MFLE
European Day of Languages
The European Day of Languages (EDL), a Council of Europe initiative, is held annually on 26 September to celebrate language and cultural diversity. The day was first celebrated in 2001, the European Year of Languages, and involves more people every year.
Winners of a European Award for Languages will be presented with their award on the day.
The EDL aims to:
- alert the public to the importance of language learning
- increase awareness and appreciation of all languages
- encourage lifelong language learning.
Ideas and resources you can try
- Check out the resources in the MFLE resource finder from CILT, Scottish CILT and the Council of Europe.
- Get all the teachers in your school from every subject to write the date on their board in at least one foreign language - it's amazing how many unexpected bits of minority languages staff know! Provide sheets for those who really don't know a foreign language.
- If you have a small budget and/or an amenable canteen, why not have a blind food-tasting competition where pupils can taste foods and guess which country they come from?
- Put up posters around the school that say 'hello' in languages from around the world, together with the matching flag (this can always be found by searching Google Images, for example 'flag Tanzania'). A huge alphabetical list of greetings is available on this greetings website.
- Ask members of staff from around the school if they would be willing to do a lunchtime 10-minute language class in a language they know. It’s always amazing for the pupils to see how talented their maths/business/sports teachers can be! Get pupils to sign up in MFL classes beforehand.
- Send an electronic postcard on the day from the Council of Europe website.
- Find ideas for other activities to do on the day by reading about past EDL events in schools.
- Why not put up these language-phrase posters (useful and entertaining at any time of the year)? Thanks to Lynne Horn of Tobermory High School for producing them, inspired by phrases from the Omniglot website.
- If you have a great idea, why not add it on the MFLE discussion forums?
Word file: European Day of Languages poster - Arabic phrase and translation (58 KB)