn Russ Teacher of Spanish and NCELP Specialist Teacher, Presdales School (Lead School)

We gave our Year 7s a language aptitude test this year for the first time and used the resource from the February Residential. Thank you for the idea! I planned a lesson around the test for the Department, incorporating some of the other materials from your PowerPoint. Feedback from the other teachers who taught it was really positive and the students were engaged in the pattern-recognition and problem-solving – so thank you very much for the great resources! We don’t set our Year 7s for languages (they all do French in their teaching groups and then choose a second language too) but we thought the results of the aptitude test could be useful as baseline data. Thank you!”

Juliette Robinson Curriculum Leader Languages, Thomas Tallis School

“”Excellent and inspirational – extraordinary knowledge of the minucia of languages teaching.”

P Corrigan Head of Depament, Cranbourne

“A really fantastic training session, thank you, Rachel and thank you, Mark, for getting us such a brilliant presenter in Rachel. I think Rachel is evangelical in our field and have followed and used her pedagogy in my classroom for year – with my own too! Ha!ha! A really valuable training session.”

Webinar Attendee At an NCELP webinar hosted by Bath Spa University

“I wanted to pass on my thanks for the course yesterday led by Rachel and Nick about designing a KS3 and KS4 curriculum. Probably the best course I have ever been to and certainly the one with the most helpful resources. Such exciting food for thought.”

CPD Teacher feedback

“Most useful training I’ve had in my career as a primary mfl lead. Nothing like this has been made available to me previously. Complete expert. Able to answer all questions thrown at her. Thank you Rachael!”

CPD Teacher feedback

“Really well organised, engaging and easy to follow with a lot of effort put in from teachers. Great to see their enthusiasm about participating in the project and how well their students are doing!”

“Having had some CPD previously on the NCELP schemes of work at ALL Yorkshire/Humber events, I really appreciated seeing the application of the resources by teachers. I would very much like to see NCELP being a nation-wide approach being taken into Key Stage 4. Thank you so much for an excellent conference!”

“The session was helpful and made me realise that with NCELP teaching MFL shouldn’t be stressful or boring but engaging and fun.”

“I thought the presenters were really good – they spoke with knowledge and experience of what NCELP is doing. Real teachers with real experience – this is so valuable.”

Gina Ossa Subject Leader Spanish, Sydenham School

“I love your teaching and learning philosophy. I have done all the CPDs and I realised that I think the same and it is wonderful to find support and the space to develop” 

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2022

Very thought provoking and helpful to adapt teaching as we move forward!

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2022

Well delivered and clearly explained.

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2022

Absolutely blown away by the amount of work that has gone into these resources! Thank you so much!.

Petra Auzinger Head of German, St. Richard's Catholic College

“We have just recently started using your fabulous resources with our Year 7 German group and I have also signed up to the CPD twilights starting in January. We are amazed at what the Year 7s can do already and how confident they are getting in their speaking. My colleague and I have also found that we are using a lot more target language.”

Jenni Bindon Executive Director of MFL, Westcountry Schools Trust

“It was really useful to have the opportunity to ask the course leaders questions”

KS3 Student Feedback

I really enjoyed the phonics lessons. I found that the phonics helped with my pronunciation especially with letters with umlauts. There were also words where the vowels were shorter and longer so this gave me an understanding of how to say these words.”

CPD Teacher feedback February, 2022

As an experienced MFL teacher and subject leader, I would wholeheartedly recommend this course. I really liked the fact that it was split into different sessions, allowing for reflection time and space to trial ideas between them. Our facilitator was knowledgeable and perhaps most importantly, an MFL teacher herself. As such, she could give us some great insight into how the NCELP curriculum design had impacted on the progress of her own students. It was refreshing to feel truly inspired by CPD and it has really made me think about my own approach to curriculum as I look towards the new GCSE and the challenges and opportunities it will bring.”

Emma Rosetti MFL Curriculum Leader, Kingdown School

“Very clear, comprehensive and informative. I now feel that I have a better understanding of the differences between the old and new language specifications.”

Helen Millar Facey Head of department, St Joseph Catholic School

Very informative. Very clear implication on teaching and learning.”

CPD Teacher feedback

Very useful tips included, excellent clarity in terms of the explanations and the structure of the presentation and accompanying resource. Thank you.”

CPD Teacher feedback

Really informative and thank you for signposting more resources to help us planning for these changes!”

Mel Yates CPD Course Leader

I have been impressed by the detailed planning of every word, the vision of what the end product will be as far as the resources and the Pedagogy are concerned. The Phonics pillar is a huge success as far as I can see. It has made us wonder why we haven’t done it before. It is helping all other skills. It is perhaps the easiest to use with other materials, has a big impact quite quickly and it is easy to have an overview of it all. It is good to know that the resources are ready made and you don’t have to make yet another PPT but you can’t dip in and out without a real understanding of the approach. The Grammar works. Year 7s can do plural nouns better than Year 11 and I am convinced they will be in a better position at GCSE to tackle a range of task and texts on a variety of topics even if they are not prepared in the usual way. The new approach has given me new energy for teaching MFL. I am enjoying the challenge of a different approach. Teaching phonics and listening to the students’ lovely pronunciation is a joy. Even if they forget some SSCs, I know we can recap and it will work again! It is highly motivating for them and me. Tongue Twisters have become such fun because they can do them. Vocabulary learning is something we have all been doing for ever. The expectation that it should remain in their heads for instant recall is what we have aimed for but the NCELP materials have this built in. The research-based approaches work!”

CPD Teacher feedback

Ms Webster showed clear understanding and knowledge on the new GCSE and the similarities/differences in relation to the current one. The session was delivered in a very clear way which made it easy to understand and follow.”

CPD Teacher feedback

I’ve loved seeing the rewards in the department, seeing the learning gains in Y8. Progress in the last six weeks has been incredible, they’re so positive about it, too. Previously you might have seen the students like the topic “holidays” more than “school”, but that was nothing compared to the motivation in students to complete learning tasks in class now. They don’t cheat in speaking tasks because they don’t need to, they can do it, and they know they’re making progress.”

Blanca Roman CPD Course Leader

I really believe in this approach. I see the positive effect in my school and our hub schools. I am looking forward to the prospect of spreading it further to lots more schools.”

CPD Teacher feedback

I’ve been asked about students who are going to sit the existing GCSE and if an NCELP-style SoW is good preparation. I have to say yes. Course books don’t have enough phonics, for example. The systematic NCELP approach shines such a light on phonics – I am so impressed with the pronunciation of our current Y8 students. And high frequency vocabulary is absolutely needed for the current GCSE.”

Jenny Hopper CPD Course Leader

I love it. It’s come maybe 10 years too late in my career, but it’s so amazing that I had to be involved. It’s re-energising the way languages are taught right across a department. I’m teaching it and thinking ‘why have I never done it like this before?’ I am so convinced about the richness of this model.”

CPD Teacher feedback

I feel passionate about the pedagogy, and I’m doing lots of training locally. I’ve been told: “it’s not going to work for lower ability”. I said you wouldn’t just take a text book and just use it. NCELP has provided a road map – it’s the teacher’s job to iron out bumps in the road. That is our job – be prepared to adapt for your classes. We are doing it and it’s working and I want to share it. We’re living it in the classroom.”

Charlotte Wallace Faculty Leader for MFL, Moor Park High School and Sixth Form

In terms of teaching some of the grammar areas such as direct object pronouns/personal ‘a’ sequence and gustar- type verbs with indirect object pronouns, whilst we always made students aware of these things, it was never taught in detail at this level. We have found that it was actually very well received when taught using the NCELP format and has certainly boosted our confidence in approaching these areas.”

CPD Teacher feedback

I am passionate about this. We’ve lost the path in this country – we do what’s needed to get students through exams with strategies, the ‘frilly bits around the edges’. The NCELP approach has infused all areas of my teaching. Now I’m really teaching languages rather than teaching skills to pass a GCSE.”

CPD Teacher feedback

Excellent! I feel so much more confident now as a new teacher and excited about the new GCSE”

CPD Teacher feedback

We have been using all of the NCELP resources with our KS3 and they are stunning. The quality of them, the fact that they come with homework, research and explanatory notes is amazing. The included listening is invaluable.”

Dr Ben Parsons Assistant Head, Sir William Borlase’s Grammar School (former Lead School)

We’re really pleased we can continue to contribute to this great work. It’s become a significant part of the buzz around teaching and learning in school, within our hub and broader outreach activity locally.”

Nina Fox Head of MFL, St George's School

Thank you all so much for all your expertise and efforts – I’m new to HOD in the past 3 months so you’ve opened my mind and inspired me to work on adapting my SOWs and getting my team of teachers on board to the NCELP way of thinking & working.”

Claudia Camp The City of Leicester College

I wanted to say I love all the resources and the work put into them is amazing. We’ve been wanting to change and update our SOW in my school to something more systematic for a while, and this is such a great set of resources for us to start using. I’m really looking forward to using it next academic year. I attended the ALL 4 London session with Rachel Hawkes and couldn’t wait to get online and download everything and get my head around all the resources.”

Robert Pugsley Head of MFL, The Victory Academy

I am very much looking forward to embracing the NCELP Yr 7 French and Spanish Schemes of Work from September in my department. Both myself and my languages team are most passionate about your grammar teaching sequencing, resources and vocabulary lists.”

Angel Donnelly Dr Challoner’s High School, Buckinghamshire

I just wanted to say a big thank you for the wonderful Hub Day Webinar last Friday. It was such a delight to be re-engaged in thinking about the subject I love, seeing all your hard work from the last couple of years, and I am looking forward to trying out new ideas and techniques. I am grateful to all the contributors, and the whole day was incredibly slick, despite remote working.”

CPD Teacher feedback

“I wanted to pass on my thanks for the course yesterday led by Rachel and Nick about designing a KS3 and KS4 curriculum. Probably the best course I have ever been to and certainly the one with the most helpful resources. Such exciting food for thought.”

CPD Teacher feedback

“Very well presented and clear. Great double-act. Lots of support given to those who were struggling with certain things. What really surprises me though is how much teachers expect from NCELP. The resources are FREE, FULLY EDITABLE & ADAPTABLE, with audio incorporated and high quality and consistently good, but they always seem to want more. The text book companies charge a fortune and still we don’t get the editing rights. If everyone worked together more we could all easily create a fantastic pool of differentiated resources.”

Jacqueline Lambert Head of Languages, Neatherd High School

My team and I are really impressed with the amount of research and careful planning that has gone into the development of the schemes of work and resources. It is reassuring to know that vocabulary and grammar are mapped so carefully to ensure retrieval and retention throughout KS3 and that students will gain confidence in grammar that is at the same time ambitious and manageable. Our students have already responded very positively to these lessons and we are pleased to see that students who were previously disenchanted with languages are suddenly thriving. We look forward to rolling these schemes of work out with other year groups and have high hopes for the future. Many thanks!”

Lucy Meyer Head of MFL, Bexley Grammar School

This was one of the most thought-provoking and useful CPD sessions I’ve attended in a long time! It was a joy to have a session be so focussed on MFL pedagogy, with free resources and assessments, based on the latest research, and all feeding into the forthcoming GCSE syllabus. Clearly explained and modelled, there was lots to take away and discuss with my leadership team – we will be adapting and implementing many of the ideas, our schemes of work and assessments as a consequence. Thank you so much to all involved in the research, the creation of the materials and delivery of the CPD!”

David Spence Assistant Headteacher, Orchard School Bristol

I work closely with a previous NCELP Specialist Teacher who is doing great work in reforming our school’s MFL curriculum along NCELP principles. It is really exciting. I can see the progress students are making over time so clearly and it is because of the consistency of the methodology and approach on vocabulary, phonics and grammar. In what is now our second year of working this way I can point to how the materials, with that emphasis on repetition and then retrieval, have really supported to move knowledge into longer-term memory”

Stephanie Cross Head of German, Dartford Grammar School

It is great seeing what students are now capable of working with, and also how we are slowly transitioning into KS4-style tasks. As always, wonderful explanations throughout all materials. As a teacher, I will be sure to use them with older year groups as well. Danke!”

Kate Stent Taunton School

After attending the online session last week, at last, I felt excited to be a languages teacher as I have been getting increasingly disillusioned over the last few years – and thinking about leaving the profession. I felt there was some really serious thinking behind the NCELP schemes of work and resources. I have raised with my department here the exciting glimmer of hope you offer the languages world in teaching.”