Oxford German Network | Professional Development Consortium in Modern Foreign Languages (PDC in MFL)

PDC in MFL?

The Professional Development Consortium in Modern Foreign Languages (PDC in MFL) gives teachers access to eight key principles of teaching and learning languages, which are based on research evidence. The Consortium was set up by Professor Suzanne Graham from the University of Reading (Principal Investigator) and Professor Ernesto Macaro from the University of Oxford (Co-Investigator). It is made up of classroom language teachers, teacher trainers and researchers in England. All languages teachers, ITE tutors and other language professionals are welcome to join in the Consortium’s work by getting in touch and having a go at one or more of the following suggestions:

Explore the website and have a look at the resources and videos - use them as part of a departmental meeting, or teacher training session

Try using one or more of the principles in your language lessons or share them with your teacher trainees in skills sessions

Pilot our proposed alternative to the National Curriculum Levels – the Speaking and Writing and Listening and Reading Assessment Framework , for use in conjunction with the principles

Create a cluster of schools from your local area and invite us to come and run a short inset workshop for you

Start your own action research project using one or more of the principles – we can support you in doing this

Give us your feedback! We love to hear how the principles have had an impact on ITT courses, language teachers and their students

Professional Development Clusters for MFL Clusters

Clusters of MFL teachers are now meeting in Reading/North Hampshire, Portsmouth, Brighton, Cheltenham, Oxford, Walsall, Abingdon/South Oxfordshire and Birmingham.

The aim of the clusters is to:

Create time after school to meet with local MFL colleagues and share in your professional development
Revisit the PDC in MFL principles and use them as a basis for discussion
Plan with your local colleagues how to apply one specific principle (or more) in your teaching
Discuss and evaluate the outcomes together at subsequent meetings

Most meetings are 1.5 hours long, and take place 3-4 times per year, hosted by the teachers or teacher trainers involved in the cluster. The work of the PDC in MFL is used as a basis for discussion but the teachers and teacher trainers have autonomy over the clusters and decide what happens in each meeting.

If you want to get involved in one of these clusters, contact lucy.beharrell@education.ox.ac.uk before July 2013 and she will put you in touch with the cluster organiser.

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Professional Development Consortium in Modern Foreign Languages (PDC in MFL)

Professional Development Clusters for MFL Clusters