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Narrator

Hello, and welcome to Literacy in languages. My name is Will Simpson, and I am a Japanese teacher at Kirrawee High School. What is literacy? What role does it play in our lives?

Literacy is the ability to understand and evaluate meaning through reading, writing, listening and speaking, viewing, and representing. Literacy skills are essential in order to be able to meaningfully participate in daily life, make sense of the world, and communicate effectively. Literacy is embedded in all New South Wales syllabus documents identified as learning across the curriculum content. This means it is the role of every teacher to support their students to develop literacy skills.

The best news for us as languages teachers is that we don't need to add literacy to our lessons. It's already there. What we do need to do is make the literacy explicit by talking about it with our students. It's also important that we incorporate links to literacy into our teaching and learning programs.

There are 3 elements which reflect aspects of literacy development. Speaking and listening-- incorporating interacting. Reading and viewing-- incorporating understanding texts. And writing-- incorporating creating texts and grammar. Due to its importance in literacy development vocabulary is included within and across all elements. As language teachers you will see a close alignment with our K to 10 syllabus objectives. Interacting, accessing and responding, composing.

Understanding the way languages work through learning another language is unique to our subject area as we explicitly teach systems of language, including types of texts, grammar, and vocabulary. The study of a language develops students' understanding of how languages work as systems enhancing literacy skills in the target language, as well as in a student's first language.

In the language classroom we discuss grammatical features, sentence construction, and the appropriateness of language for differing contexts. We encourage students to use the strategy of drawing comparisons with or highlighting differences from English in order to clarify certain aspects of the target language. We also look at things like language devices, register, tone, mood, and inferred meaning as these are all aspects of literacy in any language.

Here are some questions you can ask which support literacy. Where would you see or hear this text? What type of text does it look like or remind you of? How does the format of this text differ to other types of text? Can you identify differences in the way the target language and English language advertisements are constructed? Is this a global format?

What techniques does the writer or speaker use to engage the audience? What do you think is the purpose and context of this text? What clues are you using? What would you look for in an English text? Who is the audience? How would you compose a response which is more persuasive? How does the target language indicate a change of speakers in a written conversation? How does English do that? Which way do you prefer and why? What level of language does the writer or speaker use? Is it formal or informal? Do they use idioms? What is the effect?

By taking a modelled, guided, independent approach to developing literacy skills we're supporting our students to succeed. What do we mean by modelled, guided, independent? Let's look at an example.

When we read a text in the target language we need to deconstruct the text with students. Looking at the layout, the paragraphing, the vocabulary choices, the grammar, and so on. Here's a text about a bad man and boy who learns the importance of manners through interactions with animals. It is similar in purpose to something like Aesop's Fables.

The first step in the process is to work with the students to deconstruct the text. What makes the text effective? What language devices has the author used? This is just as effective with a text that isn't well written. Students can identify the things that don't sound right. You can use a scaffold like the one pictured here to guide the process.

Next, we move from modelled to guided. In this example, students use the scaffold to retell the story from the perspective of another character. This allows them to use the structures they have seen in the model text whilst using familiar vocabulary and a similar narrative structure.

The final step-- independent work-- asks the students to use what they have learned to write a narrative in Chinese in first or third person based on a fable that they know. This is also a great opportunity to engage with the cultural background of students in your class who may share stories that are unfamiliar to many students. This 3-step process seems very simple. But when the discussions in the first two phases are explicit in the use of metalanguage, it helps students clearly identify features of a text whilst comparing them to features of English language texts. It is an effective way of improving student writing in both the target language and in English.

Literacy competence is central to achievement in all areas of learning as students progress through their schooling and into the workforce and personal life. You will find that when you actively think about your teaching and learning programs you will realise there are many examples within the languages classroom for you to explicitly teach literacy through authentic and engaging activities.

Thank you so much for taking the time to watch this video today. You can learn more about literacy at our website.

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Transcript – Numeracy in languages (DOCX 15 KB)

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Narrator 1:

Hello, and welcome to Numeracy in languages. My name is Julia Zhu, and I am a teacher of Japanese at Baulkham Hills High School.

Narrator 2:

My name is Brindha Punneyalingam. I am a community language teacher of Tamil from Girraween Public School.

Narrator 1:

What is numeracy? What role does it play in our lives? In very simple terms, numeracy is the ability to use mathematical ideas effectively to participate in daily life and make sense of the world. Language learning provides a range of rich opportunities to engage our students in numeracy. And so it is essential that we support our students' learning outcomes by providing opportunities which are both age and stage-appropriate. Think about how you may have used numeracy in your life over the last week. Reading a timetable. Scheduling your weekend activities. Working out a good time to call a friend who lives overseas. Using a recipe. Measuring a room for new furniture. Or even calculating the tip you'd like to leave at a restaurant. What does it mean to be numerate? Students should be able to apply their knowledge across a range of contexts, including their personal, school, and work lives. Different curriculum contexts also have distinctive numeracy demands, so students need to be numerate across different subject areas. Being numerate involves mathematical knowledge, dispositions, and tools. In terms of their mathematical knowledge, do students appreciate the usefulness of mathematical knowledge in making decisions, supporting arguments, or challenging positions? In terms of their dispositions, are students confident in using their knowledge of mathematical concepts and skills? Are they willing to engage with tasks? Can they use their mathematical knowledge flexibly? In terms of their tools, can students use tools to communicate their thinking? For example, percentages, graphs, tables, fractions, and decimals.

The New South Wales Department of Education's numeracy policy states, all teachers in New South Wales government schools will develop students' numeracy skills and understandings across all key learning areas. Embedding numeracy into language programs may appear to be challenging. However, there are many ways that you can incorporate numeracy skills into your language teaching. Our syllabus documents support us to embed numeracy into our teaching and learning programs. Numeracy is embedded in all New South Wales syllabus documents, identified as learning across the curriculum content. To find the numeracy in our syllabuses, read the general capability statement at the start of the syllabus. Look for the numeracy icon next to syllabus content. Read the verbs in the syllabus content. As you will see in the syllabus, language learning provides such a range of opportunities for students to develop skills in numeracy. In our lessons, students use the target language to communicate in a range of real or simulated situations, using numbers for counting and measuring. They role-play shopping and eating-out situations in class, negotiating details such as size, quantity, and price, calculating tips, and recognizing savings. Students also use currency exchange rates to complete transactions while traveling. They use expressions of time to sequence events, and create calendars to share information about class routines and celebrations. They examine volume through using recipes and concepts of measurement. They describe animals, people, and objects through length, height, or shapes. Students also summarize and interpret data using tables, charts, or graphs. And, of course, they engage with the skills of addition, subtraction, division, and multiplication.

Narrator 2:

Look at this airport arrival screen in Europe. There is a range of numerical concepts that we need to process when looking at the screen, especially if we are waiting for passengers coming off a particular flight. How long until the flight lands? What time did the flight leave its departure point? How long was the flight? What is the time difference between Europe and the departure cities? Even just viewing a simple text like this, without applying the target language, we realised that we need to take our students beyond being able to count and do simple arithmetic in the target language. Instead, we need to show them the ways to apply mathematical concepts to a range of situations in the target language. The key to supporting students' numeracy is to ensure that the numeracy skills you teach are stage-appropriate. Don't fall into the trap of thinking that, because you are teaching numbers in Year 7 French or Japanese, that you are supporting students' numeracy skills. Instead, think about the numeracy skills that are required at Year 7 level, and align your language content to those skills.

Let's look at some examples of activities that can be used in Stage 4 language classes. Reading a menu in the target language and calculating costs, discounts, percentages. This can include calculating an appropriate tip, or 10% of takeaway items. In Japanese, you may want to include calculating costs based on sushi tray and plate colours, and comparing the prices in Australia and Japan. Creating budgets and calculating currency conversions for shopping in the target-language country. Using a map, students could produce an itinerary for travel, incorporating time zones and calculating distances. Providing students with a budget to work within means they will need to compare costs for accommodation, venues, and meals. Students can also work out travel times based on their travel speed. Using transport timetable and apps in the target language to understand and interpret information. Using the target language to summarize, analyse, and describe data represented in graphs. For example, students use a target language to conduct a survey of classmates to find out what they usually eat for breakfast, then construct and interpret bar graphs and sector graphs. Interpreting data from sporting events, such as World Cup tournaments or the Olympics, including calculating the percentages of medals won by each country or representing data through different tools.

Narrator 1:

Every teacher needs to embed numeracy into their teaching and learning programs. Numeracy skills can only be developed when numeracy is implemented across the curriculum and across a range of contexts. This involves a whole school focus, with numeracy skills explicitly taught through every syllabus and by every teacher. You will find that there are many opportunities within the languages classroom to embed numeracy activities, while implementing authentic and engaging lessons.

Narrator 2:

Thank you so much for taking the time to watch this video today. You can learn more about numeracy at our website.

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