The results are in and we are delighted to announce that 18,125 children and young people and 802 adults across the North East participated in the Festival of Languages this year. This doesn’t include those that accessed the many free resources and activities which didn’t require registration.
In total there were:
- 381 school registrations for activities
- 98 live sessions were delivered during March
- 156 activities were provided free to schools and communities in the region
- 4341 children and 96 adults took part in 87 language taster sessions delivered by Durham and Newcastle Universities in European and world languages, Becoming Visible (British Sign Language) and community teachers (South Asian languages)
- 1933 children and young people took part in the webinar on languages and careers
- 2070 children sang and made videos of the Festival Song, I am a small part of the world
- 534 children took part in the Languages Open Doors poster competition
- 420 children partipated in poetry writing for the Mother Tongue Other Tongue project
We also offered a range of pre-recorded activities that people could access anytime in March:
- 6150 children accessed the Lingotot workshops for young children aged 3-11 in 5 different languages
- 1080 children and young people participated in French puppet shows for children aged 5-11
- 1620 participated in GemArts world languages and culture workshops
- 674 took part in the Japan Society’s ‘Fun with Japanese‘ taster sessions
- 396 children and young people accessed in Newcastle University’s Ancient Stories in Stone resources and activities for KS2-4
Activities that people could access anytime without registration, included language themed podcast, webinars, quizzes, story telling, workshops and language challenge apps, as well as education resources.
The aims of the Festival
The Festival involves a wide range of local, regional and national partners to provide free activities which:
- Highlight and celebrate diversity of languages and cultures in the City/region
- Provide a wide range of fun, free opportunities to learn something new about another language or culture
- Engage schools who are not yet involved, reaches children and young people who wouldn’t usually access these activities
- Encourage language learning and understanding of diverse cultures
Benefits of language learning for young people
For children and young people, the benefits include having a wider experience of language learning with different and engaging people and new resources, in and outside school and developing wider global perspectives and understanding.
We hope to encourage young people to continue with learning languages as this:
- Strengthens intercultural awareness and understanding diversity
- Raises aspirations and builds confidence
- Improves communication/interpersonal skills,
- Improves initiative and decision-making
- Enhances adaptability, resilience, flexibility, the ability to work cross-culturally and build lasting relationships
- Can lead to higher levels of education attainment across the board
- Opens up opportunities to travel and make new friends and connections
- Influences positive education and life choices, impacting on future mobility and career opportunities
We want your feedback
We are asking people who took part to answer a few short questions in an online survey by 6th May, to help us understand what people got involved in, what they enjoyed and learned and what they may like to see in future and to help us to continue to provide all activities for free.
Click here to complete the online survey
Thank you for your feedback and if you would like to enter our free prize draw for £50 (drawn on 9th May) you simply need to provide your email address when you complete the survey.
Acknowledgements
Thank you to all the partners who provided free events, activities and resources for this year’s Festival, to the Festival Task Group who co-ordinated the event and to all those who participated.