SENTENCE BUILDERS THREAD:
Spoke to a fellow MFL teacher earlier and it got me thinking about SBs and how good ideas can often spawn lethal mutations and be poorly implemented.

For me and my department, SBs are our curriculum - they lay out what we want students to say and know. They allow our students to use beautiful language that goes beyond the national curriculum. They're a practical tool that help us live out the values of our curriculum.

I'm big on direct instruction. I want all kids to understand what's been taught. No guesswork. Comprehensible input. Manageable chunks. Practice. It works for me and it works for our students. The impact is evident when you come in our classrooms.
If that's not your thing, fine.

The reason they work so well for us is the implementation. You can have the best SB ever made but without faithful implementation, it's pretty much useless. This is where @gianfrancocont9 EPI and MARS EARS come in. But it's not a quick fix.

Implementing change takes time. Firstly it requires recognition and a case for change. It has to be modelled, reviewed, amended. Simply creating a SB and giving it to the students will have little to no impact. They're not a silver bullet.

I heard today about students being given SBs as a revision tool at the end of a module. This is not how to use them. This is simply a list of words to copy. But I'm sure the intentions are good.

My SBs are far from perfect. I'm constantly changing them. Sometimes I try and be too clever with them. I cram too much in with only 2 lessons a week in KS3.
Sometimes it becomes a competition to see where I can get a subjunctive with Y7 just because it looks good.

SBs are still relatively new and many will view them as a fad. Understandable given the constant change in tides in MFL and GCSE specs. But this is also down to a lack of understanding of how to use them well.

There is a lot of information about there about SBs and Conti methods but it's very hard to know where to start whether it be curriculum design, SB design or implementation.

@simograv @SisaSilvia4 @StefPianigiani @MrVinalesMFL @gianfrancocont9 (to name a few!) have posted lots of information and resources which are really useful. But Twitter often isn't the best place for explanations or nuanced discussion.

So with this in mind, if you want to know how to make it work, my DMs are open. From the idea stage to implementation, I'm happy to chat and support.

#mfltwitterati