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Introduction to LAwKS-3

The new version of our teaching resources is now available, including video versions of selected lessons and an expanded set of topics.

The benefits of learning a second language are numerous and extremely well-documented. They range from cognitive benefits that relate to memory and mental agility, to economic benefits such as access to foreign markets, to societal benefits such as enhanced abilities to see the world from other points of view. Nevertheless, modern language teaching in the UK in general and Northern Ireland in particular is in a deep crisis.

To address this crisis, researchers at Ulster University began the Language Awareness for Key Stage 3 (LAwKS-3) project. LAwKS-3 provides a complete set of resources that can be used by secondary schools across the UK, which will provide a language awareness module for pupils at Key Stage 3 (KS3). These resources are intended to fulfil the following objectives:

  • To provide core grammatical concepts that will support foreign language learning and English literacy, by helping pupils to recognise similarities among languages while understanding the reasons for their differences
  • To share insights that have been long established within the field of linguistics but whose potential benefits for language learners often remain unexploited, in order to provide empirical explanations for cross-linguistic differences that children might otherwise find arbitrary and puzzling.
  • To increase pupils’ engagement with modern language learning and help to reduce the perceived difficulty of these subjects.

The initial suite of resources was developed in collaboration with our partner school, St Patrick’s Academy, Dungannon. We are grateful for their support and for that of the other schools across the UK who helped pilot these materials.

Dr Christina Sevdali introduces the LAwKS-3 project

Use & Feedback

Each lesson consists of a PowerPoint presentation (available both with and without prerecorded voiceover), a handout sheet, and an activities sheet. Every PowerPoint has several places for teachers to pause for discussion and for activities. Many lessons also include a video, which provides a simple introduction to the topics discussed in the PowerPoint. Starting with Lesson 3, every second lesson also includes an assignment sheet that teachers can use to assess progress.

Our resources are freely availably for everyone to use. If you’re using our resources, though, we’d love to hear any feedback on them or answer any questions that you might have. Their development is ongoing, so any feedback can be incorporated in future versions. Please send comments and questions to Dr Christina Sevdali or Dr Morgan Macleod.

Note to teachers: One of our primary aims is to bring children’s knowledge of heritage languages into the classroom, and many of our activities involve asking children to describe languages that they may knowIf you find that not enough languages are represented in your classroom, though, your pupils can get information about different languages from other sources. One very useful resource is the free World Atlas of Language Structures. You might also invite your pupils to experiment with online translation services; please be aware, though, that these are not always completely accurate.

This work has been funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council. The resources are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Creative Commons License

Lessons

Lesson 1

Introducing LAwKS-3 (Language Awareness for Key Stage 3)

Lesson 2

Language Types, Language Families and Language Classification

Lesson 3

Writing Systems, Spelling and Writing, and Sign Language

Lesson 4

Parts of Speech, Part One: Nouns and Verbs — How Languages Describe the World

Lesson 5

Parts of Speech, Part Two: Pronouns, Adjectives, and Adverbs

Lesson 6

Parts of Speech, Part Three: Function Words — Connecting the Parts of a Sentence

Lesson 7

Case: How Languages Colour the Participants in a Sentence

Lesson 8

Number and Gender: More Properties of Nouns and Pronouns

Lesson 9

Determiners: Articles, Demonstratives, and Possessives

Lesson 10

Prepositions and Postpositions: Connecting Nouns to Other Nouns and to Verbs

Lesson 11

Tense and Aspect: Different Ways of Locating Events in Time

Lesson 12

Voice and Alignment: Identifying Participants in an Event

Lesson 13

Mood and Modals: How Languages Label Real and Unreal

Lesson 14

Agreement and Finiteness: Linking Subjects and Verbs

Lesson 15

Word Order and Language Typology: Finding Patterns in Language

Lesson 16

Complex Sentences, Part One: Types of Complex Sentences

Lesson 17

Complex Sentences, Part Two: Indirect Statements and Questions

Lesson 18

Language Variation: How Differences Produce Change

Lesson 19

Ways of Speaking: Saying the Same Things in Different Settings

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    Some examples in the lessons were generated with the assistance of Google Translate. All examples have been reviewed by the LAwKS-3 team, who take full responsibility for their content.