A celebration of languages

¡Hola! Guten Tag! Privet! Olá! Ni hao … 

Language week for Elstree Prep

Last week, Elstree enjoyed its annual event of celebrating languages and cultures. The week is a popular and competitive affair where pupils immerse themselves in languages and culture, compete in houses, and experience an array of European dishes.

Elstree is fortunate to have a number of international students, including those from Spain and Italy. They bring a wealth of experience and knowledge of their countries and first languages, which also helps educate our English-speaking pupils.

East House Year 8 kick-started the week of celebration with their language assembly. Houses – North, South, East and West – competed against each other in language challenges, presentations and quizzes, which proved to be very popular, especially the postcard challenge. This year the overall winners were East!

Head of Modern Foreign Languages Madame Simonin said:

“Our Heads of Houses played a brilliant part motivating their troops in the competitions. There was a fantastic House spirit throughout.  A special thanks to all the Staff and Gappers for taking part in the Teacher language challenge.”

Language week for Elstree Pre-Prep

To coincide with Elstree Prep’s Language Week, Pre-Prep were challenged to learn a new way of saying ‘Hello’.   They celebrated languages and talked about the differences, reading ‘The Skin I’m In’.  The languages they spoke were then added to others the children discovered from home on to a display board.

Akinniran shared ‘Ekaaro’ which is a native west African way of saying hello. This is the language his father speaks. Sophie taught us ‘Namaste’, the Hindi way of saying hello, and Bruce in Nursery helped us to learn ‘Ahoj’, which is Slovakian for hello.

European culinary delights

Just to add to the European flavour, Lara and her Catering Team organised a delicious lunch of culinary delights including:

Minestrone Soup from Italy 
Beef Bourgignon from France 
Butternut Squash Goulash from Hungary 
Roast Potatoes from England and Tres Leche Cake from Spain.

Which languages are taught at Elstree?

In the Pre-Prep, French is taught once a week to everyone from Nursery upwards. There is also a French after school club on Mondays, which in the warmer, drier months, holds its French lessons outside and treats the children to French snacks.

French is continued to be taught throughout the Prep School, with Spanish now being taught from Year 5 and Latin from Year 6. 

Year 7 French Trip

Every year, Year 7 go on a School French trip to Normandy, where they have the opportunity to practise their French in an authentic context.