Community Engagement

Modern Languages and Cultures staff in Bangor University are a major contributor and source of resources, events and projects aiming to raise awareness of the importance of learning languages, and promote the uptake of Modern Foreign Languages across Wales.

We actively collaborate with schools and partners in the area to provide a range of services and opportunities for the community:

This information is aimed at those outside the University and looking for part-time (community) evening classes.

You will find information on this page on how to enrol on a language class as well as timetable details and further information about materials and textbooks.

Languages for All courses

The department of Modern Languages is one of the active partners in the delivery of Bangor University Summer School for year 12 students. Thanks to this programme , almost 50 pupils from schools and colleges throughout North Wales get to experience university life for themselves every year.

Each year, in collaboration with Routes into Languages Cymru, we recruit a team of language undergraduates to be Student Language Ambassadors (SLAs). Some SLAs are in their final year and have recently returned from their year abroad, others are in their second year and currently preparing to go abroad to work or study. All are enthusiastic about language learning, and are keen to share their experiences with pupils in local schools. Modern Languages and Cultures staff play an active role in the training sessions, and materials and useful web links are available on the Routes into Languages Cymru website. SLAs also have the opportunity to take part in other activities organised by schools or Routes into Languages Cymru (see below). If you would like to know more about this scheme, please complete this Language Ambassador booking form for your school.

We have a high demand for Student Language Ambassadors (SLA) visits, and every year Bangor SLAs visit many schools in north Wales, reaching a significant number of pupils. A school visit may involve one or more of the following:

A talk about careers and languages to highlight the benefits of studying a language, and raise awareness of potential career paths.
Language taster sessions.
Oral revision sessions.
Talks about studying languages at university, including the experience of starting a new language.
Talks to share information about spending time abroad, either studying or on work experience.
“We really enjoyed having the students this year thank you! They were well prepared and well-presented, and the pupils responded well to them. They delivered the content in an interesting and lively way and we were very pleased with how each visit went.”

If you would like to know more about this scheme, please complete this Language Ambassador booking form for your school.

Foreign students who are spending part of their course in Bangor, are offered the opportunity to take an assessed module which enables them to spend four hours per week working as Foreign Language Assistants (FLAs). Most FLAs work in local schools, but some also work in the Department of Modern Languages and Cultures itself, allowing undergraduates to have additional contact time with native speakers.

FLAs also have the opportunity to visit schools to offer GCSE, AS and A2 oral revision sessions, and to work with SLAs as part of the school visits programme. Before beginning their work in schools FLAs are trained, and materials and useful web links are provided. If you would like to know more about this scheme, please contact Dr Jonathan Ervine.

Follow our Language Ambassadors around the globe as they embark on their third year abroad. Tasked with writing blogs on specific topics from the GCSE exam specification, the students share personal highlights and cultural flavours from across Europe and beyond.

LingoMap is the successor to the award-winning Routes into Languages ‘Adopt a Class’ scheme. Redesigned to make use of new technologies, we aim to reach a wider classroom audience across Wales. LingoMap also provides a visual and interactive platform to show pupils the global opportunities available to them through studying languages.

For further information about this and other schemes, please visit the Routes Into Languages website.

Both SLAs and FLAs are involved in revision sessions for pupils who are preparing for their modern language GCSE, AS and A level oral exams. Students have helped pupils, for example, with pronunciation, vocabulary building, presentation skills, effective handling of questions, and have even taken on the role of examiner in mock exams.

“Thank you for arranging the session with Anna – it was a huge benefit to the pupils, especially as she had done the exam herself, and knows exactly what the requirements are. Very professional!”

If you would like to know more about this scheme, please complete this Language Ambassador booking form for your school.

We are able - in collaboration with Routes into Languages Cymru, Coleg Cymraeg Cenedlaethol, and Wales Think German Network - to offer Film and Literature Masterclasses for AS and A level students and teachers. Every year these are attended by teachers and students of French, German and Spanish from schools in north Wales. They offer an opportunity for the students, who had watched the film or read the book before coming to Bangor, to widen their understanding of the item studied and extend their vocabulary. Throughout these sessions, Bangor University language students are available to assist with the workshops and talk about their experience of studying languages and visiting other countries.

‘The experience was great and I wouldn’t hesitate coming again.’
‘I saw different aspects of the film which I hadn’t seen before, and I picked up vocabulary which I wouldn’t normally know’.

For further information about our Masterclasses, please visit the Routes Into Languages website.

Bangor University Modern Languages and Cultures PhD students prepared a series of 30-minute videos funded by CADARN, and working in partnership with Routes into Languages Cymru and the Centre for Galician Studies in Wales.

These Panopto presentations analyse the key topics of some of the new WJEC A level specifications films and books, such as main themes and characters, aimed to strengthen the pupils’ comprehension and generate further discussion and thought. Additionally, other key films and books studied by Bangor University students are also being presented as useful tools to develop analytical thinking.

The Modern Languages and Cultures team at Bangor University is an active partner in the Routes into Languages Cymru programme, and Rubén Chapela, the Routes into Languages Cymru coordinator in the north is based in the school. This programme works alongside Welsh Government’s Global Future strategy. As well as some of the activities already mentioned above, collaboration with Routes into Languages Cymru has offered Bangor SLAs the opportunity to be involved in the following activities and events:

GwE Pupil Language Ambassador Training:

Pupil Language Ambassadors (PLAs) are school pupils in year 8 and 9, who have been recruited by their teachers (following an application process) and trained by Routes Cymru. Bangor University organises every year the training for the PLAs in GwE, the consortium of 6 local authorities in the north of Wales. These pupils take a key role within their school by promoting the value of Modern Foreign language learning. The main aim is to increase the take-up of languages amongst school pupils. Their input is extremely valuable, and their messages will enthuse school pupils and encourage them to think more positively about learning languages. Workshops are often delivered by partners such as the Spanish Embassy Education Office, Goethe Institut, Institut Français or Globe from Home, and the event is sponsored by British Council Wales and supported by our Student Language Ambassadors.

Bangor University Language Days:

These large events have often high profile involvement from partners such as GwE, British Council Wales, Careers Wales, Bangor Confucius Institute, Goethe Institut, Institut Français, Centre of Sign-Sight-Sound, Airbus, WJEC, Sanako UK, Signature Leather, the Centre for Galician Studies in Wales, MFL Student Mentoring, local poets and other Bangor University schools. Typically, primary and secondary school pupils attending the events have the opportunity to listen to talks about languages in the workplace, hear languages students talk about their year abroad, try taster lessons in languages such as Mandarin Chinese or Galician, practise the languages they are already learning, and participate in cultural activities with a language theme (e.g. dancing, language games, etc.).

Competitions:

The Spelling Bee is an annual national competition, which allows Year 7 pupils in schools through Wales to practise and improve their vocabulary, spelling and memory skills in another language (French, Spanish, German and Welsh second language). Pupils learn fifty words for the first stage of the competition and a further fifty words are added at each subsequent stage. In one minute, pupils must correctly spell as many words as possible. The words are given in Welsh or English, and pupils must translate it into the target language, then spell it out correctly using the target language alphabet.

Westbourne School

The Mother Tongue Other Tongue competition is open to primary and secondary school pupils, and it runs yearly. For further information please visit the Routes Into Languages website.

Follow our social media! Twitter: @routescymru; Facebook

Resource development

The following language resources include materials contributed by Modern Languages and Cultures staff and/or students:

Modern Languages Audit Tool for School Governors: Routes into Languages Cymru is working in partnership with Governors Cymru to support governing bodies to meet the growing challenges and demands that they face in the delivery of Modern Languages. Find our resources for School Governors here.
Career Flyers and Language Cards: These resources have proven to be very popular and can be useful at school events such as parent/teacher evenings. Both resources will hopefully be useful to modern languages departments to raise the profile and visibility of languages at your school.
Primary Toolkit: To support the delivery of International Languages in the New Curriculum for Wales, Routes into Languages Cymru is currently developing a Primary Toolkit to support primary teachers with language delivery.
Film resources: Including printable / downloadable lists of film vocabulary in French / Ffrangeg, German / Almaeneg and Spanish / Sbaeneg.
Monuments and memorials in Germany: These worksheets have been designed to accompany a workshop on monuments and memorials in Germany. The first sheet provides vocabulary and useful quotations, which can be discussed in class as part of a preliminary session on the role of monuments. The following sheets are intended to be used for group work, and as a starting point for encouraging students to explore specific events, personalities and issues in recent German history.
Learn a language, live abroad! Broaden your horizons: This is a set of clips produced by Routes into Languages Cymru to promote the study of languages. To access them and other related videos, please visit our YouTube channel.
Botwm y Byd: A multi-disciplinary project, including a website, which provides online resources through the medium of Welsh for secondary school and university students studying Modern Languages, International Politics and Media.

The Modern Foreign Languages Student Mentoring Scheme aims to combat the ‘serious decline’ in the take up of modern foreign languages by school pupils in Wales.

It is currently the major intervention in Wales to increase the take up and attainment of modern languages at secondary schools across the country. It is funded by the Welsh Government as part of its Global Futures strategy aimed at supporting modern languages in schools. Under the scheme, modern foreign language (MFL) undergraduates at Cardiff, Swansea, Bangor and Aberystwyth universities are recruited and trained as student mentors and are partnered with pupils in local schools.

To know more about this scheme, please visit our website, or follow our social media! Twitter: @MFLMentoring; Instagram.