- February 15th, 2011
Europe and modern languages
- nickmorgan
- Comments: noneTags: modern languages
Lots of evidence this week that Scottish school students often develop high level skills with foreign languages and use those skills as modern young citizens of Europe.
The annual secondary schools speaking competition run by the Scottish European Educational Trust has completed its regional heats and reached the last stage. It requires that participants speak on the themes of why learning a European language should matter to young people, and how language learning could be made more enjoyable. Their summing up and vote of thanks must be in a different European language. Students from five Scottish high schools will be travelling to Brussels in March to compete in the Finals at Scotland House, and will also visit the European Parliament. King’s Park Secondary, St Thomas of Aquins High School, St Margaret’s (Aberdeen), Douglas Academy and Sandwick Junior High School are the finalists.
The European Commission runs a Young Translators contest each year, with a winner in each member state. In 2011 the winning UK student is from a Scottish school, Morrison’s Academy in Crieff, Perthshire.
And finally, a group of Scottish secondary students has just returned from participating in Euroscola, a European Commission initiative which encourages collaboration among young people from across the EU. They meet in Strasbourg and discuss real issues of the day, such as the environment, using their language skills to communicate views and summarise positions with clarity. A TESS piece ‘Scots find political feet on international stage’ reports on the latest round of Euroscola, and the Euroscola Online blog describes the 2011 Scottish experience.
Categories europe, international, modern languages
Find us on