‘Raising The Game’ MFL Conference

Following the overwhelmingly positive feedback received at previous Joined-Up Languages conferences in 2010 and 2011, a cross-phase conference will take place on Wednesday une 20^th at the Wyboston Lakes Training Centre  (The Willows Centre, Wyboston Lakes, Great North Road, Wyboston, Bedfordshire, MK44 3BA). The conference will feature of excellent speakers who to inspire teachers of languages in all phases.  Talks and workshops will include:

•  A keynote speech from Teresa Tinsley, formerly Director of Communications at CILT (the National Centre for Languages).  She is a mine of information about the current situation for languages in the UK and beyond.
• ‘Making the new Ofsted Framework work for YOU!’  2 sessions – 1 for Primary and 1 for Secondary – led by Jenny Carpenter, Adviser for Modern Languages, London Borough of Barking and Dagenham.  Really useful, practical advice and guidance.
• Jackie Rayment, Languages Adviser for Hertfordshire, will lead sessions on the Olympics and also ‘Raising the Game in Key Stage 3’.
  
• There will also be input from the British Council about their support for languages and International Learning.

And much more!

This is a great opportunity to network with teachers both locally and regionally – lots of comfy chairs at the venue for a ‘good old chin wag!’

The cost is £95 per delegate (conference materials, two course hot or cold lunch (including vegetarian options), unlimited tea/coffee throughout the day and free resources included).  Also masses of free resources to take away to support your language teaching and learning.

For further information please contact Jan Lewandowski, Consultant for Languages and International Learning jan.lewandowski@bedford.gov.uk

New Horizons

We’ve had some changes here at Wildgoose in the last few weeks. Darren Bell, who dealt our Education Sales, has moved on to a new challenge. We’ll all miss him, and the office is certainly quieter since he’s been gone!

But changes can bring new opportunities, and we are excited that Michael Dodson has been appointed to take over Darren’s responsibilities, and develop the areas that Darren was working in. Michael has worked at Wildgoose for 6 years as Despatch Manager, and now, as Commercial Manager, he is well-placed to continue to build on our existing commercial relationships.

As a long-serving, hands-on member of the well-established team, Michael has extensive knowledge of the Wildgoose range of products, including an understanding of how the resources are produced and the possibilities for product development. And as a father of two school-age children, he has a keen interest in the curriculum and the production of quality teaching resources. In the next few weeks Michael will be working on his ideas to continue to improve the service that Wildgoose provides, to both trade and school customers. The Wildgoose brand is something that we’re all proud of: we have a well-deserved reputation for creating excellent resources, particularly geographical resources; our customer service is exceptional; and we are small enough to really care about our customers. We’re delighted that Michael is going to help us to continue the good work!

Olympic Park – a changing picture

We all know about the Games coming up this summer – it would be hard to miss them! And most schools will be using the occasion as an opportunity to engage learners. It’s an ideal theme to motivate even the most reluctant pupil, with the chance to take off in different directions.

As a cross-curricular project, pupils can look at writing sports reports, investigating the competing countries, calculating distances competitors will travel, urban regeneration, world records, unusual sports, design of sportswear and equipment, the history of the Games and so on. The only limit is time and imagination!

At Wildgoose we’ve approached the subject from a slightly different angle; among other things, we are specialists in aerial photography, and we have access to up-to-date and archive aerial photos. Our special pack includes 3 aerial photos of the Olympic Park site in east London, dating from 1960 to 2010. It’s fascinating to look at the same site over the course of time to see how the land use has changed, and the learning potential is huge. The photos come with comprehensive plans for a full cross-curricular topic, or the teaching ideas can be dipped into for inspiration.

We believe that it’s important to celebrate the fact that the Games are coming to the UK, and we think we’ve come up with a great resource to help.

 

Sparkly Celebrations

As celebrations to mark the Queen’s sixtieth anniversary of her ascension to throne begin in earnest, schools will be searching out resources to support cross-curricular teaching and community celebrations. At Wildgoose we’ve introduced a special edition of our best-selling Coronation Day photopack which puts the occasion into historical context. We’ll also be offering bunting and other resources for your Diamond Jubilee celebrations.

The Queen came to the throne on the 6^th February 1952 following the death of her father King George VI at the age of 56. The 25 year-old Princess, on tour in Kenya at the time, returned to England; she was immediately proclaimed Queen. She was crowned Queen Elizabeth II in a glittering ceremony at Westminster Abbey in London on 2^nd of June 1953.

The Wildgoose Coronation Day Photopack contains a 100 x 170 cm poster illustrating the ceremony – great for classroom display – as well as sixteen A4 photographs depicting the event and the nation’s celebrations. Our twentieth and twenty-first century timelines highlight significant social and technological milestones during the queen’s reign. The Jubilee itself offers lots of opportunities for cross-curricular teaching, including studies of families in general, the impact and significance of our own royal family and a look at the events of the early 1950s in the context of twentieth-century history. And we have an extra day off!

2012, here we come!

Wildgoose has released its brand new catalogues for 2012.  This year we have condensed all of the subjects that we cover into one catalogue for Primary teachers and another for Secondary teachers, to lessen our impact on the environment – after all, every little bit helps!

Our bespoke aerial photographic products continue to be as popular as ever.  As our sister company Bluesky International is a supplier of the photography to Google, we often have more recent imagery available than that shown on Google Earth – just give us a call and we can let you know when your area was last flown. Our new Secondary Classroom Pack includes multiple copies of aerial photographs, Ordnance Survey maps and historical maps, all centred on your school.

Other new products for 2012 include our desktop timelines – smaller versions of our bestselling history friezes; a digital version of our European Union pack; a KS2 cross-curricular Olympics pack based around the Olympics site in Stratford; and some wonderful sets of MFL posters in both French and Spanish.

This year there are 6 Wilbur characters hiding in the catalogue, and by taking a note of where these are located, and entering our online “Where’s Wilbur?” competition, you can win £1000 worth of resources for your school.  The competition closes on 1^st April 2012.

Another new feature in this year’s catalogue is the inclusion of QR codes for selected products; just scan the codes with a smartphone to see videos that will allow you to see the product in lots more detail.

The Wildgoose website makes it incredibly simple for teachers to place an order online, track its progress and receive an invoice (invoices to UK schools only).  There are free resources available to download, and a regularly updated bargains section. If you have already looked through this catalogue, and noted the items that you require, simply go to our “Quick Order” section at the top of our homepage and list all of the items you require.  It couldn’t be simpler.  Visit www.wildgoose.ac today and see what we have to offer.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gunpowder, Treason & Plot

November 5^th will be here before we know it, and in many classrooms this becomes an opportunity for sparkly pictures and sparkly writing.

 But why not take the chance to help children learn a bit more about the history behind the day; most of us only have a hazy idea of the background and actual events that led to this date being commemorated. The Gunpowder Plot provides lots of information and images to help you.

 When they know more about the sequence of events the class can work together in groups to develop a dramatic scenes detailing the origins of the plot, its implementation and its discovery:

Group 1: The King tells the Catholics they cannot practise their religion, Catesby gathers his group, they plot, they buy gunpowder, and so on.

Group 2: The plotters dig in the cellars, Monteagle receives the letter warning him not to go to Parliament, Guy Fawkes decides to go ahead, the cellars are searched, Guy Fawkes is caught, the plotters flee.

Group 3: The plotters are caught, Guy Fawkes is tried, people (Catholics) look at (imaginary) heads on spikes and are afraid.

 Other activities:

• Investigate the history of Parliament and how it works today.
• Locate the Houses of Parliament on a map of London or Google Earth.
• Locate the Stuart period on a time line.
• Look at the variety of ways that the day is celebrated in the UK. Some towns have very specific traditions.
• Investigate the history of gunpowder and fireworks.
• What if the plot had not been discovered? What difference would it have made to British history?
• Make your own guy.

School’s Out! (well, nearly)

The end of term is nearly upon us and teachers can be forgiven for counting down the days. Pupils are tired and ready for a break; outings, sports days and report writing are all taking their toll on everyone’s reserves of energy; and it can be hard to imagine summoning up the enthusiasm to do it all again when September arrives.

 It’s undoubtedly the case that teaching is an increasingly demanding and challenging profession, and that its practitioners need the time to recharge their batteries before re-entering the fray. But for most teachers, the summer holidays involve hours of planning and preparation. The vast majority are not content just to ‘do it all again’. Their commitment to the job means that they continuously evaluate their teaching performance and feed their evaluations into their planning for the coming year. This is a continuous process, but the summer break allows them a period of reflection and a chance to prioritise particular areas of their professional development.

 It’s also true that the end of the summer term invariably leads to mixed emotions; whilst there are inevitably some pupils who will be waved away with a sigh of relief, there will be others who have made their teachers remember why they chose the profession in the first place, whether they have made great academic progress or simply grown in confidence. Many teachers will be receiving gifts at the end of term, but it will be the hugs, home-made cards and little notes of appreciation that will make the most impact.

 Of course, at Wildgoose, summer is a busy time for us, as we’ll be creating new resources and preparing our 2012 catalogues. Have a great summer, whatever your plans!

Walk to School Week

Walk to School Week 2011 is 16^th-20^th May. It’s a great opportunity for schools to focus on the health and social benefits of walking to school. Exercise, fresh air, pollution reduction and road safety are all key factors to highlight, and it’s also worth making links with the geography curriculum. Studies of the local area can include researching safe routes to school, calculating distances from home to school and completing traffic surveys. Looking at ideas to improve the local area can involve the local community, and leads naturally into using maps and aerial photographs to study what the area is like now. 

Information about Walk to School Week can be found at http://www.walktoschool.org.uk/  Wildgoose has a number of resources to help schools make the most of the week, including our Safe Routes to School photopack, which is also available in digital format. This pack features images of a  ’walking bus’, safe places to cross the road such as pelican crossings, school crossing patrols and also some possible hazards. We are also able to supply high-quality site-centred aerial photographs and maps that will enhance local area studies and make a great focus for displays. 

We think that Walk to School Week is a fantastic idea to raise awareness of the campaign and the issues it raises, and we hope that this year will be the biggest and best yet!

Wildgoose hit by Royal Wedding Fever

Wedding fever is likely to take over many classrooms in the run-up to the special day, 29^th April, when Prince William marries Kate Middleton. So we’ve created a range of resources to support the cross curricular topic of weddings in general and the royal wedding in particular. Offering real value for money, the Royal Wedding pack includes a range of red, white and blue decorations, balloons, streamers and bunting together with a large Union Jack to help get pupils and teachers into the party mood. The pack also includes a world map to help plan the honeymoon, an aerial photograph of the wedding procession route, a recording of the Wedding March, writing frames for a wedding invitation, a wedding menu and marriage certificate and is accompanied by a booklet of teaching ideas.

 We also have a number of other resources available including high quality dressing-up outfits for the bride and groom, books about weddings to suit all primary ages and even a specially-published book about the Royal Wedding. For children this will be the first major Royal Wedding they will have experienced, presenting a great learning opportunity and an excuse for a street party or other celebration.

The invitations have gone out (maybe ours got lost in the post?), so now’s the time to start planning the festivities!

Happy (Chinese) New Year

Chinese New Year falls on the 3^rd February this year and is the start of the Year of the Rabbit. Lots of schools will take the opportunity to celebrate the occasion and foster intercultural understanding. It’s a perfect festival for a mini topic, as traditionally preparations are made in the days running up to New Year’s Eve and celebrations continue for 15 days.

The date is determined by an ancient farming calendar and traditions include: thoroughly cleaning the house; adding lucky red decorations to rooms and around doorways; sealing doors and windows on New Year’s Eve to keep good luck in and bad luck out; giving children lucky red envelopes with money inside; lots of fireworks; visiting temples to pray for peace; street parades and dances, with dancers wearing elaborate lion and dragon costumes; lighting Chinese lanterns and sending them into the sky.

 Not surprisingly, it’s a popular festival with schools, as there is the potential to learn about another country, language, culture and religion, undertake a variety of art and craft activities, listen to music from a different tradition, practise and perfect dance routines, try some unfamiliar foods and establish links with the wider community. We love it too, and we have the perfect selection of resources to help you celebrate (some are even free!)