Introduction

Mrs Peduru and our experienced and dedicated team welcome you to the German Department.  We share 7 classrooms with the French and Spanish departments which all have interactive whiteboards.  We also have 2 smaller rooms which we can use for speaking practice.

KS5

2020 A2 results: 100% A*- C. 

We are lucky that small class sizes enable us to tailor the teaching to individual students’ needs and to offer more time and support with each student in lessons.  Over recent years students have taken various paths.  Some examples are International Business at the University of Portsmouth, Japanese at the University of Leeds and French, German and Dutch at the University of Sheffield. Others have been successful in getting onto very competitive courses at university and have found that having German A Level has differentiated them positively from other students. We follow the AQA German A Level course.  More information can be found here: https://www.aqa.org.uk/subjects/languages/as-and-a-level/german-7662

Our trips to Berlin and our work experience exchange programme have always been a highlight of German A Level at Maiden Erlegh.

KS4

2020 GCSE results: 98% Grades 9 - 4.

Each year an average of 80 students study the AQA German GCSE course.  For more information, please visit:
https://www.aqa.org.uk/subjects/languages/gcse/german-8668

Our scheme of work aims to equip students with good conversational German, a high competence in reading, writing and listening as well as a broad knowledge of significant festivals and traditions in the German-speaking world.  In the past we have complemented classroom learning with cultural trips to Lippstadt in Germany and also to The Museum of Leicester which has the largest collection of Expressionist German Art outside Germany.

Foundation

By the end of Foundation students will know a wide variety of topics such as free time activities, holidays, school life and talking all about yourself. Students will know how to form the past, present and futures tenses as well as knowing how to use modal verbs, time phrases and opinion phrases.

Assessment

Homework will be set once a week for foundation and KS4 and every lesson for KS5. Homework activities could be anything from a piece of writing, to learning vocabulary on Quizlet in preparation for a test to a reading comprehension. Students might also conduct research into a cultural topic or record themselves speaking in German.  Summative assessment happens 2 or 3 times per half term. There are regular vocabulary tests and we aim to test 2 skills every half term. This could be reading, writing, listening or speaking. 

Support

There are a number of ways in which we give extra support.  Whether it is a one-to-one appointment with a student, revision sessions practising exam techniques, or debates about topics such as stereotypes for the Gold and Silver programme, we will always do as much as possible to support students’ learning and to boost their confidence.  We also recommend online platforms such as Quizlet where classes can learn vocabulary in a fun and competitive way; Linguascope which is a firm favourite and allows students to learn vocabulary and hear it used in different contexts; BBC Bitesize which is for general revision and Languages Online which is especially good for grammar practice.  Each year we invite language assistants or volunteers from the University of Reading to provide extra speaking practice with students across all year groups. 

Extra-Curricular

House baking, singing and photography competitions have all proven to be very popular in the MFL department.  We have also organised a number of visits from former Maiden Erlegh language students to talk about their experiences of languages since leaving school and to inspire current students to seize opportunities.