This event took place on 22 March 2023. You can watch a recording of the event above.
About the webinar
Have you ever wondered about the benefits a Modern Language Assistant can bring to your classroom? Are you keen for your institution to host a language assistant but are wondering how to convince your leadership team?
Modern Language Assistants can help students in the UK build their cultural capital by developing their linguistic and cross-cultural skills. A real-life foreign language speaker is an additional resource for you in the classroom giving context to language learning, talking about their experiences in their home culture and inspiring students to develop their ability to communicate their own world views.
Watch the video above to hear first-hand experience of the benefits of having an MLA in your classroom and how we at the British Council can support you.
Our webinar panel
Candida Javaid, Head of German, The Royal Grammar School, High Wycombe.
Candida has been teaching languages in the UK since 2005. Her main interests are pedagogy and language acquisition. She has an MA in Education and in 2020 she completed the Chartered Teacher Programme, where her final research project focused on how support materials modelling a teaching activity can improve student confidence in using authentic texts in the KS3 MFL classroom. She lives with her family in Oxford
Vicky Gough, lead for Modern Foreign Languages in the UK, the British Council.
Vicky has managed a number of programmes and activities that support the teaching and learning of languages in the UK and bring an intercultural dimension to language learning. She has produced resources to introduce young people to other languages and cultures and to motivate young people to continue with languages to GCSE and beyond.
Mark Kingswood, Secondary Inspector/Adviser at Hampshire County Council.
Mark has been headteacher of two secondary schools, in which language teaching has been both engaging and successful, and accessible to all learners. As both a subject leader and senior leader, Mark has led single-school and collaborative Foreign Language Assistant (FLA) schemes and seen the joy and benefits this can bring to language learning for young people. He has taught French, German and Spanish to A-Level and to adult learners, as well as being the strategic lead for a programme of Key Stage 2 languages across a large cluster of Primary schools.
Mark is currently establishing a collaborative FLA programme for secondary and primary schools in a large local authority in the south of England.