The School Modern Foreign Languages Department: Cultural, Historical and Social Practices in Student Teacher Education

Abstract

The MFL faculty comprised departments in French, German and Spanish. These departments were situated together on both school sites. There were six members of staff working with the student teachers during the research year with two student teachers in both the first and second teaching practices. A modern foreign language was taught as a compulsory subject in the lower school (11–13 year old pupils) and also as an examination subject in the upper school (14–16 year old pupils). Post 16 students could opt to take a modern foreign language course in French and/or German at Advanced level. (For a discussion of the teaching and studying of MFL, see Byram (2013), Field (2013), Johnson (2008) and Hinkel (2013).)