DESCRIPTION
Pupils at The Latymer School introduce their language backgrounds.
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Video Transcript
Student: I’m Kalshi and I speak Tamil as well, and I picked it up at home because my parents speak it sometimes.
Teacher: Lovely, thank you
Student: I’m Zara and I speak Bengali and I also learn French in School.
Teacher: Lovely
Student: My name’s Raisaa, I speak Urdu and English.
Teacher: OK
Student: My name’s Martha and I speak Hungarian at home because I lived in Hungary until I was four and then I moved over here.
Teacher: OK
Student: My name’s Cézanne, my language background is Turkish – my dad is Turkish Cypriot and my mum is English – and I also learnt German in school.
Teacher: Great
Student: My name’s Jade and I speak Creole at home because both my parents speak it, so I was brought up on it, and I do French as well at school.
Teacher: Great
Student: My name’s Jovanina, I speak Italian at home and I’m learning French in school.
Teacher: OK
Student: Hi, my name’s Silvia. I’m from a Cantonese background and I also learn German at school.
Student: Hi, my name’s Ben and I went to a Jewish junior school and so I learnt Hebrew for the first seven years of junior school.
Student: My name’s Drivni and I speak Gujarati. I learn it at home and I go to school and learn it as well.
Student: My name’s Zoe and I also speak French because my Mum’s French and I moved regularly from England to France as a child.
Teacher: OK
Student: Hi, my name’s Evangeline and my language background’s Tamil and I only kind of understand it, and I learnt German in school.
Teacher: OK, great
Student: Hi, my name’s Kin and I speak Cantonese and both my parents are Chinese.
Teacher: Great
Student: My name’s Merriam. I speak Turkish at home because both my parents are Turkish, and I also learn German at school.
Student: I only went to complementary school for a few years when I was younger, but I started attending because my cousins and my family also went. So that influenced me to want to go and learn there.
Teacher: Yes
Student: Although I could speak Turkish at home, because I attended an English school my reading and writing was poor, and my parents wanted my reading and writing to be good as well so that I could travel to Turkey and everything. So I started for that reason.
Teacher: OK
Student: I started going to complementary school because, like Merriam, my parents wanted me to learn to read and write as well as to speak. And then, as well I think they thought it was important that I met other people, because where we lived before we weren’t really part off the Italian community, and I think it was important for them that I met other people from my background.
Teacher: Right
Student: I’ve actually been to two complementary schools. I quit one when I finished doing my GCSE, and then the second one I stayed in although I didn’t actually continue learning the language. Because I pretty much knew it, I stayed in to further my education about my culture because the school doesn’t only teach the language, it teaches other aspects of my culture. It was more to do with things about bettering yourself, because the school tries to aid children in their physical and holistic development as well as mental...
Student (continued):...So not only did they teach us language, but they taught the other things in life that we need to learn in life that the people in our culture believe we should know, I mean, they teach us life skills; they teach us public speaking, we also have prayers where we are given time to reflect and things like that – we don’t necessarily have to be religious to do them, but its useful – and at a certain age we are given a certain responsibility to look after some other people, and we are taught how to be organised and how to take on this responsibility. So it’s a lot more than just language.
Student: I learnt French at school, and in terms of the preparation that I did for the Italian exams – because I took them early – it helped my motivation and stuff because I knew what the format was and I felt more confident in doing those exams.
Student: In complementary schools, there’s more of a cultural emphasis on teaching the language, for example, they often use culture as a link to languages – like special days and everything – and that differs from normal schools because its more just about the language than the culture. It’s much more integrated in complementary schools.
In complementary schools, because a lot of the kids already have a basis in their language, the relationship between students and teachers is more informal – sometimes teachers can be quite patronising if you don’t know something in the way they teach it to you. You are more comfortable learning more about your own language because they talk to you as if it’s just a discussion as opposed to teaching.
